Alberta charges chief in cigarette seizure
CBC News | Posted: April 15, 2011 7:34 PM | Last Updated: April 15, 2011
The Alberta Gaming and Liquor Commission has charged Chief Carolyn Buffalo of the Montana Cree First Nation at Hobbema, Alta., with possessing and storing 16 million contraband cigarettes.
Police seized the cigarettes from a Quonset on the reserve Jan. 5.
Initially investigators estimated the number of cigarettes at 14 million, but said a more thorough count revealed 16 million cigarettes that cost the province $3 million in lost tax revenue.
Buffalo and two men are charged under the Tobacco Tax Act with storing tobacco products not marked for legal sale in Alberta and for possessing more than 1,000 cigarettes.
The two men and another man face charges for not being licensed to import tobacco into the province for resale.
The maximum penalties include $20,000 fines, six-month prison terms or both. If convicted, individuals could also receive an additional fine of up to three times the amount of tax avoided.
Many band members and most band councillors were angered when the news of the seizure broke.
Buffalo did not tell them about the deal with Rainbow Tobacco, a company owned and operated by the Mohawks of Kahnawake, Que., they said.
Buffalo was working to set up a company to distribute the cigarettes, which would have provided 100 new jobs on a reserve with 85 per cent unemployment, she said.