Man who triggered police race data project charged with defrauding employer

http://ottawasun.com/news/local-news/ottawa-man-who-prompted-police-race-data-project-charged-with-fraud/wcm/05f066e3-a809-4707-bed3-a43ac3c5a813


Shaamini Yogaretnam

Chad Aiken participates in the Violence 360 event held at Shopify HQ on Elgin Street earlier this year.Wayne Cuddington / Postmedia

An Ottawa man who has become the face of the fight against Ottawa police racial profiling has been charged with defrauding his former employer of thousands of dollars in automobile insurance in an alleged rental car scheme involving two others, this newspaper has learned.

Chad Aiken, who previously worked at Avis car rental, has been charged with fraud, conspiracy to commit fraud and fraudulent concealment.

Aiken, 31, was just a teenager when he was pulled over in 2005 by Ottawa police in a traffic stop. He filed a human rights complaint against the force alleging that he was pulled over simply for driving a Mercedes while being black. The settlement of that complaint led to Ottawa police conducting a two-year collection of race data on drivers stopped by officers. That study found that black and Middle Eastern drivers were disproportionately stopped by local police.

The criminal charges against Aiken date back to December 2017. Investigators allege that over the course of a month, he and two others — Fercule Musanintore, 57, and her son Spike Lee Mwenisi Mugisha, 24 — conspired to commit fraud against an Avis location at 2150 Robertson Rd. in Bells Corners by agreeing to fraudulently obtain insurance for one of the company’s vehicles.

Musanintore has also been charged with intentionally attempting to mislead police and divert suspicion by reporting a fake collision. She was also charged with fraud and conspiracy to commit fraud. Police also criminally charged her son, Mugisha, with fraud and conspiracy and with the highway traffic offence of failing to report a collision.

Along with Aiken, Mugisha, too, has been charged with fraudulent concealment for allegedly trying to pass off an Enterprise rental vehicle as one owned by Avis. Like Aiken, Mugisha previously worked in the car rental industry, though not at Avis.

The exact motivation for the alleged scheme isn’t known, and details of the police case have not yet been made public but charges against the trio were laid by Ottawa police in early March 2018.

That same month Aiken spoke in Ottawa on a provincial tour highlighting his campaign to hold police accountable for racial profiling.

Aiken said he estimated he had been stopped by police around 50 times, starting when he was around 11 or 12.

“At first being stopped by police seemed kind of cool — kids at school thought so,” he said in an interview before his talk, “but after a while, it was no longer cool”.

Aiken said it has got to the stage where he refuses to drive at night unless he absolutely has to.

“There’s a 90 per cent chance I will be stopped if I go out,” he said.

At the time, Aiken told the audience: “I have no criminal record. I have a degree (from Carleton University). I have children and a house in the suburbs, which is policed by the Ontario Provincial Police, by the way — and I’ve never been stopped by them.”

None of the charges against the three, who have no criminal records, has been tested in court.

Aiken and Mugisha are next scheduled to appear in court in June.

Musanintore is next scheduled to make a court appearance on June 26 when court records indicate she is expected to take a plea.

Musanintore’s LinkedIn profile lists her as an accountant at the Supreme Court of Canada. A directory of all federal public servants lists her as an acquisitions and serials coordinator for the high court.

Ottawa police continue to investigate the case and say more charges could be laid.

syogaretnam@postmedia.com

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Ottawa MD suspended after borrowing $10,000 from elderly patient

http://ottawasun.com/news/local-news/ottawa-doctor-suspended-after-borrowing-10000-from-elderly-patient/wcm/300b785d-1b7b-43da-b3a9-be7d5cf8478b

An Ottawa doctor stepped over the line when he borrowed $10,000 from an elderly patient suspected of having dementia to pay his office rent, says the provincial body that regulates physicians. 

The discipline committee of the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario has found that Dr. Peter Diarmuid Davison committed an act of professional misconduct and suspended him for three months as of May 2.

In the summer  of 2016, Davison, a family doctor who was licensed to practice in 1975, found himself in “acute financial difficulties, both of a professional and personal nature,” according to a report from the discipline committee.

Davison was having problems paying his office rent. He turned to a close friend, who couldn’t help. He asked his landlord to come to a solution, but the landlord only partially agreed and Davison needed some money to get back into his office.

“Given his age and stage of his career, he was also deeply embarrassed by the circumstances,” said the report. “Aside from his wife and close friend, he did not share details of his financial difficulties with other family members, including his children, nor did he seek support from additional friends and family.”

Davison turned to a man in his 90s who had been patient since the 1990s.

The committee’s report said a geriatric nurse had evaluated the man in 2015, and found “suspected dementia” and “probable mixed mild dementia.” Davison had also conducted an assessment of the patient in support of the man’s application for admission into a long-term care home, and concluded that the patient needed to have his medication dispensed more frequently because the patient “forgets to take his medications” and was sometimes late for refills by up to a month.

Davison visited the patient in his condo, where the man lived alone, and asked for financial help. No one else was present.

The patient gave Davison a cheque for $10,000. Davison told the patient he would pay him back when he could and cashed the cheque on July 28, 2016.

In August, Davison again visited the patient’s condo and told him that he could not yet repay the money, but was expecting a cheque from OHIP in mid-August.

On Sept. 1, 2016, the college received a complaint from a close friend of the patient. Davison was verbally notified of the complaint on Sept. 12 and in writing on Sept. 19. On Sept. 20, he received the OHIP payment and gave the patient a $10,000 cheque, dated that day, along with a thank-you card. The cheque was cashed Sept 22.

A college investigator spoke to the patient in November 2016. When the investigator asked if the cheque had been deposited, the patient replied that far as he was concerned, the matter was closed.

On Oct. 31, Davison told the college that he was under considerable stress when he approached the patient. While he believed at the time that he and the patient were on equal footing and the patient was not a vulnerable person, he told the college he appreciated that he put the man in a difficult position and apologized to him. 

Davison had no prior history of any discipline proceeding and co-operated with the investigation, according to the College, which regulates medicine, including issuing the certificates of registration that allow doctors to practise medicine.

The discipline committee also ordered Davison to take instruction in medical ethics within six months at his own expense, to appear before the panel to be reprimanded and to pay the $5,500 to cover the cost of the disciplinary proceeding within 30 days.

Davison could not be reached for comment. A message on the answering machine at his office on McCarthy Road said only that the office would be closed for the month of May, and advised patients in need of urgent care  to visit a walk-in clinic or emergency room.

jlaucius@postmedia.com