Francois Paulhus, a former executive of engineering firm Genivar (now WSP Canada), has pleaded guilty in the Court of Quebec to conspiring to rig bids for City of Gatineau infrastructure contracts, and was sentenced to pay a $25,000 fine, in addition to a 15% surcharge on that amount.
This is the fifth guilty plea in a case that began after the Competition Bureau uncovered evidence of bid-rigging on infrastructure contracts awarded by Gatineau between 2004 and 2008. The bid-rigging targeted a total of 21 contracts and defrauded the municipality out of an estimated $1.8 million.
Mr. Paulhus admitted that he had participated in the scheme while he was a regional director at Genivar in 2004. He conspired with executives from other engineering firms to fix bid prices in order to divide Gatineau infrastructure contracts among their respective firms.
Charges were laid against Mr. Paulhus in June 2021. Charges were previously laid against four other co-conspirators in June 2018. All four of those accused also pleaded guilty for their respective roles in the scheme. They received conditional sentences totalling five years and 11 months, and court-ordered community service totalling 260 hours.
