A defence lawyer for accused killer Cory Vallee suggested Friday that a former United Nations gangster was testifying against his client because the witness was broke and deeply in debt.
Mike Tammen grilled the man, who can only be identified as C due to a publication ban, about owing hundreds of thousands with no way to pay it back when he agreed to co-operate with the police last year.
One of the people C owed cash to was Vallee, who had given C $100,000 for safekeeping after he was arrested and charged with conspiracy to kill the Bacon brothers and the first-degree murder of their friend Kevin LeClair.
C has told B.C. Supreme Court Justice Janice Dillon that Vallee was a hired hitman brought in by the UN gang to kill the notorious siblings and their Red Scorpion associates.
And C testified earlier that Vallee confessed his role in the LeClair murder within a week of the fatal shooting on Feb. 6, 2009.
Tammen asked C whether he would have to repay Vallee the money if the accused killer were convicted in the LeClair murder.
“If he is doing life in prison, for instance for killing Kevin LeClair, you agree, he has got no ability to try and collect his debt from you?” Tammen asked.
C agreed.
“If Cory Vallee was acquitted, found not guilty of all criminal offences, he might — might — be able to make efforts to collect his money from you, right?” Tammen said.
“I think that would be a tough case,” C replied.
He agreed though that Vallee “could at least ask” for the money.
Tammen noted that C had amassed other debt as well prior to getting caught with 80,000 fentanyl pills and a gun in January 2016 and eventually agreeing to become a Crown witness.
The trial has already heard that C signed agreements with the RCMP to receive $400,000 for helping collect evidence in two investigations.
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“Just before you were arrested, in the middle of January 2016, from your perspective, crime was no longer paying all that well,” Tammen asked.
C agreed that he could no longer make big money in the drug trade. At his peak, he was making about $500,000 a year, he testified.
In his good years, the money gave him a comfortable life, with time for snowboarding, golf and parties, C also agreed.
“You could afford at these parties to bring in escorts or prostitutes or visit them at massage parlours, right?” Asked Tammen.
“Right,” C replied.
Cory Vallee in photos issued by police in 2011
Tammen also asked C about a presentation of evidence made to him by police in January 2016 that included statements made by other former UN members to police.
He suggested police influenced C to provide evidence specifically about Vallee and fugitive UN leader Conor D’Monte, who has been on the run since 2011.
“At one point, they told you that Conor D’Monte and Cory Vallee were the two guys to blame for all the violence,” Tammen said.
“I don’t recall,” C said.
C agreed, however, that police referred to Vallee as particularly violent, calling him an enforcer and a contract killer.
“The police … described Cory Vallee as a psycho and a psychopath. Do you remember that?”
“Yes,” said C.
C also knew police had a surveillance video of him from a Burnaby McDonald’s near where Jonathan Barber was shot to death on May 9, 2008. At the time, Barber was driving a vehicle owned by the Bacons.
“They told you that that (vide0) put you in what they called the shooter crowd for the Barber homicide,” Tammen said.
Police told him there was evidence of his role in the conspiracy to murder Barber, C said.
The trial continues.
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