PARASIRIS ANGRY AT POLICE

'They Made Up Evidence' Laval Cops Still Maintain That He Is Linked To Drugs

Freshly acquitted of first-degree murder in the killing of a Laval
police officer, Basil Parasiris expressed more anger yesterday than
relief over the verdict.

Anger, because the high-profile trial left him unjustly branded as a
drug trafficker, he told The Gazette.

In a brief interview, the 42-year-old former businessman accused the
police of "making up" evidence that fingers him as part of a
cocaine-trafficking ring.

The suspicion cast on him was baseless, and the cops' effort before
the trial to pin the drug rap on him is returning now to "stab them
in the back," Parasiris said by phone from suburban Brossard.

"It didn't affect the jury ... but this was (something that affected)
the public opinion, you know?" Nonsense, a Laval police spokesperson
retorted after being told what Parasiris had said.

If he's upset about being linked to drugs, he has only himself to
blame, said Constable Nathalie Lorrain.

"It's certain that, for us, yes, he was mixed up in it, and we still
believe so." Nine Laval police officers were conducting a drug raid
when they stormed Parasiris's home on Rimouski Crescent in Brossard
before dawn on March 2, 2007.

The raid ended quickly and bloodily. Thinking his home had been
invaded by criminals, from the door of his upstairs bedroom Parasiris
drew a gun and opened fire.

The four bullets that left his licensed .357 magnum revolver hit
their mark. One of the officers, Constable Daniel Tessier, was
killed, and another, Stephane Forbes, was hit in the arm.

In the 30-second shootout, Parasiris's wife, Penny Gounis, was also
hit in the arm as she cowered in the bedroom closet.

The couple's two children, age 15 and 7, were in their own bedrooms
and, though panicked and traumatized, were not physically harmed.

During the murder trial, jurors were never told why the police had
come to the house in the first place.

In a decision rendered before they began hearing evidence, Superior
Court Justice Guy Cournoyer ruled the warrant that allowed the police
to conduct the raid was a violation of Parasiris's rights and was
inadmissable in court.

To get it, police had tried to link the businessman to a small
Chomedey drug ring involving his godson, Emmanuel Mavroudis, and
several other Laval men.

As part of a series of drug raids that morning, the cops got
permission to use "dynamic entry" to get into Parasiris's home and
collect evidence. With a battering ram, they knocked down his front
door and stormed the house under the cover of darkness.

The extraordinary technique was meant to surprise the suspect and
prevent any drugs from being disposed of before the cops could get to them.

Although police say a small quantity of cocaine was eventually found
in the house after the raid, they were disappointed not to uncover
what they had really come for: a much larger stash of coke they
believed Parasiris had been intending to traffic.

Instead, the cops walked away with 13 cellphones, four pagers and
eight pages of documents that, according to a Surete du Quebec
investigator who testified during Parasiris's bail hearing in May
2007, looked like the accounts of a drug trafficker.

During that bail hearing, the same investigator testified that, under
interrogation, Parasiris had admitted he'd been involved in drug
trafficking for three years as a way to get out of debt.

Five other men were arrested in the May 2007 raids, and each pleaded
guilty and was convicted of a variety of charges, including cocaine
possession (a total of one kilo was seized) and illegal arms
possession, said Lorrain, the Laval police official.

Some of the men were subsequently arrested after they broke
conditions of their release, she added.

The raids capped a nine-month investigation that teamed undercover
officers with informants to build a solid case, enough to get a
warrant and go after Parasiris, the eldest of the suspects, she added.

"We didn't go in blind," Lorrain said. "If we targeted Mr. Parasiris,
too, it was because we had enough material, enough proof, to lead us
to believe that he was mixed up in that thing." Asked specifically if
the public has the right impression of Parasiris now - namely, that
he was a drug dealer - she replied: "For us, yes, definitely, because
otherwise we would never have gone to his house that day." The jury
never got to hear any of the police accounts connecting Parasiris to
the drug trade.

Because of Cournoyer's decision, the Laval police officers who
testified in the murder trial were cautioned against using terms like
"drug raid" or "dynamic entry" or even identifying themselves as
members of the force's drug squad.

After the jurors left to consider their verdict last week, The
Gazette recapitulated many of the details of the case, including the
ones about suspicions about drugs that had already been published
before the trial.

The drug news displeased Parasiris, who now blames the cops for
"leaking" trumped-up evidence he believes harmed his reputation.

"Me, I didn't f---ing leak nothing to nobody, but them, they went and
leaked out stuff that nobody knew except the Laval cops - that's why
I'm not happy about it," Parasiris said in a four-minute conversation
with The Gazette.

He was speaking from his father George's home on Rubens Crescent in
Brossard, a few blocks from the scene of the March 2007 raid.

After first refusing to be interviewed, Parasiris said he was upset
that the details about the drug investigation came out.

"I'm really angry, because I've been reading The Gazette, and that
was not cool at all. It was stuff that came straight from the Laval
cops . that nobody knew," he said. "The only place you could have got
it was from the Laval cops or from our lawyers.

"The way (the police) were following those (other suspects) and
everything - that's their way (of portraying events), they told them
what they thought. ... It was stuff that wasn't in court. It didn't
affect the jury - no, it was after the jury (was sequestered). But
this was (something that affected) the public opinion, you know?" He
added: "We didn't make nothing up. The Laval cops did. But anyways,
(with the acquittal) it's stabbing them in the back now, so that's
it." Although Parasiris is a free man now, his legal troubles aren't
over. He still faces eight weapons-related charges, including the
illegal possession of three firearms found in his home the morning of
the raid. His lawyers have indicated Parasiris will plead guilty to
those charges.

The trial and its aftermath have been costly. Since the raid over a
year ago, Parasiris has spent virtually all his money defending
himself, his brother Nick told The Gazette after his acquittal.

Last July, according to his former business partner, Wayne Blunt,
Parasiris left the company they co-owned in Dorval, an indoor
virtual-driving range called Golf-O-Max where people practise their
swings. The pair also ran Club Avenue, a bar in the same building.

In November, Parasiris sold his Brossard house - the same one the
police had stormed - for $477,500, evaluation records at the city of
Longueuil show. Parasiris and his family had lived there since 2004.

On his lawyers' advice, Parasiris said, he has been turning down
media requests for interviews since his acquittal Friday, but might
have more to say "in a month, maybe," if the Crown decides not to
appeal the verdict.

No problem, the Laval police retorted. They might do the same.

"There are a lot of things we know about and haven't been able to say
officially," Lorrain said. "Even if there's no appeal, perhaps in 30
days we'll decide to come out with some more news."