Ex-citizenship judge jailed for illegally revealing citizenship exams

Another bad political appointee but fortunately caught out:

A retired citizenship judge has become the first in Canada to be imprisoned for breach of trust after illegally providing copies of citizenship exams.

Family members wept as Philip Gaynor, 71, was led away in handcuffs Wednesday following Ontario Court Justice Harvey Brownstone’s sentence of three years. He said Gaynor’s “reprehensible” and “appalling” actions went “straight to the heart of the integrity of Canada’s immigration system” and potentially tarnished new Canadians’ perception of the judiciary.

“In my 20 years on the bench, I have never had the misfortune to deal with something like this,” he said.

While still a citizenship judge in February 2012, Gaynor began stealing exam papers and providing them to Scarborough immigration consultant Li Ling, 49, whom he had meet in 2007, and her assistant Mo Sui Zhun, 58. Brownstone said this continued even after Gaynor’s retirement in September 2012, lasting until about April 2013. Li and Mo were charged with possession of stolen property last year. The status of those charges is unclear.

The papers were then given to citizenship applicants who went through Li’s consulting business. The court heard that Gaynor had engaged in a “social” and later “personal” relationship with Li — inappropriate given his position, said Brownstone — and was paid in cash for the papers. It is unclear how many applicants benefitted from this arrangement.

… A longtime resident of Durham Region, Gaynor was appointed a citizenship judge in 2006 by the Conservative government and reappointed to another three-year term in 2009.

The court heard he had been a volunteer on the election campaign of late federal finance minister Jim Flaherty and was a Toronto auxiliary police officer for 18 years. A Citizenship and Immigration Canada biography listed him as a former executive at the T. Eaton Co., Gordon Brothers and Premier Brand Foods.

Ex-citizenship judge jailed for illegally revealing citizenship exams | Toronto Star.