Last week the municipality of West Nipissing fired a pair of managers from its Public Works department over what it called "accounting irregularities".
Now, the West Nipissing Police Service has asked the OPP to start an investigation into those financial irregularities involving the Municipality of West Nipissing and a third-party contractor, MX Constructors of Sturgeon Falls.
See original story: Managers fired for irregularities
The town is suing MX more than $450,000 for work it says wasn't completed. That figure includes punitive, exemplary damages, and legal costs.
MX may be familiar to readers as the company involved in the Pinewood sewer extension controversy.
See: Pinewood Park sewer project implodes
West Nipissing Police Chief Chuck Seguin made the request to the OPP late last month to ensure what the chief calls "an unbiased, independent investigation".
The OPP agreed and the investigation has since been assigned to members of the OPP Anti-Rackets Branch.
A statement from Sequin says the OPP conducts investigations in other jurisdictions, if appropriate, at the request of the police service affected.
"At the present time, the WNPS has no further information or comment with respect to the investigation," says Seguin.
"At this point the anti-rackets branch of the OPP has been asked to conduct a criminal investigation that involves financial irregularities involving employees of the municipality of West Nipissing and a third party contract," OPP Detective Superintendent Dave Truax, told BayToday. "Obviously the criminal investigation will be conducted to determine if there was any wrongdoing."
"Depending on the results of the investigation, there could be fraud or theft related charges that could be considered depending on the evidence, and whether or not first of all, if there was any criminal wrongdoing.
"In order to avoid any perceived or actual conflict of interest, the chief of police for the West Nipissing Police Service made a request to the OPP in order to undertake an investigation."
Truax says he can't put a timeframe on the length of that investigation.
"I'm not able to speculate as of the length of time required to do a thorough and professional investigation. There are a number of factors such as interviews of witnesses, collection of financial records from financial institutions and other factor that can affect the length of time it takes."
