‘An emotional day': Zampino tells court about police search of his home
When police searched his home more than a decade ago during an investigation into his alleged role in a bid-rigging scheme at Montreal city hall, Frank Zampino, the former president of Montreal's executive committee, was ordered to stay in the entrance to his residence for 10 hours while UPAC investigators did their work.
While being cross-examined on Tuesday, Zampino, now 65, told Quebec Court Judge Silvie Kovacevich that the day his home was searched in 2014 was 'an emotional day.'
Zampino said he and his wife were told to remain near the main entrance to their home while investigators with the Unité permanente anticorruption (UPAC) searched for documents or devices that might contain evidence related to Project Fronde, the investigation that led to Zampino and several other men, including Robert Marcil, now 60, the city's former head of Montreal's public works department, being charged in 2017.
Zampino and Marcil face three charges each: conspiracy, fraud and breach of trust. Three former executives with engineering firms that were alleged to be part of the bid-rigging scheme are also part of the trial.
The scheme stretched from 2004 to 2009, and the case involves 34 contracts worth more than $160 million.
The prosecution's theory is Zampino organized a plan to award contracts, offered through public tenders by the city of Montreal, in exchange for illegal financing for Union Montréal, the political party Zampino was a part of while he was the head of the executive committee between 2002 and 2008. Zampino is alleged to have put in place and orchestrated a system of collusion with the goal of leading the fraudulent awarding of contracts to 13 engineering firms in exchange for political contributions.
When the search was carried out in 2014, Zampino was already facing criminal charges in another case involving the 2007 sale of the city-owned land known as Faubourg Contrecoeur at a discounted price to a construction firm. Zampino was charged in the Faubourg Contecoeur case in 2012 and was acquitted in 2018.
UPAC investigators were apparently advised to be careful not to seize items that might have involved exchanges Zampino had with his lawyers who represented him in the Faubourg Contrecoeur case. A lawyer from the Barreau du Québec and a lawyer representing Zampino were present during the search to make sure Zampino's attorney-client privilege was respected.
While being cross-examined by prosecutor Nicolas Ammerlaan on Tuesday, Zampino said he was unable to watch as investigators looked through such items as an Apple computer.
'I was not allowed to leave (that space), so if anything was done regarding (a legal procedure), this was done between the lawyer with the Barreau and the UPAC officers and my lawyer who was present,' Zampino said. ' I was contained to a five-by-eight (space) with my wife throughout the entire search, and I certainly was not allowed to accompany the police officers room by room (through his house).
'I was confined to the main entrance to my home. That was where I was confined to, a five-by-eight space, and I stayed there, with two folding chairs, with my wife from 6 in the morning to about 4 in the afternoon.'
The prosecutor also asked Zampino several questions about a fax machine Zampino used in an office in his home. During the trial, the prosecution presented evidence that some documents related to the bid-rigging scheme were faxed to his home.
Zampino denied seeing the documents and said he rarely received work-related items through his home fax number.
This story was originally published May 27, 2025 at 1:16 PM.
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