Two men convicted for 2021 violent armoured car holdup in Parc-Ex
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Two notorious Canadian criminals, including one who shot a Brinks security guard more than three decades ago, were found guilty Thursday at the Montreal courthouse on charges related to a violent armoured car holdup carried out in Parc-Extension in 2021.
Quebec Court Judge Christian Tremblay found Eugene Fengstad, 71, and Ghislain Bouffard, 49, guilty of several charges they faced following their arrests nearly four years ago as suspects in a robbery carried out on Oct. 18, 2021 around 11 p.m. close to a bank on Jean-Talon St. near Querbes Ave.
Garda employees were in the process of moving bags of money into the truck when the two robbers approached them. The guards were pepper-sprayed and at least one shot was fired, though neither of the victims were injured. Both of the thieves fled on foot carrying sacks of cash.
The robbery was investigated by Montreal police major crimes detectives François Lambert and David Simard, and Fengstad and Bouffard were arrested days later. Tremblay heard evidence over the course of 20 days in July last year and delivered his decision Thursday afternoon.
At the time of the robbery in Parc-Extension, Fengstad was serving a life sentence he received in 1996 for wounding a Brinks guard in Vancouver on Dec. 18, 1989 during a robbery carried out in a shopping mall.
The guard was shot in the throat and survived. Fengstad and an accomplice made off with $300,000.
Fengstad was out on full parole on the sentence he received for shooting the guard in B.C. when he became a suspect in the armoured car holdup in Parc Extension.
Shortly before the robbery, Fengstad informed his parole officer he had injured his foot, it had become infected, and he was awaiting surgery.
As reported by The Gazette in 2022, Fengstad's complaint about his foot helped the Montreal police as they investigated the armoured car heist carried out in Parc-Extension.
On Nov. 4, 2021 following the robbery, Montreal police detectives met with Fengstad's parole officer and asked if he walked with a limp. Fengstad was arrested later the same day after the parole officer confirmed Fengstad had difficulty walking.
Fengstad's parole was revoked following his arrest.
In 2002, Bouffard was part of a group of two dozen men who were the first bank robbers in Canada to be charged with gangsterism. The group was linked to 42 robberies, and a Sûreté du Québec investigation revealed the robbers were so co-ordinated they could be considered a criminal organization that acted like a gang.
Bouffard eventually admitted he took part in a dozen of the robberies the group carried out and was sentenced to an overall prison term of four years. A decision made by the Parole Board of Canada in 2006 described Bouffard as having been 'the right-hand man of the leader' of the group. Bouffard carried out the 12 armed robberies while he was out on release from a five-year sentence he received in 1999 for his role in eight other heists.
The sentencing stage of the Parc-Extension robbery case will start at a later date.
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