Former Montreal-area daycare manager sentenced to 3 years for smuggling ghost guns into Quebec
Some of the guns that were smuggled by Stacy St-Pierre on July 14, 2024. (Source: RCMP/Court records)
A former Quebec daycare manager who smuggled ghost guns across the Canadian border has been sentenced to three years in prison.
Stacy St-Pierre, 43, pleaded guilty to the weapons charge in April following his arrest by the RCMP on July 14, 2023.
The judge delivered the sentence Thursday morning at the Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu courthouse, agreeing with the Crown prosecutor that a 36-month sentence was an appropriate punishment for the crime.
The defence had asked for house arrest.
At the time of his arrest, St-Pierre was one of the managers of a daycare with two locations west of Montreal.
His spouse, 46-year-old Ruby Sharma — also a manager — was arrested in 2023 but was acquitted of all charges in April.
According to an agreed statement of facts filed in court, the guns St-Pierre smuggled into Canada were 'all functional and in good firing condition.'
Ghost guns are typically made from assembled parts or 3D printers, making them difficult for police to trace.
Ghost funs near Lacolle
A discarded box of ghost guns in the grass near Lacolle, Que. (Source: RCMP/Court records)
An RCMP border camera captured footage of an unidentified man who drove a black Jeep Gladiator to the Canadian border in Rouses Point, N.Y., on July 14, 2023, at 3 p.m. and threw a black box filled with weapons into a field on the Canadian side.
He drove away and, a few minutes later, St-Pierre arrived in his black Infiniti QX60 on the Canadian side in Lacolle, Que.
He made a phone call and then got out of the car to pick up the box of weapons and returned to his vehicle.
When an RCMP patrol car arrived minutes later, he threw the box into the grass.
Ghost guns seized by RCMP
Six ghost guns were seized by the RCMP in Lacolle, Que. on July 14, 2024. (Source: RCMP/Court records)
'The weapons box bounces open, scattering its contents across the long grass,' the document stated.
Once the officer met up with him, St-Pierre — with his fly down — told the officer that he had stopped to urinate as he was on his way home from a golf club.
The officer, who did not see St-Pierre throw the box earlier and did not know that another man had thrown the box over the border, cleared him to leave.
But minutes later, a second patrol car arrived on the scene, and the officer noticed the box of weapons discarded in the grass.
The two officers pursued St-Pierre and arrested him at 3:33 p.m.
With files from CTV News' Stéphane Giroux.
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