Features
Canadian Escapade Nearly Over
A Canadian concert promoter accused of stealing more than $600,000 from the Escapade Music Festival is expected to be sprung from custody in December in an odd deal in which he won’t be charged with a crime but will cop to details of how it was committed.
Nicholas Guindon-Vachon appeared in an Ottawa court Nov. 15 to enter pleas, but Ontario court justice Heather Perkins-McVey put the matter over to Dec. 9, according to the Ottawa Citizen.
Ottawa Police Handout
It’s expected the promoter – who has languished in jail since being arrested in Aruba in August 2012 – will be released with credit for time served.
He’s also expected to receive a year’s probation and be ordered to repay his former partners at DNA Presents around $300,000.
Guindon-Vachon is accused of cleaning out a safe of the cash at Ottawa Stadium, where the Escapade festival took place June 30 to July 1, 2012.
He allegedly stuffed the cash into a cardboard box and used some of it to charter a private plane to the Caribbean from Montreal.
About half the stolen concert cash has reportedly been recovered, including about $237,000 from a safe in Guindon-Vachon’s Aruba rental house.