Air Canada security camera could have caught insider in Toronto airport gold heist but wasn't working that day - National Post

A shipment worth $20 million disappeared from this Air Canada cargo holding facility known as Cargo West at Toronto's Pearson airport. Photo by Peter J. Thompson/National PostArticle contentA crucial surveillance camera inside an Air Canada cargo warehouse was not working the day a crate carrying more than $22.5 million in almost pure gold and cash was stolen, a security slip hiding the identity of an airline insider who helped pull off the gold heist, court heard.

Parmpal Sidhu, a 56-year-old former Air Canada cargo warehouse employee, is accused of using his inside access to print off an official Air Canada air waybill that was used by a truck driver to collect the high-value crate stolen in the Toronto airport gold heist in 2023.

Sidhu has pleaded not guilty to theft and conspiracy and his ongoing trial in Ontario Superior Court in Brampton, Ont., featured internal Air Canada security video showing the crate being moved around the airline’s large cargo facility at Pearson airport, loaded onto a truck, and driven off.

Get a dash of perspective along with the trending news of the day in a very readable format.

A welcome email is on its way. If you don't see it, please check your junk folder.

The next issue of NP Posted will soon be in your inbox.

We encountered an issue signing you up. Please try again

Nowhere on the video footage, however, was anyone seen printing or collecting the waybill that was the key to releasing the crate to a gold heist gang instead of to Brink’s security guards, who arrived later to pick it up for a Toronto bank but learned it was nowhere to be found.

The court has heard that Sidhu’s employee ID number was used to access an Air Canada printer within the building to print it, but has also heard that airline cargo employees had woeful computer hygiene and routinely swapped and shared login credentials.

A Peel Regional Police detective, testifying on the witness stand for a second day Wednesday, revealed why the identity of who took the air waybill off the printer and got it into hands of the driver is in any doubt.

Sidhu’s lawyer, Shale Wagman, asked Det. Sarah Angevine about the police evidence in the case against Sidhu.

“There was no fingerprint of Mr. Sidhu on the air waybill,” Wagman asked.