'Pierre Poutine' recorded another message
Fake Liberal voicemail uploaded to RackNine
The mysterious "Pierre Poutine" who launched misleading robocalls into Guelph, Ont., on election day also recorded another voice message, ostensibly in support of the local Liberal candidate, in the riding.
Court documents filed Friday show the suspect at the centre of the vote suppression scandal referred to someone in the Conservative Party when he spoke to the owner of RackNine, the Edmonton voice-broadcasting company used to send the robocalls.
The apparently fake Liberal message was uploaded to Rack-Nine, along with a misdirecting fake Elections Canada call, but never sent. The second recording was revealed in a sworn statement by Al Mathews, the Elections Canada investigator leading the probe into more than 7,600 robocalls - more than previously reported - directing voters to the wrong polling stations on election day.
According to Mathews, the second message "had the appearance of being in support of the Frank Valeriote [Liberal Party] campaign in Guelph. The voice sounded to me as though computer generated rather than a script read by a person."
Poutine had set up a call display number with Rack-Nine, also not used, that corresponded to Valeriote's campaign office during the election. The suspect later deleted the Valeriote call but the recording was retained on the company's server and provided to Elections Canada.
The strange call in support of Valeriote raises the possibility that Poutine intended to use the synthesized voice message to annoy the Liberal candidate's backers. In other ridings, numerous voters have complained of live calls, some of them rude or aggressive, that purported to come from Liberal candidates' campaigns late at night or early in the morning.
A spokesman for Valeriote said Friday that their campaign never used RackNine.
"At no point during the election did Frank Valeriote's campaign use the services of RackNine, nor was the campaign aware of the company until recently," said Daniel Arsenault, the MP's constituency assistant.
"Elections Canada officials have played the recording to Mr. Valeriote in a recent meeting in which he confirmed that the recording was not from his campaign and is unaware who made it. Mr. Valeriote and his campaign have been open about all calls made during the campaign."
The Elections Canada investigation into the Guelph robocalls has focused on the campaign of Conservative Party candidate Marty Burke, who earlier this week denied any knowledge of who placed the calls.
According to Mathews' statement, RackNine owner Matt Meier said he was under a con-tract with the Conservative Party during the 2011 election that did not allow him to do business with other parties.
Meier said the "Pierre" who opened the account with his company two days before the election "referred to knowing someone in the Conservative Party" and had called on Meier's unlisted extension, asking for him by name.
"In Meier's view, these facts meant that someone must have given Pierre his contact information," Mathews wrote in the Information to Obtain a production order on Dec. 12.
Meier did not know his ser-vice was being used to send out the misleading calls and is cooperating with Elections Canada.
'Pierre Poutine' recorded another message
Fake Liberal voicemail uploaded to RackNine
The mysterious "Pierre Poutine" who launched misleading robocalls into Guelph, Ont., on election day also recorded another voice message, ostensibly in support of the local Liberal candidate, in the riding.
Court documents filed Friday show the suspect at the centre of the vote suppression scandal referred to someone in the Conservative Party when he spoke to the owner of RackNine, the Edmonton voice-broadcasting company used to send the robocalls.
The apparently fake Liberal message was uploaded to Rack-Nine, along with a misdirecting fake Elections Canada call, but never sent. The second recording was revealed in a sworn statement by Al Mathews, the Elections Canada investigator leading the probe into more than 7,600 robocalls - more than previously reported - directing voters to the wrong polling stations on election day.
According to Mathews, the second message "had the appearance of being in support of the Frank Valeriote [Liberal Party] campaign in Guelph. The voice sounded to me as though computer generated rather than a script read by a person."
Poutine had set up a call display number with Rack-Nine, also not used, that corresponded to Valeriote's campaign office during the election. The suspect later deleted the Valeriote call but the recording was retained on the company's server and provided to Elections Canada.
The strange call in support of Valeriote raises the possibility that Poutine intended to use the synthesized voice message to annoy the Liberal candidate's backers. In other ridings, numerous voters have complained of live calls, some of them rude or aggressive, that purported to come from Liberal candidates' campaigns late at night or early in the morning.
A spokesman for Valeriote said Friday that their campaign never used RackNine.
"At no point during the election did Frank Valeriote's campaign use the services of RackNine, nor was the campaign aware of the company until recently," said Daniel Arsenault, the MP's constituency assistant.
"Elections Canada officials have played the recording to Mr. Valeriote in a recent meeting in which he confirmed that the recording was not from his campaign and is unaware who made it. Mr. Valeriote and his campaign have been open about all calls made during the campaign."
The Elections Canada investigation into the Guelph robocalls has focused on the campaign of Conservative Party candidate Marty Burke, who earlier this week denied any knowledge of who placed the calls.
According to Mathews' statement, RackNine owner Matt Meier said he was under a con-tract with the Conservative Party during the 2011 election that did not allow him to do business with other parties.
Meier said the "Pierre" who opened the account with his company two days before the election "referred to knowing someone in the Conservative Party" and had called on Meier's unlisted extension, asking for him by name.
"In Meier's view, these facts meant that someone must have given Pierre his contact information," Mathews wrote in the Information to Obtain a production order on Dec. 12.
Meier did not know his ser-vice was being used to send out the misleading calls and is cooperating with Elections Canada.
'Pierre Poutine' recorded another message
