Belbas to return to court in August

THUNDER BAY - A man who has pleaded guilty to a series of charges involving fraud will return to court in late August.

Richard Belbas appeared in court in early March for sentencing for fraud charges dating back to 2017. At the time, defence counsel Karen Scullion had recently been retained by Belbas and requested a lengthy adjournment to May in order to give her enough time to get up to speed with his case.

During this proceeding, Crown counsel Andrew Sadler expressed concern over the number of times this case had been adjourned since he pleaded guilty in 2017.

However, the May sentencing was once again pushed back when the Superior Court of Justice temporarily halted nearly all operations in order to limit the spread of the virus in mid-March.

According to court documents, Belbas will return to court on Aug. 24.

Belbas was sentenced to more than five months in jail in 2015 after pleading guilty to fraud charges.

Facts regarding Belbas’s case will be made public at his sentencing hearing when they are read into the record.