Extortion charges against police sergeant Gurdip Panaich dropped

Brampton’s award-winning Indo-Canadian police sergeant Gurdip Panaich, 39, who was charged in an extortion plot and obstruction of justice in March and suspended, has all the charges against him withdrawn. Panaich, who is serving in York Regional Police, was suspended after he and four Indo-Canadian men were arrested in the alleged extortion plot against Brampton real estate agent Dale Mundi in March.
While the four others – Inderjit Bains (46), Surjit Brar (46), and Zorawar Mahal (25) and Rajkanwar Mangat (39) – will face charges in court next week, Panaich could be back on duty soon.
According to Panaich’s lawyer Danielle Robitaille, assistant Crown Amber Lepchuk withdrew the charges against the police sergeant as these did not meet a “criminal code standard.’’The lawyer told the court that his client – Sgt. Gurdip Panaich – was “devastated by the charges’’ and he is eager to return to his duty.
The extortion plot in the Indo-Canadian community made big headlines in March when comments were posted online against realtor Dale Mundi, alleging that he tried to engage an underage sex and a fake Twitter account in Mundi’s name posted anti-Muslim posts. Many angry Muslims confronted him about the posts.
Extortionists asked Mundi to pay a huge sum of money to get the posts against him taken off. Mundi complained to police and investigations led to the arrest of the five Indo-Canadian men, including the police sergeant.