Crown abruptly closes case against ex-Mountie accused of being bounty hunter for China

Judy Trinh reports on the trial of former RCMP officer William Majcher, accused of participating in China’s Fox Hunt program.

VANCOUVER -- A foreign interference case against a retired RCMP officer allegedly turned by China may be unravelling, three days after the trial began.

On Wednesday, the Crown abruptly closed its case against William Majcher, 63, while the prosecution’s key witness was waiting in the atrium to be sworn in to testify.

CTV News analysis of evidence presented at the trial so far reveals a tangle of relationships and conflicting intelligence which has put the Crown’s case on shaky ground.

Majcher, is charged with one count under the Security of Information Act for “preparatory acts” in working with the People’s Republic of China (PRC) to coerce a Vancouver businessman, Hongwei Sun or Kevin Sun, to return to China in 2017.

Majcher is accused of illegally participating in China’s “Project Fox Hunt” essentially as a bounty hunter, to help Beijing track down economic fugitives living abroad.

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Sun had allegedly stolen C$125 million from a bank in Jilin province. According to testimony from Supt. Peter Tsui, who was RCMP liaison officer at the Canadian Embassy in Beijing, the punishment for Sun’s crime in China would be the death penalty.

An FBI-intercepted email from Majcher refers to a “real estate mogul in Vancouver” with more than $100 million in assets. Majcher writes to his business partner that he wants to “impress upon the crook that we hold the keys to his future.”

Kevin Sun is not named in that FBI email.

The reluctant witness

The key witness who the Crown was counting on helping it connect the dots was a private investigator named Kim Marsh.

He once ran the RCMP’s International Organized Crime Unit in B.C. and helped recruit Majcher into undercover operations. Marsh was also Majcher’s best man when he married his now-wife Diana in Taiwan in 2010.

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In the early stages of the investigation, Marsh was named as Majcher’s co-conspirator but has not been charged. Since then, a search warrant executed at Marsh’s home has been deemed unlawful.

Marsh told CTV News that he did not agree to a pre-interview with the Crown even though he was subpoenaed to testify.

Top secret documents revealed

But there are more challenges to the Crown’s case than just the close relationship between the prime suspect and the key witness.

Declassified top-secret documents about “Project Severo” filed in court reveal RCMP investigators were unsure if Majcher was a Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) asset or a threat.

A dossier filed in court written by RCMP Sgt. Nicolas Ferland, team commander of the Integrated National Security Enforcement Team, (INSET) raises concerns that “could have detrimental effect on the current investigation and the potential future judicial proceedings.”

Ferland acknowledges the possibility that Majcher was a CSIS agent. He stipulated that Majcher may have been “no longer of value or interest in 2018-2019 - or possibly considered a threat” due to his involvement in the case of Meng Wanzhou. Meng, the chief financial officer of Huawei, was detained by Canada at the request of the United States in 2018.

Ferland wrote that addressing “disclosure obligations and questions as to potential entrapment remain paramount in the viability of any future judicial proceedings undertaken by the RCMP and the Public Prosecution Services of Canada.”

Undercover asset

Before Majcher retired from the RCMP, he worked as an undercover officer infiltrating terrorist groups and drug cartels to investigate financial crimes. After he left policing in 2007, he moved to Hong Kong and founded a corporate risk firm called EMIDR, which specializes in asset recovery.

The Chinese government and its state-owned enterprises were among his clients.

Project Severo investigators obtained a 13-page document from another RCMP officer that states around 2011, Majcher was approached by CSIS to help build its contacts and capabilities overseas.

Majcher was asked by the spy agency about the “ease in inserting covert CSIS personnel into the local business community.” At that time CSIS expressed interest in China’s big tech companies ZTE and Huawei.

Later, CSIS asked Majcher if he would help run a covert intelligence gathering operation because the agency could not find “qualified personnel to seamlessly fit into the cover story.”

Majcher apparently said he was prepared to do his part to help CSIS and Canada. According to the document, the operation was co-led by Britain’s MI6 in a deliberate strategy by CSIS to circumvent Canadian laws which prevented it from operating extraterritorially.

Majcher was provided equipment and training in an operation that ran for 24 months. He said he was paid in U.S. currency, delivered in an envelope by a CSIS agent.

The turning point

After 2015, the declassified document shows that Majcher had no contact with CSIS until 2019. That’s when Majcher was hired by Anbound, a Chinese think tank, to obtain information about the case of Meng Wanzhou. After Canada detained Meng on an extradition request by the United States, China retaliated by arresting Michael Spavor and Michael Kovrig.

According to the document, Majcher, aware of the tense political climate, checked in with CSIS in 2019 to self-report his new role with Anbound.

He suspected Anbound was a front for China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and indicated to his CSIS handler that he would be willing to “feed any misinformation to the Chinese or function in a counter-intelligence type role.”

Majcher reportedly said he would have to provide the Chinese with “sufficient information to keep them engaged” but that he would not provide them with sensitive or classified details.

It would appear that meeting became a turning point. CSIS began to doubt Majcher’s intentions.

National security warning

In September 2021, CSIS issued an espionage alert declaring that Majcher “poses a significant espionage threat to Canada and Canadian national interests due to his activity on behalf of hostile intelligence actors in the People’s Republic of China.”

The alert sent out to all RCMP units, urged officers to report any other employees who may have shared information with Majcher.

In a follow-up warning seven months later, the RCMP provided more information about Majcher’s method of operation.

A March 2022 email stated that hostile intelligence actors may be using “journalistic, think tank and academic cover” to achieve their aims.

“Majcher continues to undertake intelligence-gathering activities in Canada on behalf of the PRC including by leveraging contacts with Canada and abroad to obtain access to Canadian Law Enforcement officials for the benefit of the PRC.”

In July 2023, Majcher flew into Vancouver from Hong Kong to visit family. He was arrested at Vancouver International Airport without a warrant.

Earlier this month in B.C. Supreme Court, Justice Martha Devlin found that there were no reasonable and probable grounds for Majcher’s arrest at the time.

Justice Devlin will also weigh the evidence and decide the verdict in Majcher’s trial.