Cameron Ortis, the former RCMP intelligence official who was found guilty of attempting to sell secrets, has been granted bail pending an appeal of his conviction and sentence.
Jon Doody, a lawyer for Ortis, confirmed the Court of Appeal’s decision to Global News on Friday. The decision is expected to be released publicly next week, he said, after which he anticipates Ortis to be released from prison.
The ex-RCMP officer was found guilty in November of breaching Canada’s Security of Information Act, the country’s official secrets law.
Ortis was expected to serve seven years in prison — part of a 14-year sentence with time served that was handed down in February, but well short of the 20-plus years sought by the Crown. The sentence had taken into account his time spent behind bars and on bail since his 2019 arrest. His defence team had suggested he should be released based on time already served.
The guilty verdict was the first time a person had been convicted in a trial under the Security of Information Act.
Doody confirmed after the sentence that they would appeal both the conviction and the sentence, calling Ortis “an innocent man.”
Ortis was formerly head of the RCMP’s “Operations Research” group and had access to highly-sensitive intelligence gathered by both Canadian authorities as well as Five Eyes security partners, including the U.S. and U.K.
Crown prosecutors alleged during the trial that Ortis had used that access to dangle secrets to targets of law enforcement and intelligence investigations, including Vincent Ramos, former head of encrypted communications company Phantom Secure.
While no money appears to have ultimately changed hands, the Crown alleged Ortis intended to sell top secret intelligence. Ortis, who pleaded not guilty, maintained that he was running an undercover operation aimed at luring criminals onto an encrypted email service, which he alleged was accessible to Western intelligence.
It was an unusual trial. Given the nature of some of the evidence, the public was excluded from much of the testimony both by former RCMP officials and Ortis himself, with partially-censored transcripts being released after national security secrets were scrubbed form the record.
Ortis’ defence maintained that he also wasn’t able to share with the jury certain information – including the identity of a foreign counterpart who allegedly asked him to keep his activities secret from other RCMP members.
with files from Global News’ Alex Boutilier and Bryan Mullan