India's search for missing loot from Toronto airport gold heist prevents alleged inside man from returning to Canada for trial - National Post

Simran Preet Panesar is suspected of moving gold stolen at Toronto's Pearson airport in 2023, or proceeds from it, through businesses in India. Photo by Peel Regional PoliceArticle contentA man wanted for his alleged insider role in the high-value Toronto airport gold heist cannot return to Canada to face trial because Indian authorities won’t let him leave over suspicions he brought the loot to India to secretly sell, documents allege.

Law enforcement and court documents from India, obtained by National Post, say Simran Preet Panesar is suspected of moving stolen gold or proceeds from it through businesses in India, where he has been living since resigning from his job with Air Canada after the heist.

Peel Regional Police, west of Toronto, consider him a wanted fugitive and allege he was an inside man who abused his position at the Air Canada cargo warehouse to pull off Canada’s biggest gold heist, in 2023, when a crate filled with nearly pure gold and foreign cash — worth more than $22 million — was stolen without anyone noticing shortly after arriving on a flight from Switzerland.

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Canada has requested Panesar’s arrest and extradition from India.

India’s Directorate of Enforcement, the country’s national enforcement agency for combating financial crimes, calls the 2023 theft “a sophisticated gold heist” and notes its connection to suspects of Indian origin who worked for Air Canada.

“Indo-Canadian employees Pampal Sidhu and Simran Preet Panesar played key roles in the heist,” alleges the document signed last year by two senior directorate officials based in Chandigarh, in India’s northwest.

“Simran Preet Panesar is in India and is suspected of laundering the stolen gold proceeds through various activities,” the report says. “It is suspected that a large portion of the stolen gold has been melted down and sold in markets that are flushed with gold, such as India or Dubai.

“Investigation is required to be conducted to ascertain the total proceeds of crime generated, layered, and integrated in the form of movable and immovable properties and identify all the persons/entities who is involved or knowingly assisted,” the directorate’s report says.