Undercover officer testifies about ‘Mr. Big’ scenarios during Fertuck trial

A first-degree murder trial in Saskatoon resumed this week with testimony from an undercover RCMP officer who created and monitored more than 100 “Mr. Big” scenarios involving Greg Fertuck.

The officer was among those involved in an “organization” that hired Fertuck to take part in both legal and illegal work across B.C., Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba in 2018 and 2019.

Fertuck is charged with first-degree murder and offering an indignity to a body after his ex-wife Sheree went missing in the Kenaston area in 2015.

After two years of police investigating, questioning Fertuck, executing search warrants and surveillance, Sheree’s remains still hadn’t been found.

That’s when the RCMP initiated a “Mr. Big” operation — a police technique used to try and entice a suspect in a crime into a fake criminal organization to try and get a confession to the crime in question, over a period of weeks or months.

The Mr. Big operation began shortly before Fertuck won a prize in a fake contest for a trip for two to Alberta with his girlfriend Doris Laroque in September of 2018.

While they were on the trip, they met other “friends” who were actually undercover officers. According to the first officer to testify about the Mr. Big operation, a series of introductions, meetings and scenarios began shortly after Fertuck accepted work within the “organization.”

The officer, who can’t be identified because of a court-ordered publication ban, was called the “cover.”

The officer testified at Court of Queen’s Bench on Tuesday about some of the scenarios in which Fertuck took part and during which he was “tested” for his loyalty as well. The officer told the court it was made clear to Fertuck that the “organization” was not violent, and members never suffered repercussions for any reason.

One of those scenarios during the Christmas holidays involved transporting illegal cigarettes from B.C.’s Lower Mainland to Vancouver Island. Another involved making sure to keep a specific thumb drive in a hotel room safe.

During that time, the “cover” officer was told Fertuck was drinking heavily and lied to another officer about killing someone who tried to rob the hotel room in which the thumb drive was located.

On New Year’s Day of 2019, the “cover” officer told court Fertuck had taken a bad fall on some ice after he’d been once again drinking heavily and had hit his head. He was taken to hospital, but checked himself out against doctors’ wishes.

At that point, members of the organization checked on Fertuck to see whether he could continue.

By Jan. 8, Fertuck had fallen again and couldn’t get back up. He’d soiled himself and hadn’t eaten, and when there was no improvement in his condition by Jan. 10, the organization contacted an ambulance and he was taken back to the hospital. He stayed there until Feb.15.

During that time, the scenarios involved showing Fertuck the organization could be depended upon to help him and his girlfriend, and to be there when needed. When he left hospital, Fertuck was given a choice about whether he wanted to stay or to leave his job, and he chose to stay.

Over the course of the next couple of months, the “cover” testified, the entire Mr. Big operation was in doubt and a number of scenarios were planned in order to test Fertuck’s health and memory.

“He was as good as we’d ever seen him,” the officer said.

He added that Fertuck during that time had virtually quit drinking, was more alert, had lost 30 pounds and seemed to be in good spirits.

The officer told Crown Prosecutor Cory Bliss there was some concern at times, however, that Fertuck couldn’t recall previously meeting some members of the organization, or “certain aspects” of what he’d been previously shown. The officer wasn’t sure whether that was because of Fertuck’s head injury, his previous heavy drinking or both.

Over the course of the next several months, a series of scenarios were crafted to demonstrate to Fertuck the value of honesty, including one member who had lied about getting into a “fight” with a female drug addict in his hotel room, and ending up in jail over it.

The officer involved in that fake scenario was given the opportunity to tell “the boss” what had actually happened, but did not and was then fired — or told to “get lost.”

By April and May of 2019, a “high impact” scenario involving illegal guns was introduced to Fertuck. A transaction occurred at a Lower Mainland hotel room with several handguns that the 68-year-old “enjoyed,” said the cover officer.

Fertuck even offered $3,000 to buy a 9mm handgun with a silencer, but was denied the request because it was “bad for business.”

A series of domestic violence-related scenarios were then introduced by May of 2019, during which an undercover officer and his girlfriend had a series of incidents including the girlfriend finding questionable pictures on her boyfriend’s phone, the girlfriend dumping the boyfriend on a back road, and a fight during which the male officer suffered scratches to his face.

The cover officer was told Fertuck said at one point that if that had been his girlfriend, she would have “ended up in the hospital” and wouldn’t even know her name.

The cover officer began testimony about the day undercover officers met Fertuck in a Saskatoon hotel room where he admitted to killing Sheree with a .22-calibre rifle, wrapping her body in black plastic sheeting and putting it in the back of his pickup truck.

The officer’s testimony is expected to continue on Wednesday morning.