CBC News reported this week that court records that they obtained show that an extortion scheme that targeted South Asian homebuilders in Edmonton is linked to the Brothers Keepers gang.
CBC said that the agreed facts of the case show that Harpreet Uppal, who was shot dead along with his 11-year-old son in a 2023 shooting was part of the extortion plot.
(The VOICE had reported in November 2023: “Uppal was also targeted two years ago when a man shot at him several times through a window while he was having dinner with his family in a south Edmonton restaurant in October 2021. Uppal sustained several gunshot wounds and was taken to hospital with serious but non-life-threatening injuries. However, his family, including children, staff and other customers were not harmed.)
The agreed statement of facts says Uppal was a member of Brothers Keepers and was a “close associate” of Maninder Dhaliwal, who allegedly orchestrated extortions and arsons from abroad.
The Edmonton Police Service (EPS) arrested several alleged members of the group running the extortion scheme in July 2024.
(The VOICE in July 2024 had reported: “One female, Jashandeep Kaur, 19, and five males, Gurkaran Singh, 19, Manav Heer, 19, Parminder Singh, 21, Divnoor Asht, 19, and a 17-year-old male are all facing a host of serious criminal charges. Canada-wide warrants have also been issued for Maninder Singh Dhaliwal, 34, who is believed to be the leader of the criminal organization responsible for the extortions. Jointly and individually, the seven accused are facing a total of 54 charges, including extortion, arson, intentionally discharging a firearm, break and enter, assault with a weapon, as well as a number of charges linked to committing an offence for the benefit of, at the direction of, or in association with a criminal organization.”)
Divnoor Singh Asht pleaded guilty on May 23 to three of the seven charges he faced: arson, extortion and conspiring to commit extortion, CBC News reported.
Asht admitted he was one of the people responsible for “assembling and instructing the lower members of the group to carry out the extortion and related arsons. These actions were based on the direction and instruction of Maninder Dhaliwal and Harpreet Uppal, prior to his death.”
Asht was sentenced to 4½ years in prison.
The agreed facts say some in the group were members of Brothers Keepers, but there’s no evidence that Asht was one of them, CBC News said.
Gurkaran Singh, Manav Heer, Parminder Singh and the 17-year-old boy are still before the courts. The charges against them haven’t been proven. Court records show the charges against the 19-year-old woman were stayed in March, CBC News reported.
CBC News said Dhaliwal was arrested in the United Arab Emirates late last year on separate charges. He has yet to be prosecuted. An extradition request remains in effect to send him back to Canada.
CBC News also reported that court records show Harpreet Uppal was involved in the early days of a scheme where successful Edmonton developers received extortion calls. If they failed to pay, they saw their properties burned down. In some cases, there was gunfire outside their own homes.
According to the agreed statement of facts, Asht is described as one of the “middle managers” in the group who took instructions from higher ranks. He assigned tasks and reported progress. He didn’t directly make threats against the homebuilders, but he was aware of them.
Below Asht were Heer and the youth, who were “largely, but not exclusively, the group’s principal arsonists,” the agreed facts say.
Asht didn’t personally start any of the fires, but his role involved “encouraging and instructing” those who did. He also sometimes scouted locations of possible arson targets and gathered proof that the job was done.
CBC News reported details of some of the extortion cases.
It said that lawyers for the three adults charged in the case — Heer, Gurkaran Singh and Parminder Singh — are set to meet for a procedural pre-trial court appearance later this month.
