A veteran Toronto police officer was found guilty this week of stealing credit cards and a $6,500 watch from the deceased individuals he was tasked with investigating.
An Ontario judge found Const. Boris Borissov guilty Wednesday of all 15 charges laid against him in connection with five incidents that occurred between 2020 and 2022, including being in possession of a stolen Honda Pilot and misusing a police database to assist an accomplice in fraudulently acquiring vehicles.
In her decision, Justice Mary Misener concluded that Borissov’s testimony was “completely unworthy of belief” and wrote that the police officer’s story made “no sense” at least a dozen times.
“I have found in respect of each count that the only reasonable inference that could be drawn from the totality of the evidence was that Mr. Borissov committed the offence charged,” she said in a written decision obtained by CTV News Toronto.
“His evidence was riddled with lies, inconsistencies and evasions. I reject it. It does not raise a reasonable doubt as to his guilt.”
The incidents
On Feb. 18, 2022, Borissov and another officer were called to the apartment of a man who was reported missing and later found to have committed suicide.
A court heard that while Borissov was investigating, he stole the man’s debit card, which was used by an associate named Zvezdomir Mollov at a Missisauga butcher shop the next day.
The Crown told the court Borissov attended the butcher shop and downloaded the surveillance footage of Mollov and submitted a false police report in an attempt to obstruct justice.
Borissov also took a TAG Heuer wristwatch, valued at $6,500, from the deceased individual’s apartment and tried to sell lit, the Crown said. The watch was never found.
In his testimony, Borissov argued that the TAG Heuer watch box was empty when he arrived at the apartment. He also said the only reason his phone records revealed he had Googled the brand’s name after the search was because he was “curious about watches.”
As for how Borissov came to be in possession of the stolen credit cards, he told the court he found the deceased’s wallet inside a jacket discovered at the waterfront during the investigation and was concerned the wind that day would “blow” it away, which prompted him to bring the coat to his scout car.
Const. Boris Borissov takes the stand at his trial.
In a separate incident, Borissov was investigating the death of a woman in May 26, 2020 when he stole her credit card and gave the information to an unknown individual who then used it to make fraudulent purchases, the court records show.
Borrisov was arrested on April 11, 2022.
During the trial, the court heard that Borrisov was in possession of a stolen Honda Pilot at the time of his arrest, a vehicle he had obtained from Mr. Mollov that was equipped with a GPS jammer. Borrisov was also convicted for his involvement in Mollov’s “scheme” to obtain vehicles by fraud, which saw the Toronto cop misuse police databases to “ensure that the scheme went undetected.”
Borrisov, who pleaded not guilty to the charges, is a 16-year veteran of the police service and has been suspended with pay since February 2022.