Time to give rink a rethink, at least for this winter

Doctor pays $500K to revamp courtyard at care home where he works

Fifty years after Dr. Pravinsagar Mehta began caring for residents at Actionmarguerite, a courtyard he had long watched deteriorate is getting a new life after he and his wife committed $500,000 to its redevelopment and long-term maintenance.

Nightclub owner, divorced dad sentenced for involvement in cocaine-trafficking case

Three people, including a Winnipeg nightclub owner and a divorced dad desperate for cash, have been sentenced in a cocaine-trafficking case city police were once concerned had been compromised by a corrupt cop.

The trio was charged in early 2024 as part of Project Roasted, a lengthy investigation into a drug trafficking network by the Winnipeg Police Service organized crime unit.

Investigators arrested two of the men, Mohamed Ali and Abdullah Khan, as they left the Stella’s on Pembina Highway in early February 2024. Two kilograms of cocaine was found in Khan’s car.

On the same day, Ahmed Dini was arrested at his River Avenue suite, where investigators found more than 200 rocks of crack cocaine.

Foreign workers at Manitoba hotel are owed $138-K in unpaid wages and fees, labour board rules

BRANDON — The Manitoba Labour Board has ordered the Western Star All Suites Hotel to pay nearly $138,000 in unpaid wages and administrative fees after it dismissed the appeals involving three foreign workers employed by the company.

In a decision dated Aug. 25, the board ordered 6692452 Manitoba Ltd. (doing business as Western Star All Suites Hotel), 1638185 Alberta Ltd. and company director P.X. to pay a total of $137,915.79 to the Employment Standards Branch for wages owed to foreign workers S.J., J.B. and G.R.

The decision was edited to protect the personal information of the employees, who worked at a hotel, reportedly in Melita, at different times and also lived there during their employment.

The board stated the employees were owed wages after hearing evidence about long working hours, irregular payments, inadequate employment records and working conditions.

Owner credits entire team for Quarry victory in Canadian Derby

Eight-time leading Assiniboia Downs owner Henry S. Witt Jr. flew into Century Mile in Edmonton and won the biggest horse race of his life, the $200,000 Canadian Derby (G3), on Aug. 22. His winning steed was named Quarry, a horse he claimed at Churchill Downs for $80,000 on June 20. Quarry is basically a free horse now.

Witt bet $100 win-place-show on his horse and got back over $1,800, some of which went back to the grooms in trainer Jerry Gourneau’s barn, and that’s what he wanted to talk about. He’d already said his trainer was the best in the business, now he wanted to talk about the grooms.

“I was videoing the shed row, you know, just to show some of my buddies how professional everything looked,” said Witt, What he shot mostly showed young grooms doing unglamorous work well. The thing that stopped him was a groom named Juliana LeRoux, who also happens to be Quarry’s groom, standing in a stall with Bergheim, a horse with a reputation for leaning on people.

“Bergheim kind of wallows on you, leans on you a little bit,” Witt said. “And people were saying, ‘You better watch him,’ Anyway, I walk down the shedrow and I look back and she’s over there petting him, kissing him on the forehead, talking to him. And I said, ‘What the heck?’”

Security guard in stable condition after grocery store assault

A security guard was taken to hospital after an assault at a Sargent Avenue FreshCo Friday, just days after another guard was stabbed during a robbery at a St. James Dollarama.

Winnipeg police said officers were called to a store in the 600 block of Sargent Avenue shortly after 1 p.m. for a report of an assault.

An 24-year-old male victim was taken to hospital in critical condition, later upgraded to stable. Charges against a 23-year-old man were announced Sunday. The suspect had tried to leave the grocery store without paying for merchandise before a confrontation broke out and he pulled out a knife outside of the store, the Winnipeg Police Service stated in a news release Sunday.

Peter Edwin Morrison Black, 23, has been charged with robbery, assault with a weapon and possession of a weapon. He was detained in custody. He was arrested Aug. 29, the day after the stabbing, in the area of Ellice Avenue and Sherbrook Street.