CALGARY \u2014 Former Calgary Mayor Jyoti Gondek will not be getting her phone back from police until next year at the earliest.<\/p>\n
On Wednesday, a judge ordered the phones of a number of individuals, including Gondek, stay with police during their investigation into municipal corruption.<\/p>\n
Lawyers for Gondek and former city councillor Sean Chu had asked the court to dismiss a police request to extend the hold on their clients’ devices, including their phones.<\/p>\n
Justice Allan Fradsham rejected that bid and extended the hold on the electronics to March 17, 2027 \u2014 which is one year from when they were seized.<\/p>\n
“In these circumstances, a longer extension may better reflect a practical reality in the investigation,” Fradsham told court.<\/p>\n
He noted police have not been able to gain access to the electronic devices using Cellebrite, a digital forensics tool, but said there are upgrades coming that may unlock additional evidence.<\/p>\n
“The devices continue to be necessary for the purposes of the investigation,” he said.<\/p>\n
Court documents show police began investigating Gondek, Chu and others in the business community for municipal corruption, obstruction of justice and fabricating evidence in July 2025.<\/p>\n
Investigators allege Gondek and Chu were involved in an influence peddling scheme where council reconsidered a change in bylaw to allow for a townhouse development in Calgary in exchange for campaign donations that exceeded the allowable amount.<\/p>\n
Court documents did not disclose how much was offered or if that money changed hands.<\/p>\n
None of the allegations have been proven in court.<\/p>\n
Gondek was mayor from 2021 to 2025, but was defeated in the most recent municipal election. Chu had been a councillor for a decade but did not run in 2025.<\/p>\n
This report by The Canadian Press was first published July 22, 2026.<\/p>\n
Bill Graveland, The Canadian Press<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CALGARY \u2014 Former Calgary Mayor Jyoti Gondek will not be getting her phone back from police until next…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":139877,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[46273,51,1611,6267,32911,35313,35045,989],"class_list":["post-139876","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-calgary","tag-allan-fradsham","tag-calgary","tag-calgary-flames","tag-city-councillor","tag-jyoti-gondek","tag-police-request","tag-sean-chu","tag-the-canadian-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139876","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=139876"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139876\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/139877"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=139876"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=139876"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=139876"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}