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Gun-smuggling case puts spotlight on library straddling US-Canada border
A cross-border meeting place for divided families was the site of a plot to bring dozens of firearms from Vermont to Quebec
Ashifa Kassam in Stanstead, Quebec
@ashifa_k
Wed 31 Jan 2018 07.14 EST
It was built deliberately to straddle the frontier between the two countries – a symbol of cooperation and friendship between Canada and the US.
More than a century later, the Haskell Free Library and Opera House continues to allow residents of both countries to mingle without having to cross a border.
But a court case this week has cast the cross-border institution into the spotlight for all the wrong reasons after it became an unwitting setting for a scheme to smuggle dozens of guns into Canada.
Alexis Vlachos, 40, a Canadian citizen, pleaded guilty in a Vermont court on Monday to charges relating to a plot to use the library to smuggle backpacks full of handguns into Canada on at least two occasions, according to the US attorney in Vermont.
More:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jan/31/canada-border-library-gun-smuggling-case
