Dallas Stars Owner Tom Gaglardi Faces Jail Time for Altering Fish Habitat

On Thursday Tom Gaglardi, the owner of the NHL’s Dallas Stars, was found guilty of two counts of harmful alteration of a fish habitat.

The Canadian billionaire’s hotel and restaurant company Northland Properties was also found guilty of Canadian environmental law violations. Northland Properties is a Vancouver-based hotel and restaurant behemoth founded by Tom’s father, Robert Gaglardi, who was also named in the lawsuit that was adjudicated in a provincial Kamloops court. The elder Gaglardi was found not guilty.

According to Kamloops This Week, the charges involve the 2010 destruction of riprap in order to construct a boat ramp on his waterfront home in Savona known as “Tom’s Shack.” When Federal authorities began investigating suspected environmental violations, one Northland employee testified that he was ordered to throw his computer hard drive “in the lake” and to shred pertinent documents.

The court proceedings didn’t seem to bother Gaglardi enough to get in the way of strategizing potential line configurations for the Stars, which he often scribbled in a notebook while in court. Also, he was reprimanded for keeping his iPhone turned on during the trial and at one point concealed it from sheriffs by hiding it in his book.

Sentencing is set for August 21 and Gaglardi is facing fines up to $1 million and/or six months in jail.