Gurpreet Dhillon demands City of Brampton scrub Integrity Commissioner report after lawyer confirms former accuser withdrew sex assault allegations

Nearly three years after the woman who accused him of sexual assault withdrew her allegations, former Brampton councillor Gurpreet Dhillon is once again demanding the City of Brampton remove Integrity Commissioner Muneeza Sheikh’s report which sided with the woman. 

Dhillon’s lawyer, Eric Gillespie, has batted away Sheikh’s claims that a letter written three years ago by the former complainant, withdrawing her allegations, can not be verified.

"It may not have been clear at the time, but the withdrawal letter was provided by the complainant's legal counsel. We have now communicated with them,” Gillespie stated in a press release two weeks ago. “They have confirmed the process required by the Law Society was followed, specifically including the lawyer verifying the identity of their client. There is then no rational basis for anyone to doubt the veracity of the withdrawal given its source and this confirmation." 

Sheikh told Brampton Council earlier this year that she could not verify the letter and refused to answer questions from The Pointer when she was asked if she went to the woman’s lawyer to confirm the veracity of the letter. Sheikh, who was fired by a majority group of councillors last term, then rehired by her friend Mayor Patrick Brown who oversaw her original hiring in 2019, has refused to explain why she did not simply ask the woman’s lawyer if the letter is legitimate. 

Gillespie has now confirmed that the lawyer who represented the woman in 2023 when her letter was sent to City of Brampton legal staff, confirmed it was her who wrote it.

Sheikh once again did not respond to questions asking her to explain why she did not go to the lawyer herself to confirm the contents of the letter and its author. 

Dhillon is again calling on the City of Brampton to remove Sheikh’s 2020 report which claimed Dhillon had done what the woman had initially alleged during a Brampton trade mission to Turkey.

The Pointer has reviewed the letter written by the woman on September 1, 2023. She wrote to the City of Brampton that she wanted a “withdrawal of the sexual misconduct allegations that I made against Gurpreet Singh Dhillon in late 2019 and early 2020 while we both attended a conference in Turkey…I want to be clear that I am not withdrawing my accusations because of any pressure or threats from Mr. Dhillon or his representatives…my memory of the events in question may have been clouded by a number of factors including emotional distress, misinformation and coercion from people who were not genuine with their intentions.”

Her letter continues: “I also recognize that making these accusations has had serious consequences for Mr. Dhillon both personally and professionally. I would like to take this opportunity to offer my sincerest regrets to Mr. Dhillon for any harm that my accusations may have caused him.”

In April of 2024, the City of Brampton’s head lawyer at the time, Sameer Akhtar, wrote a memo to all members of council, which The Pointer obtained, confirming the letter had been received by him through a lawyer in late October 2023, and that the woman had withdrawn her allegations which she wanted the City to acknowledge.

Dhillon has since demanded Sheikh’s 2020 report be expunged and has asked for an apology, following the council decision to suspend him for 90 days without pay after Sheikh recommended the punishment, claiming Dhillon had done what the woman originally alleged. Dhillon has threatened a $5 million lawsuit against the City.

Former Brampton councillor Gurpreet Dhillon, pictured above (left) in front of City Hall when he was one of the members who voted in 2022 for a set of sweeping investigations into allegations of corruption under Mayor Patrick Brown. The hiring of Muneeza Sheikh by Brown was one of the matters being investigated, until Brown cancelled all of the probes when he had just enough votes due to council vacation absences later that summer. 

(The Pointer files)

After years of silence and inaction by City of Brampton officials and Sheikh, she finally addressed the letter and Dhillon’s demands for the report to be withdrawn.

Delegating virtually to council on May 6, Sheikh claimed she had “exhausted all of my own means to try and make contact with the complainant” to verify the letter (The Pointer was able to find her immediately while performing an internet search, locating her place of work and the community where she is working; her name is not being published to protect her privacy).

Sheikh said she had reached the woman’s lawyer but failed to explain why she did not ask him to verify the letter.   

Sheikh has maintained she cannot alter or remove the report without confirmation of the letter to show her 2020 findings were in error.

In a July 15 press release, Gillespie said he has now confirmed directly with the complainant’s own legal counsel that the process required under the Law Society of Ontario, including verification of the woman’s identity, was followed when she signed the withdrawal letter that was sent by a lawyer to City of Brampton officials in 2023.

Gillespie highlights the conflicts and some of the controversy around Sheikh that, according to him, should prevent her from interfering in the matter.

“Brampton's current Integrity Commissioner (Sheikh) also recently attempted to investigate the matter without Council authorization,” the press release states. “The same Integrity Commissioner also previously launched legal proceedings against numerous former and current City Councillors including Mr. Dhillon. As a result, she was advised she is in a conflict of interest and should not participate in matters involving these individuals.”

Sheikh threatened legal action after she was fired in 2022 when a majority of councillors learned she had billed seven times more than what previous integrity commissioners had charged the City. 

They brought forward an external investigation to find out how she was hired under Brown despite having no experience in municipal law and no experience ever working as an integrity commissioner. Brown cancelled the investigation, taking advantage of councillor vacations when he had just enough votes in August 2022 to terminate the probe, then rehired her in 2023 when most of those councillors, including Dhillon, did not return following the 2022 election.

Brown and Dhillon had been council opponents from the start, following the 2018 election when Brown became mayor after he was forced to quit provincial politics when one woman accused him of rape and another accused him of attempted rape. He denies the allegations.

Brown repeatedly accused Dhillon of sexual abuse in public leading up to the 2022 election, which Dhillon lost after the since withdrawn allegations were used by supporters of his opponents.

Gillespie said in the press release, "We do not understand why the current Integrity Commissioner continues to try to pursue matters involving Mr. Dhillon and the current Council continues to allow this.”

The release highlights that Sheikh’s report is still published on the City of Brampton website. "The City is under no statutory duty to publish misleading and/or false information and should not be making this claim. The Supreme Court of Canada has been clear, even if the City is not the author it can be held liable for republishing information it now knows is untrue," Gillespie said. 

The press release continues. “As a result, the City has been advised to remove the Report or face substantial claims against it.” Gillespie called upon City officials to remove the report now that the woman’s lawyer has confirmed the authenticity of the letter. "Our client sincerely hopes that given the confirmation of identity this will not be necessary but will proceed to ensure the City properly complies with its legal obligations," Gillespie said.  

Dhillon has denied the allegations from the beginning, and was never criminally charged. He said police never spoke to him and Peel Police previously confirmed they did not pursue an investigation. 

Gillespie said the letter by the woman withdrawing her allegations will be released if Dhillon is forced to file a lawsuit, and when all documents will be made available to the public ahead of a trial. 

In a statement to The Pointer, Gillespie stopped short of confirming legal action, saying instead that whether it comes to that depends on how City officials choose to respond. He said though Dhillon is not ruling out legal action, his client wants to give City of Brampton officials time to do the right thing. “That's really up to the City,” he said. “Our client believes there is a proper basis to proceed. So it's really in the hands of the City at this stage.”

City of Brampton Media Relations Manager, Kennisha Petgrave, said “Any further decision on this matter rests with the Integrity Commissioner, Muneeza Sheikh.”

The Pointer asked Sheikh why she did not confirm the letter with the woman’s lawyer, which was a straightforward matter for Dhillon’s lawyer. She did not respond.

Mayor Brown did not respond to questions.

Sheikh's ties to Brown have shadowed her role since she was appointed integrity commissioner in July 2019 by a hiring committee that included Brown, a decision criticized at the time after reporting showed she had publicly defended his leadership of the Ontario PC Party when he was accused of rape and attempted rape. Sheikh’s husband at the time had done paid work for Brown and the Ontario PC Party under his leadership.

A photo of Patrick Brown and Muneeza Sheikh that Brown used for an election campaign before she became Brampton’s Integrity Commissioner.

(Patrick Brown/X)

Brown used a photo of himself and Sheikh together at a public event in his previous election campaign material. 

Sheikh previously said any connection to Brown was strictly professional and she had no plans to recuse herself from matters involving him. 

In May The Pointer reported that Dhillon was finalizing a lawsuit as Brampton officials continued to claim it was Sheikh’s decision to remove the report from the City website. Dhillon said any lawsuit would be about accountability, not compensation and that any money awarded by the court would be invested back into the city. He criticized both Mayor Brown and Sheikh for continuing to ignore the harm caused by the publication of the report, as they point a finger at each other to make a decision. 

On May 7, Dhillon said Sheikh is in a conflict, arguing that she should be recused from his matter given council’s 2022 decision, which he took part in, to terminate her job, which he says has left her biased against him.

Dhillon has registered for this year’s municipal election and is currently campaigning to be Brampton’s city and regional councillor for wards 9 and 10.

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