SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE - The owners of a downtown office building have been found not legally responsible for the unlawful occupancy by GNWT workers in a 52 Street office building.

Even though a City of Yellowknife building inspector found 28 public servants had started moving into offices in the Nova Plaza building without an occupancy permit, territorial court Judge Christine Gagnon found Nova Builders Inc. not guilty.

"(This case) is about semantics and whether the accused was properly charged," Gagnon said on Wednesday.

The City of Yellowknife charged Nova Builders Inc. with unlawfully occupying office space on the first floor of the building after a building inspector noticed Education, Culture and Employment employees unpacking boxes, working on computers and talking on the telephone on Jan. 25, 2010.

Nova Builders applied for the permit the following day. It was issued on Feb. 17. The GNWT employees remained in the building all the while.

The inspector, Delia Nitu, testified at the Dec. 1, 2010 trial that she was supposed to meet Milan Mrdjenovich, a part-owner and site supervisor with Nova Builders Inc., at the site. However, when Mrdjenovich didn't show up, a GNWT employee let her into the premises. She took several photographs to show Bill Fandrick, the city's building inspections manager. Fandrick testified that, based on the photographs, he saw "people engaged in normal work activity."

The court also heard at the trial that the GNWT had a lease that began Feb. 1, 2010 at a cost of $29,900 a month, but the department began moving in weeks earlier on Jan. 18 while still maintaining some staff in their former Greenstone building offices on Franklin Avenue.

Nova Builders Inc. pleaded not guilty to the charge Aug. 24, 2010.

Had it been found guilty, the company could have faced a maximum penalty of $10,000 a day for each day the office space was unlawfully occupied.

Loretta Bouwmeester, the City's lawyer, and defence lawyer Sheldon Toner listened for about 30 minutes as Gagnon read her decision, first citing several legal and common dictionaries over the terms "occupancy" and "occupant."

Gagnon ruled that even though Nova Builders Inc. owned the building and failed to submit an occupancy permit before the office space was occupied, she said Nova Builders Inc. wasn't an occupant of the space but rather that party was the Department of Education, Culture and Employment. She pointed out that Nova Builders Inc. did not have its own corporate office in the building.

As well, Gagnon ruled that even though the tenants remained in the office space until a permit was granted on Feb. 17, the City of Yellowknife failed to post a "do not occupy" notice on the building. As a result, neither Nova Builders Inc. nor the GNWT were responsible for vacating the office space because they weren't properly notified.

Both Mike Mrdjenovich, the principal owner and his son Milan declined to comment on the decision.

Bill Fandrick, building inspections manager for the City of Yellowknife, couldn't be reached for comment.

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