Ontario man fined $20,000 for illegal use of professional engineer’s seal

The Ontario Court of Justice at Kitchener fined a man $20,000 in December for attempting to pass off his own work as the work of a professional engineer by applying a facsimile of the engineer’s seal to design drawings filed with the Cities of Kitchener and Waterloo and fabricating a letter from the engineer which also bore the seal.

On Thursday, December 9, Robert Sajkunovic of Kitchener, Ontario pled guilty to six counts of breaching section 40(2)(c) the Professional Engineers Act for applying the seal of a Cambridge, ON, engineering practitioner to six drawings. He also pled guilty to one count of breaching section 40(2)(a) for using the title of a professional engineer on a letter submitted to the City of Waterloo with respect to a residential construction project.

Her Worship Jennifer Thompson levied a fine of $2,700 for each use of the seal on the six drawings and $3,800 for the letter purporting to be from the engineer.

Matthew Howe (Counsel) and Cori Goldberger (Student at Law), both from the Toronto law firm Polley Faith LLP, represented PEO on the matter.  PEO would like to thank the cities of Kitchener and Waterloo and the engineer for their cooperation in this investigation.

Professional Engineers Ontario administers the Professional Engineers Act to serve and protect the public interest by licensing Ontario’s 85,000 individual practitioners and engineering firms. Professional engineers can be identified by the P.Eng. after their names. When retaining the services of an engineer or engineering firm, the public may search the directories of licensed professional engineers and authorized professional engineering companies at the website www.peo.on.ca.

Inquiries regarding unlicensed individuals and unauthorized companies may be made to PEO through its enforcement hotline at 416-840-1444 or 1-800-339-3716 ext 1444 or the e-mail address enforcement@peo.on.ca.