Tristan Marois Drouin of Gatineau, Quebec was sentenced Friday for robbing several regional banks. (Photos: Submitted / OPP)
The “Blue Jays Bandit” was sentenced in a Belleville courtroom Friday.
Thirty-year-old Tristan Marois Drouin of Gatineau, Quebec, was sentenced to four years in penitentiary and given a lifetime weapons prohibition by Mr. Justice Stephen Hunter.
Drouin, short, bald, heavy-set, and wearing glasses, pleaded guilty to eight counts of armed robbery.
Drouin, who almost always wore a Blue Jays hat while robbing banks, robbed eight banks of cash in a short period of time beginning last August.
Included among the robberies were ones in Napanee and downtown Trenton.
A total of $12,000 cash was stolen, some of it American currency. Some of the bills taken were marked. $500 was stolen from the Royal Bank in Trenton.
In each of the robberies, Drouin walked in and handed the teller a note suggesting he was armed and demanded cash. No one ever saw a weapon, nor was one ever seized by police.
Police finally caught up to him on December 16 after two robberies that day, one in Bowmanville and the second in Cobourg.
He was arrested along the 401 in Quinte West by OPP later that day.
Prior to the bank heists, Drouin had no criminal record.
Before being sentenced, he stood up in the prisoner’s box and quietly apologized to everyone, especially the tellers, adding he never meant to hurt anyone.
Drouin’s lawyer said he doubted his client would ever be back before the courts again adding that he’d struggled with bi-polar disorder and depression.
On giving his sentence, Judge Hunter said “even after 26 years on the bench, the oddities of human behaviour still continue to surprise me.”
Drouin has already served 138 days in custody.
