An Elections Canada investigator alleges he had reason to believe that Michael Sona admitted he was involved in misleading robocalls in the 2011 federal election and also alleges that the former Conservative Party campaign worker had hinted he didn’t act alone.

Sona is the only person charged over the “Pierre Poutine” calls sent out to more than 7,000 voters in Guelph, Ont., on election day.

These new but unproven allegations against Sona are detailed in a sworn statement from Elections Canada investigator Allan Mathews, which came to light Monday only after a judge issued a publication ban restricting the reporting of some of the statement’s details.

The publication ban, ordered by Judge Célynne Dorval, was issued at the request of Sona’s lawyer and with agreement of the Crown prosecutor.

Sona’s lawyer, Norm Boxall, said it is important that cases are not tried in the media before they go to court.

“A temporary publication ban is often important to preserve the integrity of the investigation by the both the Crown and the Defence as well as to preserve the fairness of the trial,” Boxall said in an emailed statement.

The order forbids the reporting of certain paragraphs of a document called an Information To Obtain (ITO), sworn by Mathews on May 3, 2013, that allowed him to get a court order for records from a credit company related to a credit card used to pay for the robocalls. The allegations by Mathews have not been proven in court.

The Ottawa Citizen is considering whether to challenge the ban in court.

Sona, who has repeatedly stated he believes he is being made a scapegoat by the party, was charged in April with breaching the Elections Act, a violation that carries a fine of $5,000 or up to five years in prison. Boxall is to appear in court in Guelph on Thursday morning for a pre-trial conference along with a federal prosecutor.

In one of the paragraphs of the ITO not subject to the publication ban, Mathews writes: “Based on the facts identified in my grounds for belief, I have concluded that Michael Sona was involved with the sending of misleading messages to electors in Guelph on May 2, (2011), that he admitted to personal involvement while leaving some suggestion that he did not act alone.”

He also alleges, “Further, a number of identified steps were taken by one or more persons on April 30 through May 2 in relation to these messages, which included the purchase and use of prepaid Peoples Trust payment cards, which I have left a record of time, location and use.”

Mathews swore the ITO to ensure his investigation legally obtained information about disposable Vanilla credits, purchased at Shoppers Drug Mart locations in Guelph shortly before the election. These cards were used to pay the Edmonton-based voice broadcasting company, RackNine, that the suspect used to send out the misleading automated calls.

He asked for a court order to obtain the list of other transactions, other than the RackNine purchases, that were recorded against the same four disposable Visa and MasterCard accounts. Although he had obtained this data previously, Mathews went back to the court in May for the order to ensure the evidence was legally acquired.