The Niagara Regional Police Officer accused of smuggling $300,000 worth of cheese and chicken wings across the border into Canada went on trial today. Scott Heron is facing six charges for violating the customs act and breach of trust. The crown says Heron was part of a criminal smuggling enterprise involving another Niagara Police Officer.

Heron was charged three and a half years ago for his role in a large scale cheese and chicken wing smuggling operation. Geoff Purdie, a disgraced and former Niagara Police Officer is also involved, and is the Crown’s star witness. Purdie testified the cheese smuggling began in 2009. Heron would make the phone calls for cases of cheese and Purdie was smuggle them over in his pickup truck.

Early 2012 on a cheese smuggling run, Purdie got scared. Convinced he was being followed, Purdie was already on the cross border task force’s radar for multiple steroid smuggling runs. He was convicted in 2013 for smuggling half a million dollars of steroids over the border. He spent a year in a US prison for that crime. He was facing up to ten years.