A retired police officer Canada accused of being an agent for China has been acquitted of national security charges after prosecutors failed to prove he acted illegally.

William Majcher, who served in the RCMP’s financial crime unit, was charged in 2023 over allegations he had breached Canada’s Security of Information Act by helping Chinese police coerce a Vancouver-area real estate investor, accused of fraud, to return to China.

On Wednesday, Martha Devlin, a British Columbia supreme court justice, found Majcher was not guilty of a charge under Canada’s Security of Information Act.

Devlin said the crown, which brought a rarely used charge against Majcher had “failed to meet its burden” in this case.

The closely watched case came amid fears that China was interfering in Canadian elections and operating clandestine “police stations” throughout the country to threaten dissidents.

Majcher, who lives in Hong Kong and works as a private financial and cybersecurity investigator, was arrested in Vancouver in 2023.

At the time, police alleged he “used his knowledge and his extensive network of contacts in Canada to obtain intelligence or services to benefit the People’s Republic of China”.

But the case unspooled at trial, with the crown unable to convince a judge that anything illegal occurred.

Devlin said she found evidence by prosecutors was “entirely circumstantial” and that the arrest by the RCMP appeared to be based on a “hunch or generalized suspicion”.

She also questioned a meeting between Majcher and Peter German, his former boss and an anti-money-laundering expert. In the meeting, Majcher explained his working relationship with the Chinese government.

“I find it at least reasonable to infer that Mr Majcher would not direct the attention of a former high-ranking law enforcement official towards his activities with the [People’s Republic of China] if Mr Majcher intended and understood those activities to be aimed at unlawful extortive conduct,” Devlin wrote.

Majcher told reporters after the verdict that he was “very grateful” to both the judge and his wife. Majcher said the three years of legal fighting had been “devastating” for his wife and young children. “That’s time I’ll never get back, they’ll never get back.”

Majcher’s lawyer Ian Donaldson told reporters after the verdict that foreign interference fears may have influenced the RCMP’s investigation and the “very significant public resources” it took up.

“Today, of course, with irony, America is thought to be the enemy and China is our friend,” he said.