An Ontario woman has been sentenced to house arrest for a year for her role in a “grandparent scam” that cheated nine Manitoba seniors out of nearly $90,000.
Gabriel Paradis, 27, pleaded guilty to one count of fraud over $5,000 after admitting to being a “money mule” for a crime ring whose leaders remain unidentified.
The grandparent scam, which has victimized an increasing number of Manitoba seniors in the past few years, involves a fraudster who claims to be a relative in need of money to get out of a sticky situation. The caller pleads with the victim to keep it a secret. Scammers are known to research obituaries or start the phone call with leading questions to gain credibility with the victim.
There have been dozens of similar cases in southern Manitoba this year alone. RCMP believe there are more victims of the scam than are reported to police.
It’s becoming increasingly common for victims to be hit by the same scammer multiple times, and for the scammer to show up in person to collect the money.
The Winnipeg branch of the Canadian Association for Retired Persons regularly holds talks for its members about how to identify and avoid scams. Similar information is included in newsletters sent to members.
Bank employees in Canada are trained to ask probing questions if a customer makes an unusual transaction, yet seniors continue to fall prey to fraudsters.
The grandparent scam is one of several illegal ploys that have surfaced recently to take advantage of unsuspecting victims.
“Clearly, Ms. Paradis is not the head of this organization, she is not the kingpin,” defence lawyer Franco Aiello told provincial court Judge Julie Frederickson at a sentencing hearing Tuesday. “To some extent, she was exploited.”
Court heard a Brandon woman received a phone call July 27, 2022, from a man claiming to be her grandson, saying he had been texting while driving and hit a pregnant woman.
“The male advised that he had been arrested and… put the grandparent on with someone purporting to be a lawyer and was requesting $9,000 for bail,” Crown attorney Peter Edgett said.
The woman went to her bank and withdrew $9,000 cash, Edgett said. That same afternoon, Paradis knocked on the woman’s door, picked up the money and drove away with a female co-accused.
The next day, the phone scammers targeted a Winnipeg senior.
“Luckily, the victim in this case started asking the (caller) a lot of questions they couldn’t provide answers to,” Edgett said. “Ultimately, this accused and the co-accused aborted their operation,” by which time police had already been alerted and spotted their vehicle.
A day later, Winnipeg police executed a search warrant at the Airbnb where the two woman had been staying and found envelopes containing $75,000 in cash hidden underneath a bed.
Police identified a total of nine Manitoba victims cheated by the crime ring.
“Luckily, in this situation, police were able to zero in and recover most of the money.”–Crown attorney Peter Edgett
“Luckily, in this situation, police were able to zero in and recover most of the money,” Edgett said.
According to a pre-sentence report prepared for court, Paradis had a troubled upbringing marred by domestic violence and instability and has struggled with addictions to methamphetamine and fentanyl.
Court heard Paradis’s history of addiction and need for cash made her ripe for exploitation by her crime bosses.
“The accused is at the lowest end of the spectrum,” Edgett said. “You have people who are quite sophisticated at the top who are getting all this information and targeting (victims) and then insulating themselves with people like (Paradis), who really don’t care about themselves… who are desperate for money and basically prepared to take all the risk for a small token of money.”
Edgett and Aiello jointly recommended Paradis be allowed to serve a conditional sentence in the community. Frederickson said she had “some concerns” about the recommendation, given Paradis’s ongoing addiction issues, but said she was prepared to go along with it in light of her good behaviour while on bail.
“I do recognize I made bad choices and I’m doing my best to stay away from drugs,” Paradis said.
— with files from Malak Abas
dean.pritchard@freepress.mb.ca
Dean Pritchard
Courts reporter
Dean Pritchard is courts reporter for the Free Press. He has covered the justice system since 1999, working for the Brandon Sun and Winnipeg Sun before joining the Free Press in 2019. Read more about Dean.
Every piece of reporting Dean produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print — part of the Free Press‘s tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press’s history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates.
Our newsroom depends on a growing audience of readers to power our journalism. If you are not a paid reader, please consider becoming a subscriber.
Our newsroom depends on its audience of readers to power our journalism. Thank you for your support.