Achi news desk-
A group of suspects who allegedly defrauded seniors across Ontario and other parts of Canada through the so-called emergency grandparent scam appear to have ties to “traditional Italian organized crime,” according to an investigator involved in the OPP-led investigation.
Details of the inter-county investigation, known as Project Sharp, were announced at a news conference in Scarborough on Thursday morning.
Police said 56 charges were filed against 14 suspects, all of whom were arrested in the Montreal area.
Sûreté du Québec deputy chief Benoît Dubé said the suspects were part of a group that had “ties to traditional Italian organized crime.”
According to police, since January, investigators have identified 126 victims who were defrauded out of a total of $739,000. Fifteen of those victims were targeted on multiple occasions, police said, resulting in the loss of an additional $200,000.
Most of the victims are from Ontario
The victims, who ranged in age from 46 to 95, lived across the country, police said, adding that most were from Ontario.
According to the investigators, four of the 14 suspects remained in custody while the other 10 were released on bail. The charges they face include involvement in organized crime groups, extortion by threats, impersonating a police officer and fraud, police said.
OPP Det.-Insp. Sean Chetland told reporters Thursday that the investigation began as an intelligence investigation in September 2022.
“It took us a significant amount of time to really understand this group, understand how they operated, even identify them,” Chetland said.
“As soon as we were able to identify this group, we immediately moved to a criminal investigation.”
By February 2023, Chetland said the investigation had been formalized into an OPP-led joint force investigation involving police services in Ontario and Quebec.
“This organized crime group demonstrated a deliberate and systematic approach in exploiting victims. They operated out of Ontario and Quebec, using grandparent emergency scams on victims across Canada,” he said.
“They would impersonate police officers, judges, lawyers and loved ones, preying on grandparents who believed they were trying to help family members in trouble.”
The victims, according to the police, were instructed by the suspects not to speak to anyone due to a “banning order” that was in effect.
The police are shown at a press conference announcing the results of a multi-jurisdictional investigation into the grandparents’ fraud. (CP24)
The victims had lines
Chatland said that in many cases, the suspects used “money mules” or bulldozers to collect large sums of money from the victims.
The victims, he said, were targeted based on the fact that they had landlines.
According to Chatland, the information the suspects used to defraud the victims was publicly available online.
According to him, the impact on the victims in this case was “devastating”.
“This investigation is much more than fraud,” Chetland said. “This organized crime group has affected victims across Canada in a way that will change their lives mentally and financially for many.”
He said investigators “worked closely” with financial institutions and the Canadian Bankers Association to recover losses of more than $500,000.
Police are seen taking evidence from a building in Quebec during an inter-provincial investigation dubbed ‘Project Sharp’. (handout)
Fraud ‘massively underreported’
Chetland said the OPP believes the group is responsible for more than $2.2 million in losses since the intelligence investigation was launched in 2022.
“That’s what we were able to determine, but we suspect it’s probably bigger than that,” he said.
He noted that the OPP believes that only about five to 10 percent of all fraud cases are actually reported to the police.
“Fraud is very underreported,” he said. “A lot of it has to do with victimization, victim blaming and people just feeling cheated. That’s the nature of fraud.”
For the full list of arrests and charges, go to this link.
