Blog Dis
Fraud most foul...
2024-11-21
"Never steal anything under a million dollars," was the advice doled out to me as a young girl, by a man who ironically had to flee Canada to avoid charges and is now living in Malta. I guess he didn't follow his own advice. But I took his words to heart and never forgot them as I grew into an adult. As a teenager, however, I went thru my kleptomaniac phase during which I could lift any variety of face make-up that was small enough to fit into my pocket without being noticed. I assure you, however, I'm no longer this person. Five-finger discounts might seem lucrative on the surface, but it's just plain dumb.
Fraud is an entirely different animal. In the act of committing fraud, in most cases, the person doing the deed continues to maintain the façade of being your friend or trusted employee. Fraud is subversive and passive aggressive, to my mind, because it's not the same as a thief coming up to your car at a four-way stop wielding a knife, jacking your belongings with his or her angry face staring into your petrified face. With fraud, often the perpetrator is not necessarily known until caught. That is the nature of fraud, the crime must be committed under the noses of the losers who lose out. And so on this dreary day, when the sun is hiding, and there's a light canopy of rain, the online posts that appear to be rushing in like winter flurries, coming out of the USA online on social networks, are taking me back in time to Ottawa in 2008. This particular year had experienced a scandalous event. An employee working at the Department of National Defence (DND) was sentenced to 7 years in prison for defrauding the Canadian Government.
Here I am inspired to pose a rhetorical question: Should anyone bcus of this scandal have applauded the harsh measure of incarceration that was eventually meted out, to clap their hands, to jump into the air, yelling hooray?
Here comes the rub. A fraud is a fraud is a fraud but do you measure the difference in the amount of money that is being defrauded to consider the act of fraud a bona fide fraud or do you not regard it as fraud, if it's a small amount of money, such as an employee taking home with them a harmless pen?
The individual charged, whose first name is Paul, had defrauded the Department of National Defence to the tune of $140 million (Cdn funds). His lifestyle had reached such a swanky level that he owned several homes in the Turks and Caicos Islands, numerous fast cars w/ the requisite fast women, clothes, lavish vacations and the like, seemingly going about his life and work as though it was all normal and owed to him. The intricate invoicing scheme Paul had set up was funneled through DND - phony contracts were issued for inflated work orders that were never filled but invoices were paid by DND for services and supplies that were never received. And when finally asked by his employees how on earth could he afford such a grand life, owing to the fact that he made $60,000 a year, Paul replied that his fortune was derived from playing the stock market, and the casino.
Riiight. I'll have another crack across the mouth, thank you, if you please.
The question has remained with me: Were the monies ever returned to DND or was every red cent spent? The answer to this question of course is not privy to the public. A plea-bargain was arrived at between all parties. But I bet bcus so much money was spent on homes, clothes and expensive vacations that not even DND was prepared to admit the whole truth of their grandiose stupidity. The scheme went undetected for a decade and was only discovered when one supplier came knocking on DND's door looking for payment. At least Paul was smart enough to spend the money as opposed to setting up Swiss bank accounts, where the money could be traced and ultimately returned - the smart, thieving bastard!
Some conversations we never forget. It doesn't matter how many years pass. I remember when this scandal hit the 6 o'clock news, my mom called me to declare that if she could get away with stealing over $100 million, she'd be willing to spend 7 years in jail just to do it. "No, mom," I countered. "You wouldn't want to spend one day in Millhaven, rest assured."
Millhaven is a maximum-security prison in Bath, Ontario. This prison is considered one of Canada's most brutal penitentiaries and perhaps this is just reward. Having grown up with a father whose close friends were police offices, I had occasion to dialogue with them, some of whom were required to deliver prisoners to Millhaven. Even seasoned police offices, a select few having worked as undercover narcotics officers, freely admitted that dropping off a prisoner at Millhaven was an unsettling experience, leaving them feeling terrified to even step inside the prison.
And this brings me to my main point on Government spending, and how annually each year our country's Auditor General releases a report to the entire country on wasteful spending. The AG's report is intended to deliver a list of specific cost-cutting measures, to stop the bleeding of tax-payers' dollars. Yet, not one recommendation is ever followed, nor is there a follow-up within the Government rank and file if even any of these recommendations had been taken into consideration. This seems insane to me!
I can say with 100% certainty that not even stealing a million dollars would be worth one day in Millhaven. I'll take my small life for what it is and be content.
[Aerial view of Millhaven; holds 413 inmates, known as 'gladiator school' - convicts who serve time here are highly regarded in the criminal subculture]
Fraud is an entirely different animal. In the act of committing fraud, in most cases, the person doing the deed continues to maintain the façade of being your friend or trusted employee. Fraud is subversive and passive aggressive, to my mind, because it's not the same as a thief coming up to your car at a four-way stop wielding a knife, jacking your belongings with his or her angry face staring into your petrified face. With fraud, often the perpetrator is not necessarily known until caught. That is the nature of fraud, the crime must be committed under the noses of the losers who lose out. And so on this dreary day, when the sun is hiding, and there's a light canopy of rain, the online posts that appear to be rushing in like winter flurries, coming out of the USA online on social networks, are taking me back in time to Ottawa in 2008. This particular year had experienced a scandalous event. An employee working at the Department of National Defence (DND) was sentenced to 7 years in prison for defrauding the Canadian Government.
Here I am inspired to pose a rhetorical question: Should anyone bcus of this scandal have applauded the harsh measure of incarceration that was eventually meted out, to clap their hands, to jump into the air, yelling hooray?
Here comes the rub. A fraud is a fraud is a fraud but do you measure the difference in the amount of money that is being defrauded to consider the act of fraud a bona fide fraud or do you not regard it as fraud, if it's a small amount of money, such as an employee taking home with them a harmless pen?
The individual charged, whose first name is Paul, had defrauded the Department of National Defence to the tune of $140 million (Cdn funds). His lifestyle had reached such a swanky level that he owned several homes in the Turks and Caicos Islands, numerous fast cars w/ the requisite fast women, clothes, lavish vacations and the like, seemingly going about his life and work as though it was all normal and owed to him. The intricate invoicing scheme Paul had set up was funneled through DND - phony contracts were issued for inflated work orders that were never filled but invoices were paid by DND for services and supplies that were never received. And when finally asked by his employees how on earth could he afford such a grand life, owing to the fact that he made $60,000 a year, Paul replied that his fortune was derived from playing the stock market, and the casino.
Riiight. I'll have another crack across the mouth, thank you, if you please.
The question has remained with me: Were the monies ever returned to DND or was every red cent spent? The answer to this question of course is not privy to the public. A plea-bargain was arrived at between all parties. But I bet bcus so much money was spent on homes, clothes and expensive vacations that not even DND was prepared to admit the whole truth of their grandiose stupidity. The scheme went undetected for a decade and was only discovered when one supplier came knocking on DND's door looking for payment. At least Paul was smart enough to spend the money as opposed to setting up Swiss bank accounts, where the money could be traced and ultimately returned - the smart, thieving bastard!
Some conversations we never forget. It doesn't matter how many years pass. I remember when this scandal hit the 6 o'clock news, my mom called me to declare that if she could get away with stealing over $100 million, she'd be willing to spend 7 years in jail just to do it. "No, mom," I countered. "You wouldn't want to spend one day in Millhaven, rest assured."
Millhaven is a maximum-security prison in Bath, Ontario. This prison is considered one of Canada's most brutal penitentiaries and perhaps this is just reward. Having grown up with a father whose close friends were police offices, I had occasion to dialogue with them, some of whom were required to deliver prisoners to Millhaven. Even seasoned police offices, a select few having worked as undercover narcotics officers, freely admitted that dropping off a prisoner at Millhaven was an unsettling experience, leaving them feeling terrified to even step inside the prison.
And this brings me to my main point on Government spending, and how annually each year our country's Auditor General releases a report to the entire country on wasteful spending. The AG's report is intended to deliver a list of specific cost-cutting measures, to stop the bleeding of tax-payers' dollars. Yet, not one recommendation is ever followed, nor is there a follow-up within the Government rank and file if even any of these recommendations had been taken into consideration. This seems insane to me!
I can say with 100% certainty that not even stealing a million dollars would be worth one day in Millhaven. I'll take my small life for what it is and be content.
[Aerial view of Millhaven; holds 413 inmates, known as 'gladiator school' - convicts who serve time here are highly regarded in the criminal subculture]
