This is a guest post by Sam Peters
If you have been watching any daytime television over the past fifteen years, you know there is strong competition for your mobility dollar. Your government sponsored healthcare is willing to spend big money on your increased mobility and companies are in a marketing war to receive those benefits. Gone are the days of walkers and manual wheelchairs and in are the days of power scooters and wheelchairs. It is easier than ever to keep an active lifestyle.
Watch your wallet, three of the most important words of advice you may ever hear. You ignore them at your peril, since the consequences may be very serious in a number of different ways.
Today is Elder Abuse Day in Canada as Sharon Singleton points out in her article, Seniors should focus on estate planning.
Canada will mark Elder Abuse Day on Tuesday, with concern about retirement and pension planning mounting as the population ages. Nearly half of all Canadians from the baby boomer generation have not saved enough for their needs, according to a poll carried out for the Canadian Institute of Actuaries.
As lawyer Les Kotzer of Fish & Associates suggests that’s a recipe for exploitation of their elders. In his book, Where There’s an Inheritance, he collates about 80 anecdotes on how a lack of estate planning, or mistakes in working out a will, have led to abuses.
Longer lives and reducing financial resources give a double whammy to those who have done insufficient retirement planning. That can affect both the boomers and their parents. The boomers are hoping to inherit from their recession-era parents who are in turn dependant on over-indebted kids.
Kotzer points out that some of the most common problems come from giving up control to the children, without having proper protection in place. He cites a number of examples:
Children who had convinced their mother that she could save them money on taxes when she died by transferring her assets to them. They then paid her an allowance, though when she overspent one month, her daughter yelled at her.
An 80-year old woman was pressured by her son to put the house in his name to avoid probate taxes. What he didn’t tell her was that his business was going bankrupt and his creditors sent her a letter laying claim to the house.
A 75-year-old woman worked two jobs. She had loaned her daughter $100,000 and her son $150,000 and when her husband died asked for the money back. Her daughter didn’t have the cash and her son claimed it was never intended as a loan and she’d have to go to court and sue him for it.
It is important to keep good records and these documents need reviewing on a regular basis to reflect changes in life. Wills should be drawn up and kept up to date as grandchildren are born, or children get divorced. Putting such documents away and forgetting them is a recipe for a family disaster.
If we were only talking about the book, there would be little hardship involved. Unfortunately it could be used to label the latest Ponzi scheme in Canada as we read that Businessman missing as Dutch Canadians out millions.
At least 80 elderly Dutch Canadians trusted Harry Snoek Jr. with their life savings. But the money is gone. And so is Harry, possibly back in the Netherlands or maybe Qatar, leaving a trail of empty promises and despair in his wake.
By the latest tally of those who have come forward and who are trying in Ontario courts to recoup their losses, Snoek has absconded with more than $34 million. The total number of affected investors may be as high as 200.
Promissory notes and court documents obtained as part of a Toronto Star investigation, as well as interviews of investors and business partners, suggest Snoek ran a Ponzi scheme, where early investors are paid off from the contributions of later ones. The RCMP is looking into the case.
Troubling payment delays from Snoek started in 2007 with Snoek exploiting shared ties to motherland and church to ease anxieties and keep their money just a few months more, and then another few months more.
In a lawsuit filed in Brantford, a receiver was appointed who is combing through Snoek company files. The receiver may try to sell Snoek properties in Milton and spread the proceeds to investors. But it is believed that the land will fetch only a fraction of what Snoek owes.
Unfortunately paradise will not be regained.
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If you have income, then you must pay taxes. That is true even when that income may be only what a Ponzi schemer may have reported to you. That is unfortunately the situation in which the Montréal victims of Earl Jones now find themselves.
Apparently the Quebec tax authorities will try to lighten the tax burden on Jones’s victims even though many should have no tax burden since the income was illusory.
Victims of financial fraudster Earl Jones won’t have to pay taxes on investment income they didn’t actually earn, Quebec Revenue Minister Robert Dutil announced. Jones’s victims will also be able claim a deduction for lost revenues, Dutil said in a statement. “I sympathize with these people who are going through a deplorable situation, and I want to clarify this to help avoid all confusion for these victims,” he said.
When someone is in a precarious financial situation and unable to meet their obligations, the agency follows their case closely in line with the information available.
Some of the fraudster’s victims are finding at the federal level that things are moving more slowly and there are delays in getting some relief for taxes they paid on fictitious income.
Kevin Curran, a member of the Earl Jones Victims Organizing Committee, says the government told victims last summer to file adjusted tax returns for previous years stating that the fake income provided to them by Mr. Jones was erroneously reported, at which point they would receive tax refunds. Many of the more than 150 victims did so, but despite a promise to move swiftly, they are still waiting for their tax returns. Some of these people are struggling to afford daily living expenses. Furthermore, a handful of the victims that would qualify for increased government pensions cannot get them because their income is still wrongly pegged as being too high.
Last year in the United States, the Ponzi Scheme victims of Bernie Madoff received somewhat faster tax breaks although the public resentment about the support the troubled banks were getting may have created a more favorable climate for speedy action.
The Internal Revenue Service announced unprecedented tax relief for victims of Ponzi schemes, saying many of those affected could deduct up to 95% of their losses immediately. The move represents a significant relaxation of longstanding limits on tax relief for victims of investment scams. It reflects the pressure officials are feeling to help individuals who have been hurt in the current financial crisis, when public resentment is growing over the billions of dollars the government is directing into troubled banks and other big corporations.
Meanwhile it is good to see that vigorous action is being taken to prosecute those who perpetrated these dreadful schemes. The Feds are targeting Bernie Madoff’s brother and sons for Tax Fraud.
Last summer, prosecutors essentially made clear they wouldn’t go after Bernie’s wife, Ruth. But that’s not the case in regard to his brother, Peter, or his sons, Mark and Andrew. It is reported that federal tax-fraud prosecutors in Manhattan are pursuing cases against Bernard Madoff’s brother and sons.
To add to this sorry tale of woe, it now appears that there is a Bogus Web Site Reportedly Trying to Rip Off Madoff Victims
A bogus Web site is targeting victims of Bernard Madoff’s record Ponzi scheme in an apparent identity-theft scam, the Securities Investor Protection Corp warned today, The New York Post reported. The site claims that $1.3 billion in Madoff money was recently found hidden in Malaysia, and displays photos of huge stacks of cash allegedly stashed by the mega-crook. The so-called “International Securities Investor Protection Corporation” urges burned investors to submit claims by filling out an online form and mailing in a copy of “your most recent brokerage account statement.”
The site rips off design elements of the real SIPC site. The SIPC wants to be as clear as possible that Madoff victims and other investors should not share any personal financial information via this Web site or rely upon it as an information source.
One would hope that these poor victims have gone through enough to realize that once bitten requires them to be twice shy.
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Earl Jones gets an 11-year sentence for orchestrating his massive fraud scheme.
Victims of the Ponzi schemer had hoped he would get the maximum 14-year sentence but a deal reached between prosecutors and his attorneys agreed on the 11-year sentence. Since he can apply for parole after serving one-sixth of his sentence that means he could be released from prison after 22 months. Many victims who have seen their future destroyed wonder how such an evil fraudster could possibly be spared the maximum sentence allowed by the law.
Earl Jones pleaded guilty last month to running a pyramid scheme that started in 1982 and included at least 158 victims, including several close friends and relatives. The Quebec court Judge Helene Morin was extremely harsh on Earl Jones in her remarks Monday. “Some victims call him a liar, a demon, a parasite, a snake, a financial predator and a social sociopath, as he promised them that their money was not only to be safe with him but growing.”
Many people had trusted Earl Jones but perhaps the most devastating case was that of his brother, Bevan.
Jones’ brother said he never wanted to speak to him again and would never forgive him.
“None of us will ever be the same,” said Bevan Jones who, along with his wife Frances Gordon, was fleeced out of $1 million.
“You work all your life, you sell your printing company and now we live on our government pension,” Bevan Jones said.
“Everything we saved up for and worked for is gone, ruined, by this little … I can’t say the word.”
The judge made sure that Earl Jones understood that his victims are not just suffering financially: she said all have suffered from insomnia and many have seen their health rapidly deteriorate. Some who took pride in never having taken medication are now on anti-depressants.
Jones has been shunned not only by his friends and relatives, but his wife Maxine has also filed for divorce. Jones once lived in the lap of luxury, but recently, he lived anonymously in a suburban rooming house and was penniless apart from a government pension.
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Be warned that Online scams abound even on some of the most reputable websites such as Craigslist. Apparently some buyers are more interested in scamming you than in scoring a great deal.
Alan Munro posted an ad on Craigslist to sell a windsurfer board and was asked to email the prospective purchaser an invoice through PayPal. He did so and got an email that seemed to come from PayPal, saying that a remittance had been made. But since the invoice was in U.S. dollars, he was asked to pay the exchange difference before the money was released. Paypal does not send such emails and this was a scam.
Craigslist and other similar services such as Kijiji, suggest some simple rules to avoid getting taken in:
Applying just those two simple rules will ensure that you do not get taken in by these ever more prevalent scams.
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There are many hazards in dealing with banks and trying to ensure the security of your bank dealings and your money. A new hazard is that a Bogus bank manager may be calling local seniors.
The Niagara Regional Police have issued a warning about two incidents where seniors have been contacted by an individual claiming to be calling from the senior’s financial institution and posing as the branch manager. The caller appears to have sufficient information regarding the senior’s account to appear to be a manager.
Supposedly there is an investigation of an internal theft involving a teller. The senior is requested to withdraw a significant sum of money and meet the ‘bank manager’ away from the financial institution in an effort to catch the dishonest teller.
Once the senior meets the caller and turns over the money, the suspect thanks the senior for their cooperation and leaves the area. Police are warning the public that no financial institution would involve any of their clients in any such type of ‘sting operation.’
Remember it is most important to shred all financial information before disposing of it and not release any personal information over the phone or by email unless you have initiated the call and are certain with whom you are dealing.
If some incident like this happens, you are encouraged to call Crime Stoppers. You can leave an anonymous tip or information at the Crime Stoppers toll-free number at 1-800-222-TIPS (8477). Calls are not electronically recorded or traced, and Crime Stoppers does not subscribe to call display.
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According to the RCMP, several Calgary residents tricked 24 elderly or disabled Americans out of about $3 million over a three-year period by telling them they had won a lottery. This lottery scam targeted U.S. seniors.
Between 2005 and 2008, the victims were contacted by letter or phone and told they had won a lottery or sweepstakes but were required to pay taxes, administration fees or lawyers’ fees before they could collect winnings, which didn’t exist.
One person sent in between $500,000 and $1 million, with the scam collecting about $3 million in total. Some people lost their life savings, and have been ostracized by family or have been forced to remortgage their homes. Others in their 70s had to return to work.
Investigators have arrested four people from Calgary, one from Burnaby, B.C., and one from Toronto. Canada-wide arrest warrants are outstanding for three other suspects who police believe are in the Calgary area.
As the Times Journal advises, Be Skeptical, Be Rude – Don’t Be a Victim
Each year, nearly 25 million Americans are victims of consumer fraud. Senior citizens are more at risk of telemarketing scams than any other age group. Fraudulent telemarketers direct 56 to 80 percent of their calls at older adults.
Evidence indicates that offenders believe older people have more assets and are more susceptible to excitement tactics or appeals to altruism. They have told police their ideal “mark” is an elderly person, who lives alone, with no contact with family members. They know that senior citizens will not give money or personal information to just any stranger. These experienced criminals have made a science of gaining the trust of older adults.
If a smooth talker wants to keep talking and you are concerned about his or her motives, cut the call quickly or even just hang up the telephone. Follow up some of the principles involved in Assertiveness Training and stay in control of the conversation. One trick is to have a short phrase that is easy to say, which is guaranteed, when repeated several times, to cause the caller to end the call. That could for example be “This is not for me.”
Scam artists are experts in establishing rapport to steal seniors’ money. There are a variety of approaches including:
Criminals assume that senior citizens will not report the crime to law enforcement officials because they will be ashamed of being victimized. They also worry that concerned family members will take control of their finances.
Recognizing scammers is important and you then should report them to the appropriate law enforcement authorities. This is critical to protect others. When you report a scammer, you help the police prosecute them and this stops the scammer from stealing from someone else.
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