Article content
At the story’s end, she cried bitter tears, absolutely inconsolable at what she’d done — sending $10,000 to fraudsters posing as the police.
It was her life savings as a cleaner in Canada and the scam left her with 33 cents in her chequing account. Within about an hour Monday, it was all gone.
”It’s a tragedy in this particular case, a scandal in the broader one,” said her advocate and occasional employer, Sean Moore, a semi-retired lobbying expert who is a well-known figure in Parliamentary circles.
Her name is Jocelyn. She is 50, married with a daughter. She came to Canada from the Philippines about eight years ago and, for long stretches, worked two jobs: cleaning houses by day and Ottawa’s airport at night. (Postmedia has chosen not to use her last name to spare her any public shaming or future vulnerability.)
She was cleaning Moore’s house this week when her phone rang. A woman said her social insurance number was being used by criminals in a drug-related money laundering scheme. If she could provide the number of the local police station, this could be straightened out. She asked Jocelyn to find the number online, which she did. (She appears to have settled on the RCMP headquarters on the Vanier Parkway.)