Saskatoon, Sask. – Most of the funds the City of Saskatoon lost to scammer posing as a construction executive have been located and locked down by the courts, city officials said.
“While it is early in the investigation, we’re pleased to say most of the funds have been identified or traced and have been locked-down by Court order,” said city manager Jeff Jorgenson in a press release.
Jorgenson says the city is chasing down every lead and working with banking institutions and the Saskatoon Police Service.
“Recovery of the remaining funds, further fortifying our controls, and gathering all of the facts continues to be the City’s number-one priority,” he says. “This is a very good start and we are cautiously optimistic about recovering more funds.”
The $1.04 million were put into a fraudster’s account earlier this month after they impersonated the chief financial officer for Allan Construction. They requested a change of banking information and after the city complied, the next contract payment intended to go to Allan deposited into the fraudulent bank account. The city discovered they had been duped on August 12.
A fraudster electronically impersonated the Chief Financial Officer of Allan Construction, asking for a change of banking information. The City complied, and as a result, the next contract payment intended to go to that company, was directed to the fraudster’s bank account. The fraud was identified on August 12, 2019.
“It’s very disconcerting that the perpetrator used my name and our company name to commit this crime,” says Allan Construction’s CFO Blaine Dubreuil in a press release. “We have done a security assessment and are confident that our systems were not hacked or compromised. We’ll be working closely with the City of Saskatoon and the Saskatoon Police Service as the investigation continues.”
The City has issued a claim with its insurer. Police, the city and Allan stated that to protect the investigation, no more details will be released at this time.
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