CRA scam: Fraud charges approved against former Burnaby resident who fled Canada

Vancouver -

Police say criminal charges have been filed against a former Burnaby resident who was allegedly involved in international telephone scams, including some in which the callers purported to be from the Canada Revenue Agency.

Haoran Xue has been charged with nine counts of fraud-related offences, according to a news release issued by the BC RCMP Federal Financial Integrity team on Thursday.

Specifically, Xue is facing the following charges:

• Fraud over $5,000
• Being party to an offence
• Theft over $5,000
• Possession of property obtained by crime
• Dealing with an identity document without lawful excuses
• Identity theft
• Personation with intent to gain advantage
• Multiple counts of uttering a forged document

The charges stem from an investigation into telephone scams that began in June 2019, police say, adding that the scammers were purporting to be representatives of the CRA, bank or police investigators, or software companies.

Victims of the scams were instructed to send the scammers cash via courier companies, police say.

Xue, then a 27-year-old Burnaby resident, was allegedly part of a group responsible for the "elaborate telemarketing scheme." Police say he communicated with three other people on encrypted and unencrypted social messaging platforms to co-ordinate the scheme.

Police allege that Xue participated in the fraud and subsequent money laundering related to seven victims, who collectively lost nearly $200,000, though $90,000 of that total was intercepted and returned, according to police.

Mounties say Xue fled Canada in August 2019 and a warrant has been issued for his arrest.

They also say that a home in Burnaby has been foreclosed by the B.C. Supreme Court for being "proceeds and an instrument of unlawful activity." The property has been sold, with proceeds from the sale now being held by the court.

In the release, the officer in charge of the BC RCMP Federal Serious and Organized Crime unit's financial integrity section, Supt. Brent Taylor, praises the investigators for their work.

"The dedicated work and determination of the financial integrity investigators who brought this national investigation to a positive result is commendable," Taylor says. "Too often, those who perpetrate these types of crime remain anonymous."