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Crime

Everything you need to know about the failed assassination attempt of Donald Trump

Published

7 months ago

41 minute read

From LifeSiteNews

By Frank Wright

Amid all the varying accounts and evidence, there is no clear picture of the attempt to kill Donald Trump, and the FBI and Secret Service have been unwilling or unable to supply answers to the questions raised by the failed assassination.

Almost two weeks have passed since the miraculous survival of Donald Trump and still the major questions raised by his attempted assassination are unanswered.

How can the United States Congress fail to determine the facts of a systematic failure of security which seems almost designed to permit an attempt on the former president’s life?

The obvious questions – how could this happen? – and why? – have equally obvious answers. The reason there are no answers is because Donald Trump is the mortal enemy of the entire political establishment of the U.S. and its subject nations.

We are ruled by a conspiracy against the obvious. The attempt to kill Donald Trump cannot be understood if we do not begin with a statement of the obvious: his political enemies want him dead.

This is a report on the official and unofficial investigations into what the FBI called “an incident” on July 13. As we shall see, the official lines of inquiry effectively exclude the obvious.

The most obvious fact of all is that everyone except the people supposed to protect him have seen this coming for a long time.

See no evil

The version of events presented by the bare facts is another conspiracy against the obvious. The story says a lone gunman – a 20 year old called Thomas Matthew Crooks – decided to shoot Trump one day, and no one stopped him until he had done so. According to CNN, Crooks scoped the site with a rangefinder three hours before the shooting, and was seen doing so, before returning to carry it out. A rangefinder has one use: to report the distance to a target.

Former Secret Service chief Kimberly Cheatle said a rangefinder “is not a prohibited item” when asked why Crooks was not stopped.

Crooks was filmed wandering the perimeter of the Trump rally one hour before the shooting. 

He was photographed by Secret Service snipers and seen on the roof by them – and others – well before the shots were fired. 

‘We cannot trust the FBI’

This report will first examine the official story of a lone gunman acting alone. Cheatle refused to answer whether her agency had produced a complete timeline of Crooks’ movements leading up to the moment of Trump’s shooting.

“We cannot trust the FBI to do an open and honest investigation” said Sen. Ron Johnson, speaking to Fox News.

Johnson also mentions that local law enforcement, tasked with securing the building from which the shooting took place, were instructed to send pictures they took on the day to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF). “What does the ATF have to do with this?” he was asked. Perhaps the FBI will explain.

Perhaps not. FBI Director Christopher Wray told Congress on July 24 that he had doubts as to whether Trump was shot at all.

This seems callous in the extreme, given that Corey Comperatore was killed and two other men critically injured by the shootings.

During the hearing, it was reported that two FBI agents were on record expressing regret that Trump had survived. 

The FBI, which sees no evil in Crooks which can explain his actions, and whose director insists Crooks “acted alone,” may itself be connected to the shooting.

Reports have surfaced showing a phone connected to Crooks was “pinged” eight times in the vicinity of an FBI field office in 2023.

The Secret Service cannot say whether it has attempted to recreate Crooks’ movements and connections prior to the shooting. In the absence of any evidence of an official attempt to do so, this task has been undertaken by the Heritage Foundation’s Oversight Project, and reported on July 22 by independent news outlet Blaze Media:

According to Oversight investigators, a phone associated with Crooks’ work address at a nursing home in Bethel Park, Pennsylvania, traveled to the Gallery Place complex in downtown Washington, D.C., on June 26, 2023. The phone ‘pinged’ seven or eight times from that location the same day.

Gallery Place – an 11-story mixed-use building constructed over the Chinatown Metro station – is filled with retail stores and restaurants but also houses offices of the FBI on the upper floors, former FBI Special Agent Kyle Seraphin told Blaze News.

‘It is the closest [location] off-site that I’m aware of to the Washington Field Office,’ Seraphin said. ‘Agents are assigned to Washington Field, but they work out of Gallery Place.’

Former Secret Service chief Cheatle told Congress she knew how many bullet casings were found beside Crooks’ body – but refused to tell Congress. Cheatle referred Congress to the FBI for more information.

This is significant. At least nine – some say ten shots – were recorded on the day. A burst of three, followed by a different sounding burst of five, then perhaps another, then finally the single shot from the Secret Service sniper who killed Crooks.

The number of ejected shell casings on the roof beside Crooks would indicate how many shots came from him on that roof. Cheatle’s refusal to tell Congress is a refusal to admit what sound analysis appears to have confirmed: there was more than one shooter on the day.

Sen. Ron Johnson points out Cheatle’s refusal to tell Congress that reports claimed eight shell casings were found beside Crooks’ body.

Oversight Project Director Mike Howell warned of the obvious conflict of interest in permitting the Secret Service and the FBI to investigate themselves:

For the protection of whistleblowers and our investigation, we will not be sharing further information with the congressional task force due to the connective tissue between that entity and FBI, USSS, and other entities.

Mike Benz noted how the Oversight Project’s “parallel” investigation of the Trump assassin “already has more transparency and information than what the FBI is telling us.”

Why would anyone distrust the FBI? Here it refers to “the incident that took place today involving President Trump” and reassures Americans it has “assumed the role of the lead federal law enforcement agency” investigating this “incident.”

 

One role the FBI will play will be that of investigating its own links to the supposed “lone gunman.” FBI Director Wray says the agency still has no idea of the motive behind the shooting.

In addition, the Department for Homeland Security (DHS) will be investigating its own failure to secure the homeland. Sen. Josh Hawley revealed that whistleblowers told him that some of Trump’s security detail were “not even Secret Service. DHS assigned unprepared and inexperienced personnel.”

In place of Secret Service, Hawley’s sources claim Homeland Security Investigations agents were used instead. You can watch a video here which asks you to spot which agents might be “DEI” placements from DHS.

Can we reasonably expect DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas to answer for this, or for the DHS “taking over” communications from the Secret Service to Congress?

Apparently not. On July 24, as a U.S. Senate hearing on the “Trump shooting” was announced, Hawley noted that Mayorkas would not be present to answer questions.

Conspiracy or clown show?

There are two ways to see the clear path to the assassination of Trump that Crooks was presented on the day. One – incredible incompetence. Two – a conspiracy to kill the enemy of the status quo.

The attempt to kill Trump is slipping off the news cycle. The latest news is that Kim Cheatle has refused to answer any of the most important questions around the shooting. She appears to have perjured herself before Congress whilst doing so.

She has since resigned. So far, no one has recommended she undergo enhanced interrogation to encourage her to respond to questioning.

Cheatle was even condemned by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, as well as Marjorie Taylor Greene – a genuinely bipartisan outrage at the “security failures” over which Cheatle had presided.

Greene asked bluntly, “Was there a stand down order? Was there a conspiracy to assassinate President Trump?” 

Cheatle said the Secret Service had no audio recordings from the day of the shooting.

Cheatle was shown video of Crooks crawling on the roof before the shooting, asking to explain why he was not seen as a threat.

Cheatle refused to answer when asked whether Crooks was “acting alone,” referring Congress to the FBI investigation.

Following this performance, House Oversight Committee Chairman Rep. James Comer said “there will be more accountability to come” following Cheatle’s resignation. Comer’s pledge displays a confidence that few sane people will share.

The actors from the Deep State are never held to account.

More to this story?

It is unlikely in the extreme that Cheatle, Mayorkas, or any of the people who have sought to destroy Trump will ever be held accountable – unless he takes power in November.

They know this very well, and this is an obvious reason why the only good Trump is a dead Trump to the Deep State. This is a view shared by some members of Congress.

As Rep. Eli Crane asked the House Committee on Homeland Security on July 23:

After partisan attempts to bankrupt Trump, to imprison him for 750 years and countless depictions of him as a modern-day Hitler –  are you surprised that a lot of Americans are like, ‘Maybe there’s more to this story’?

Cheatle’s role in the story was to briefly become it, but her appearance before Congress was a master class in refusing the mention of the obvious.

No news from Cheatle is good news – if you support the official conspiracy theory of a lone gunman, favored by an unlikely series of helpful oversights.

How fortunate was this son of a registered Libertarian? The timeline of Crooks’ movements raises even more questions than those Cheatle declined to answer.

Timeline of events

The court press of the regime which hates Trump has offered a simple timeline of the day. NBC’s “full timeline” has it like this:

5:10PM: Crooks, the shooter, identified as a person of interest.
5:30PM: Crooks spotted with rangefinder.
5:52PM: Crooks spotted on roof by Secret Service.
6:02PM: Trump takes stage.
6:12PM: Crooks fires first shots.

Even the lying press admits a 20-minute gap between Crooks being seen with a rifle on the roof and the shots fired at Trump. He had been noted as suspicious one hour before the shooting.

Sen. Chuck Grassley published video on July 23 that showed agents admitting they had identified Crooks as a danger before he was permitted to start shooting.

The man who was mentioned as “detained” is this man, who appears to be the owner of the bicycle that some accounts – such as that of the U.K.’s Daily Mail – said belonged to Crooks.

Pictures of the bicycle showed a bag on the handlebars and a backpack on the ground beside it.

The bag on the handlebars appears to be the bedroll of Mr. Evans, the owner of the bicycle. Media reports said the bike belonged to Crooks. Evans said he was detained – not for being the shooter. “They thought I had the bomb.”

Agents in the video released by Sen. Grassley can be heard saying they saw Crooks arrive on a bicycle, with a backpack, but then lost sight of him.

NBC’s timeline is far from “full.” It excludes these and other key events, including Crooks’ actions in preparing for the shooting, the presence of explosives in a vehicle at the site, and the eyewitness reports of at least a second shooter.

The timeline: complete?

A far more comprehensive timeline has been published here. It begins with Crooks’ preparations, which included visiting the site three times: once a week beforehand, once on the morning of the shooting – and once more to carry it out.

Crooks bought a remote transmitter to detonate explosives, planned a drone surveillance route, and set up and used “encrypted communications channels” before visiting a shooting range on July 12.

At some point he hid the weapon on site, before the “pac man” perimeter was set up.

Kim Cheatle told Congress “the rooftop was outside of the perimeter” of the Secret Service’s “responsibility.” She did not explain why.

She had previously told the media that the roof, being slightly sloped, was unsafe. Here, Rep. Pat Fallon excoriates Cheatle for this ridiculous non-explanation, saying she should “go back to guarding Doritos,” referring to her previous post as senior director of global security at PepsiCo.

The sniper who shot Crooks was positioned on a much steeper roof, of course.

She did explain why there were no agents on that roof. They were taken off the roof because it was too hot, and went inside the building instead, to take up positions on the second floor of the building.

This gave them clear lines of sight to Crooks, who was “jumping from roof to roof” in plain view of Secret Service positions.

More than one gunman

According to one independent analyst, “The first three shots came from a very different weapon in a different location” to that of Crooks.

Why should anyone believe Chris Martenson, who is just posting on X? Well, his analysis relies on a report of sound signatures which confirmed at least three shooters.

“Deep State-aligned” CNN published a report on July 14 detailing the acoustic analysis of shots fired, naming three separate weapons. That of Crooks, that of the sniper who killed him, and a third weapon.

Martenson says the shots from Shooter 1 have no echo, whilst Shooter 2’s echoes are consistent with Crooks’ position, the report of the AR-15 resounding from the flat roof.

The third sound signature is unexplained.

The sounds from that day do not support the lone gunman conspiracy theory.

This image shows the location of two recordings of the shots fired on the day, which Martenson analyses here. The image below is taken from another account, which suggests a second shooter (the heavy) was firing from a window in a building to the rear of that where Crooks – “the patsy” – was positioned.

Wherever the shots came from, this third weapon was also firing at the stage, says Martenson. He explains that the first three shots have no echo, are muffled, are further away.

Five shots follow, with echoes. Another shot, more of a snapping sound, is heard. Nine shots so far.

Later, the Secret Service sniper shoots. This would be shot number 10 – if the snapping sound is counted.

John Cullen contests Martenson’s account. He says there may have been two shooters in addition to Crooks – drawing on another eyewitness report.

Cullen suggests a shooter may have been positioned in a tree, which one reporter said snipers were aiming at. Police were pictured scaling the tree after the shots with a ladder. 

An eyewitness who says she was present at the rally says she saw “cops pull a guy out of the tree.” She said her friend saw someone shooting from the tree.

Cullen also asks questions concerning the van – said to be that of Crooks – which was towed 10 miles away from outside the Trump rally – despite being reported as being “laden with explosives.”

A report from CNN, however, claims Crooks had a Hyundai Sonata “with an improvised explosive device in the trunk wired to a transmitter he carried.”

Then, Crooks drove his Hyundai Sonata about an hour north, joining thousands of people from around the region who flocked to Trump’s rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. He parked the car outside the rally, with an improvised explosive device hidden in the trunk that was wired to a transmitter he carried, the official said. Then, investigators believe, he used his newly-bought ladder to scale a nearby building, and opened fire on the former president.

As investigators continue to search for a motive behind the attempted assassination, they are scrutinizing Crooks’ movements before the attack and trying to piece together a timeline of his actions leading up to it.

The New York Times reported two explosive devices in the Hyundai, along with the drone presumed to have been used by Crooks to surveil the site. According to the Times, “So far, [the FBI has] found no evidence that he was motivated by any strong partisan political beliefs or an animus against Mr. Trump.”

Yet the social media site Gab seems to have found an account made by Crooks making strong pro-immigration and pro-Biden remarks.

“While the account made very few posts on the site, the majority of them were in support of President Biden,” Gab CEO Andrew Torba claimed. “A number of posts in particular expressed support for President Biden’s COVID lockdowns, border policies and executive orders.”

Torba made the claims in a July 24 X post.

The refusal to notice the obvious is a hallmark of the agents of the empire of lies. This is a regime which obviously hates Trump, and the truth he tells about their corrupt junta and the murderous wars by which it is enriched. It is obvious that the regime has radicalized millions through its propaganda and lies to defend a dying liberal global order from democracy. The refusal to find any whisper of a motive is the refusal to acknowledge the reality in which this shooting took place.

Did the van – which resembles a vehicle pictured under the water tower – carry the explosives? Did the Hyundai? Did Crooks arrive in two vehicles and on a bicycle as well? The agents in Sen. Grassley’s video mention both the water tower and a van. This is footage we would never have seen had it not been leaked. Why?

All the information which has been useful so far has been released outside official channels. The narrative of the fact-checkers and trusted sources in the mainstream simply does not make sense.

How many shots were fired?

On July 3, the House Committee on Homeland Security met to discuss the assassination attempt.

During the hearing, the Pennsylvania State Police Commissioner Christopher Paris told Rep. Eric Swalwell that “eight casings have been recovered,” after Swallwell asked how many rounds the shooter fired.

Rep. Michael McCaul asked Commissioner Paris about the water tower. According to Paris, there were no Secret Service at or on the water tower. McCaul also mentions explosives in a car, said to be that of Crooks, which Crooks was presumably intending to detonate using a device found on his body.

Who gave the order not to position a sniper on the water tower – the “tallest structure on that site”?

“I do not know,” said Paris.

At the 3-hour, 10-minute mark, Paris confirms that a local police officer gained the roof and was confronted by Crooks, who pointed his weapon at the officer peering over the rooftop.

Paris says that Crooks began firing “a matter of seconds” after this officer came face to face with Crooks, dropping from the roof to avoid being shot himself.

“I’d like to clarify it was a matter of seconds,” says Paris, “because I think earlier it might have been minutes.” Earlier reports suggested an interval of several minutes between the officer’s encounter with Crooks and when, as Paris says, “the first shots rang out.”

Seconds after turning to face a police officer, Crooks is here said to reposition and immediately fire on Trump, narrowly missing his skull.

Hiding in plain sight

Rep. Eli Crane is a former U.S. Navy Seal sniper. On July 22, he posted a video on X from the perspective of a window on a floor occupied by Secret Service agents.

It shows a clear field of view of the roof on which Crooks took position. How could these agents not have seen Crooks?

On the same day, July 22, Crooks posted a video he filmed himself from the roof on which the “supposed sniper took his shot.”

Crane does not believe the official account is credible. This may echo suspicions that the shooter was not Crooks at all. [Caution – graphic image.]

“Why weren’t security team sir, on site, able to spot a 20-year-old kid with zero camouflage crawling up a white roof with an AR-15 that several rally-goers were screaming and yelling and pointing out and they noticed him – and they weren’t even there to conduct security they were there to watch the president – do you have any idea why the security teams couldn’t find that guy?” he asked.

“I do not, sir,” Paris replied.

The lapses in security do not explain how agents with a clear view of the roof of the American Glass Research building on which Crooks was killed could not see him. Crane does not buy the story that Crooks was a lone gunman, and suggests he was not the would-be assassin at all.

At the 3-hour, 34-minute mark, Crane asks Paris whether he is aware that the “lone gunman” narrative is viewed with widespread suspicion.

“Are you aware, sir, that many Americans believe this was very likely not a lone shooter but a coordinated assassination attempt? Have you been getting those messages from people like I have?”

Paris said, “I have not, sir.”

Crane replied:

You haven’t. Well, there’s a lot of people in this room that have been getting the same messages. Why do you think that is? Why do you think that a lot of Americans are like, ‘This doesn’t add up? This doesn’t make sense, guys?’

How could this many things have gone wrong – like the things I pointed out? A 20-year-old kid got 150 yards of the [former] president of the United States with an AR-15, flew a drone to conduct sight surveillance, was spotted with a rangefinder ranging targets, then lost.

He had advanced explosive devices on him, with no military training. Nobody was placed in the most obvious spot to conduct counter-sniper operations.

I was a sniper in the SEAL Teams, Colonel. As soon as I got out of the SUV and I saw that water tower I was like, ‘That’s exactly where I’d be. Put me right there. So obvious.’

After partisan attempts to bankrupt him, imprison him for 700-50 years and countless depictions as a modern-day Hitler, are you surprised, sir, that a lot of Americans are like, ‘Maybe there’s more to this story?’

Crane finishes with reference to a November 30, 2023, article written in the Washington Post by neocon warmonger Robert Kagan, the husband of former under secretary of state Victoria Nuland. The article’s headline reads: “A Trump dictatorship is increasingly inevitable – we should stop pretending.”

“This article compares Trump to Caesar and attempts to justify the assassination of President Trump,” Crane said. “I think even though we want to dodge around it and not make this partisan, I think we all know that a lot of this has to do with the very violent rhetoric that has led up to this.”

Crane did not mention that Kagan wrote a follow-up – “The Trump dictatorship: How to stop it” – in January 2024. Kagan said that the system he champions is fighting for its survival, and that stopping Trump is a “matter of life and death.”

Kagan suggested neocon Zionist Nimrata “Nikki” Haley as the savior of the evil and its empire he has done so much to inflict on the world. His family business is war, in which others die and for which he and his murderous clique are celebrated and enriched.

Investigation

Joe Biden and DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas appointed Janet Napolitano to investigate the attempted assassination of Donald Trump. 

As the Oversight Project of the Heritage Foundation says, “She has a very long record of vehement anti-Trumpism.”

What is more, the House of Representatives announced on July 24 that they will be off “next week” and returning on September 9.

Trump promised to declassify the investigation should he win the election in November 2024.

Former presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich asked why the buck had seemed to stop with Kim Cheatle. Why was Mayorkas not removed, too?

Mayorkas’ DHS had already “taken over” the briefing of Congress by July 16, replacing direct communication between the Secret Service and Congress.

According to Politico’s Congress reporter Jordain Carney, a spokesman was reported as saying, “After the Secret Service agreed to brief members of the House Oversight Committee on Tuesday, [DHS] took over communications with the Committee and has since refused to confirm a briefing time.”

Oversight’s Mike Howell saw this as a clear case of political obstruction of any “independent review” of the shooting. 

Howell’s picture of the feverish domestic situation in the U.S. is also compelling, saying “years of escalating the tensions” in the U.S. shows how “this is well beyond the Secret Service and their posture.” 

In the aftermath of the shooting, Trump supporters at the rally were filmed directly accusing the mainstream media of inciting the assassination attempt. 

Moves underway to deny Trump protection

Readers may be aware that Democrat lawmakers had drafted legislation to remove Secret Service protection from former President Trump.

Rep. Thomas Massie called for those involved in this move to be barred from participating in the investigation into the attempted assassination.

Rep. Bennie Thompson is one such Democrat congressman.

Thompson explained in the video above that the mechanism of removing Trump’s Secret Service protection relies on whether Trump “is sentenced to jail,” following his legal persecution on felony charges in a process widely criticized as lawfare. Yet as Massie points out, Thompson’s own published fact sheet calls for the removal of Trump’s protection “once he is convicted.”

Responding to the attempted assassination of Trump, Thompson’s own staffer suggested on Facebook that Crooks “should have taken shooting lessons.” Massie also notes that Thompson also “helped Secret Service delete their phone data” relating to the alleged “insurrection” on January 6.

Why should representatives who are engineering the removal of protection from Trump be involved in investigating the effective removal of protection which enabled his attempted assassination?

When reminded of the fact that Trump has just survived an attempt on his life, Thompson is asked to withdraw the legislation to remove Trump’s protective detail.

Thompson refuses to do so, saying “Trump had Secret Service protection in Butler, Pennsylvania.”

Thompson also says the secretary of the Department of Homeland Security – currently Alejandro Mayorkas – can reassign Secret Service protection once Trump has served his sentence.

He does not mention the fact that Trump did not, in fact, have a full Secret Service protective detail in Butler.

Trump to be defended by his enemies?

Massie here raises yet another question that cannot be answered by the official conspiracy theory. It is obvious that Trump is hated by members of the US political class who have worked tirelessly to destroy him. Why should people who want to throw him in prison with no protection be involved in this investigation at all?

Sen. Chuck Grassley has published a letter to Mayorkas, asking whether Mayorkas can explain why local law enforcement was sharing responsibility with Secret Service for securing the building from which Crooks shot at Trump – and why Crooks was able to fly a surveillance drone over the site.

Sen. Grassley also asks “whether the water tower was cleared” and whether the water tower had “any role” in the attempted assassination.

A video taken on July 13 shows a vehicle parked beneath the water tower, as the stage is prepared for Trump’s address.

Redacted news reported three separate eyewitnesses at the rally who were interviewed – claiming shots were fired from a second location. They all indicate the water tower. At the 22-minute mark in this video you can watch them make these claims.

X user Austin Ayers claims this recording is “raw 911 audio” of law enforcement responding to “shots fired towards the blue water tank, blue water tank, that side.”

There is no clear picture of the attempt to kill Donald Trump. The official agencies have been unwilling or unable to supply the answers to the questions raised by the failed assassination.

How can the Senate hope to succeed where Congress has failed? The conspiracy against the obvious did not begin with this shooting. It is the policy of the liberal global regime itself, to deny its agenda of destruction and death, while the evidence of its diabolical designs becomes impossible to ignore.

Whoever fired those shots, whoever was behind the alleged lone gunman and his apparently motiveless crime, and however he arrived to commit it, it is obvious that the number one enemy of the globalist regime was almost shot to death on live television.

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Crime

Cartel threats against border agents include explosives, drones

Published on February 18, 2025

By

MXM logo MxM News

Quick Hit:

Cartels are intensifying their threats against U.S. Border Patrol and ICE agents, employing increasingly sophisticated tactics, including drones, wireless tracking devices, and potential explosive attacks. As President Donald Trump strengthens border security measures, agents face growing dangers both at and beyond the southern border. Experts warn that these threats are an effort to counteract the administration’s immigration enforcement policies.

Key Details:

  • Cartels are using drones and wireless tracking to monitor and potentially attack Border Patrol and ICE agents.
  • The discovery of a security risk tied to body cameras has led CBP to suspend their use to prevent agents from being tracked.
  • Leaks of ICE raids pose additional threats, increasing the risk of ambushes against agents conducting enforcement operations.

Diving Deeper:

Cartels along the U.S.-Mexico border are becoming more aggressive as President Trump enforces stricter immigration policies, with reports indicating that border agents are facing an escalating range of security threats. Fox News reports that Mexican cartels are leveraging new technology to track and potentially harm Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents.

Lora Ries, director of the Heritage Foundation’s Border Security and Immigration Center, emphasized that cartels are feeling the pressure from Trump’s border policies and are resorting to dangerous countermeasures. “The cartels are losing business. The encounters at the border are the lowest they’ve been in decades, and the cartels are not just going to give up that business quietly,” Ries told Fox News.

Among the threats agents face are drones used for surveillance, gunfire from across the border, and even the possibility of improvised explosive devices (IEDs). A recent internal memo warned that cartels might be planning to use snipers positioned in Mexico to attack U.S. agents. Additionally, agents are now vulnerable to tracking through wireless technology, prompting CBP to suspend the use of body-worn cameras after a social media post revealed they could be exploited via Bluetooth scanning apps.

The suspension of body cameras has raised concerns about increased false claims against border agents. Ries warned that “the number of claims of abuse are about to jump to exploit this lack of camera use,” underscoring the challenges agents will face without recorded footage of their encounters.

Beyond external threats from cartels, agents must also contend with internal security risks. Leaks about upcoming ICE raids have made enforcement operations more dangerous, potentially exposing agents to ambushes. Ries noted, “That subjects ICE agents to an ambush… Worse would be if aliens stay here and attack ICE agents, that is a risk.”

To counter these threats, border security experts stress the need for increased congressional funding to provide CBP and ICE agents with enhanced technology, equipment, and manpower. Ries urged lawmakers to act swiftly, stating, “Congress needs to hurry up” to ensure agents have the necessary resources to carry out Trump’s mass deportation efforts and secure the southern border.

As cartels escalate their tactics in response to Trump’s immigration policies, the safety of border agents remains a growing concern, highlighting the urgent need for stronger enforcement and security measures.

Continue Reading

Crime

“Fake Chinese income” mortgages fuel Toronto Real Estate Bubble: Canadian Bank Leaks

Published on February 16, 2025

By

Canadian Banking Money Laundering Investigation Reposted in Light of Ottawa’s Fentanyl Czar Pledge

In response to Ottawa’s pledge to tackle fentanyl-linked money laundering—including the appointment of a “fentanyl czar” and new intelligence-sharing initiatives with the United States—The Bureau is reposting this February 2024 investigation estimating tens of billions, potentially several hundred billion, laundered through Vancouver and Toronto real estate via underground banking networks tied to China and global narcotics trafficking, including fentanyl.

FINTRAC’s 2023 analysis of 48,000 transactions involving members of the Chinese diaspora exposed vast wire transfers from Hong Kong and Mainland China, funneled through “money mule” accounts linked to students, homemakers, and shell businesses—including law firms. These findings raised serious concerns about Canada’s banking oversight but led to no prosecutions in Canada. The study also revealed laundering patterns central to the U.S. Justice Department’s $3 billion TD Bank case, with international students from China working with Beijing’s United Front networks playing key roles in the TD Bank money laundering, according to U.S. investigator David Asher, a former Trump Administration official. The revelations underscore how the so-called “Vancouver Model”—once centered on laundering drug proceeds through British Columbia government casinos—evolved during the COVID-19 pandemic, embedding itself deeper into Canada’s banking and legal systems. These findings align with research from SFU urban planner Andy Yan, who has documented how foreign capital distorts Canada’s housing market, with mortgage approvals and home purchases far exceeding reported local incomes.

At the heart of this investigation is HSBC Canada whistleblower “D.M.,” who believes they uncovered at least $500 million in dubious Toronto-area mortgages backed by fabricated remote-work salaries from China. After raising the alarm internally, D.M. says HSBC Canada introduced only superficial reforms and pressured him to delete critical records—deepening his conviction that Canada’s financial oversight remains dangerously weak.

Former RCMP investigators Garry Clement and Cal Chrustie, who reviewed D.M.’s evidence, warn that systemic vulnerabilities persist. Chrustie—who has extensively documented Canada’s weak regulations enabling underground banking linked to organized crime in China, Iran, and Mexico—pointed to the 2012 U.S. Justice Department case where HSBC was fined $1.9 billion over $881 million in cartel-linked transactions involving Mexico’s Sinaloa cartel and Colombia’s Norte del Valle cartel.

As Andy Yan has emphasized, governments at all levels bear responsibility for enabling foreign capital to flood Canada’s housing market without adequate transparency. “When you have programs designed to domesticate foreign capital into local real estate, you see these income-to-home-price incongruities,” he said.

Ottawa’s new fentanyl czar is tasked with coordinating intelligence-sharing and enforcement actions with U.S. agencies to disrupt fentanyl trafficking and related money laundering. Trudeau’s government has also pledged to designate cartels as terrorist organizations, a move that could have sweeping consequences for Canadian banks by exposing them to heightened U.S. financial scrutiny and enforcement actions.

It remains to be seen what position Liberal Party leadership favourite Mark Carney—former Governor of the Bank of Canada (2008–2013) and the Bank of England (2013–2020), and a globally influential banker—will take on Canada’s ongoing struggles with financial crime and illicit capital flows. While the Bank of Canada does not oversee financial crime enforcement, Carney’s extensive experience in international financial regulation—gained through his roles involving oversight at global institutions such as the Bank for International Settlements and his active participation in forums on financial stability—suggests he could offer valuable insights into Canada’s banking vulnerabilities. This is particularly noteworthy as he emerges as a political contender and potential Prime Minister.

OTTAWA, Canada — The whistleblower, a Canadian business school graduate, was staggered by the suspicious home loans he discovered in 2022 when he joined a mortgage approval team in a small HSBC branch on the outskirts of Toronto.

He knew of suspicions surrounding Chinese capital in British Columbia real estate, but had never witnessed shady lending while working at an HSBC branch in Campbell River, a bucolic town on the coast of Vancouver Island.

When he arrived at HSBC’s bank in Aurora, an affluent suburb north of Toronto, he discovered explosive growth in home loans to Chinese diaspora buyers during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Chinese migrants living across Toronto were obtaining mortgages from HSBC while supposedly earning extravagant salaries from remote-work jobs in China. In one example, an Ontario casino worker that owned three homes also claimed to earn $345,000 in 2020 analyzing data remotely for a Beijing company.

Before joining HSBC Canada, the whistleblower had studied fake-income mortgage frauds for his Business Masters degree at Vancouver Island University. After arriving at Aurora in February 2022, while digging into the branch’s loan books and interrogating his colleagues, he made mind-blowing assessments.

Since 2015, the whistleblower concluded, more than 10 Toronto-area HSBC branches had issued at least $500-million in home loans to diaspora buyers claiming exaggerated incomes or non-existent jobs in China.

These foreign-income scams spiked during the pandemic, the whistleblower believed, because borrowers could somewhat plausibly claim to be working remotely in other countries while riding out Covid-19 in Canada.

While a small bank of Aurora’s size was expected to issue about $23-million in residential loans every year, this branch had shovelled out $88-million in mortgages in 2020, according to the whistleblower, and over $50-million in 2021.

The whistleblower, whomThe Bureau is calling D.M., immigrated to Canada as an international student from India, making him a minority among mostly Chinese-Canadian co-workers at the Aurora branch.

As D.M. probed his colleagues, his belief gained conviction, that HSBC Canada and other Canadian banks including CIBC had systemic problems with highly questionable mortgages issued to diaspora buyers with unverified sources of wealth in China.

Losing sleep, in April 2022, D.M. sent an audacious email to senior bank executives: “I am going to reveal potential mortgage fraud at HSBC Bank Canada and possibly some employees benefited from the fraud, financially pocketing thousands of dollars, which I call the proceeds of crime.”

D.M.’s explosive four-page complaint triggered an internal investigation that led to some reforms at HSBC Canada according to internal emails obtained by The Bureau.

But more than a year later, D.M. was so dissatisfied with the bank’s response that he risked sharing his story and numerous internal documents for an unprecedented journalistic investigation into Canada’s housing affordability crisis.

“I found out a huge mortgage fraud showing borrowers with exaggerated income from one specific country, China, pretending to be working remotely,” D.M. informed The Bureau in June 2023. “I believe the housing prices in Toronto are linked to this, because this is about income verification in banks, which is supposed to moderate demand.”

The Bureau asked HSBC Canada to review emailed information for this story and provide an appropriate manager for an interview regarding D.M. ‘s records and allegations.

“I won’t have anyone to speak with you directly,” Sharon Wilks, Head of Communications, responded. “But for context: As a global bank, HSBC is at the forefront of efforts to identify, prevent and deter financial crime … We will not do business with individuals or entities we believe are engaged in illicit conduct.”

Wilks added that HSBC Canada “can and do regularly exit relationships with clients whose activities we deem too risky.”

The Bureau’s seven-month investigation into D.M.’s allegations suggests HSBC Canada and other Canadian banks could have issued many billions of dollars in questionable mortgages to Chinese diaspora buyers, and a significant cause of Canada’s real estate bubble is hundreds of billions in illicit fund transfers from China into Canada, and bank lending that amplifies its impacts, especially in Toronto and Vancouver home prices.

“There are thousands of these cases, large scale,” D.M. said in an interview. “Hardworking Canadians are denied mortgages and these Chinese residents forge documents and get mortgages approved, heating up the already hot Ontario real estate markets.”

“These people don’t have steady jobs or income in Canada,” he alleged, “but what they are doing is scams to launder money, and get mortgages using fake documents.”

The Bureau’s investigation included asking seven prominent Canadian experts to assess some of D.M.’s documents, allegations and conclusions.

This investigation suggests D.M. ‘s calculation is plausible, that the Aurora branch and other Toronto-area HSBC branches have issued at least $500-million in questionable Chinese income loans since 2015.

But D.M’s findings could also change the public’s understanding of housing affordability in Toronto and Vancouver, a politically explosive issue expected to frame Canada’s upcoming federal election.

This is because, according to the academics and criminologists that reviewed D.M.’s documents with The Bureau, his evidence fits into FINTRAC’s much broader examinations of suspicious real estate and banking transactions.

In 2023, the anti-money laundering watchdog published a ground-breaking study into 48,000 Chinese diaspora banking transactions.

FINTRAC found that during the Covid-19 pandemic, because Canadian casinos were closed, Chinese underground banking schemes evolved, flooding electronic fund transfers from Hong Kong into Canadian bank accounts that served like corridors for murky real estate transactions.

The Bureau’s analysis also finds that what D.M. discovered in Toronto banks, finally sheds light on mysterious capital flows discovered by a prominent Canadian academic in 2015, in a study of Vancouver land titles and mortgages.

That examination of $525-million worth of real estate purchases in a six-month period found 66 percent of buyers in several affluent neighbourhoods were recent Chinese diaspora migrants, and most mortgages went to buyers with little or no income in Canada.

Similarly, what D.M. found in his probe of pandemic-era loans could be called the evolving “Toronto Method” of an underground banking system discovered first in Vancouver, and found to be laundering a stunning $1.2-billion in cash from Mainland China through British Columbia government casinos in 2014.

This system of shadowy transfers was dubbed the “Vancouver Model” by an Australian professor, and brings together transnational organized crime, affluent Chinese nationals seeking to export their wealth abroad, and Canadian casinos, banks and real estate, in transactions that evade policing because the pivotal cash exchanges are done off the books by professional money launderers serving the global Chinese diaspora.

According to FINTRAC’s 2023 study of 48,000 pandemic-era transactions, this evolving Vancouver Model network “simultaneously facilitates money laundering and the circumvention of Chinese currency controls”

“As a result of the temporary closures of Canadian casinos due to the COVID-19 pandemic, professional money launderers began to diversify their money laundering methods,” FINTRAC’s study says.

“During this time, FINTRAC observed a rise in money laundering typologies involving transferring large sums of funds to Canada from foreign money services businesses, often located in China, notably Hong Kong, and the laundering of the funds primarily through the real estate, securities, automotive and legal professions.”

These wire transfers from China were routed into bank accounts of “multiple, unrelated individuals in Canada,” that served as “money mules” in byzantine networks involving Canada-based real estate developers, real estate agents, mortgage brokers and banks.

These Chinese diaspora bank account owners often claimed they were students, homemakers, office managers, or unemployed, FINTRAC reported.

They sometimes used their accounts to send bank drafts to others in Canada for home purchases, or served as “straw buyers” for offshore investors.

“Mortgage payments are sourced from incoming funds from China,” FINTRAC’s alert said.

FINTRAC’s study doesn’t say that Canadian banks knowingly issued fake-income mortgages to Chinese diaspora buyers in Toronto.

But in an interview, D.M. said banking staff are trained to guard against fraud, and the loan application packages he reviewed in Aurora beggared belief.

“The bank found out that one lady works in a casino part-time but got a $1.4 million mortgage showing over $300,000 annual income,” he said. “Plus she takes money as benefits from the government, for her two kids.”

In other examples, an HSBC mortgage client claimed to earn $700,000 annually for remote work in China, while simultaneously living in Canada and paying off a $10,000 student loan.

Another woman who owned homes in Aurora, Markham and Scarborough, worked part-time as a hairdresser while also claiming to earn $536,280 at a “Business Manager” job in Guangzhou.

“Canadian workers have been put out of the real estate market by people working as a hairdresser that own a couple homes,” D.M. said in an interview.

“How is that fair?”

The most shocking case reviewed by The Bureau, shows that one woman that owns at least four Toronto properties opened her HSBC Aurora bank account in 2013, claiming to be a “Homemaker with no annual income.”

But her Toronto account soon received incredible amounts of wire transfers from HSBC China accounts, and paid out “high value cheques” to third parties for real estate purchases.

This case suggests “Toronto Method” shadow banking described in FINTRAC’s 2023 study has been seeping into Toronto real estate for about a decade.

And yet in 2020, this same woman applied for another HSBC Canada mortgage, claiming to earn $763,000 remotely from her job in China.

This evidence from the HSBC whistleblower complements the seminal investigations of Simon Fraser University academic Andy Yan, who examined sales from August 2014 to February 2015 in several communities on Vancouver’s westside. The average home price in Yan’s study was $3-million.

Looking back at his Vancouver findings in comparison to D.M.’s Toronto banking documents, Yan told The Bureau “I think this helps affirm some of my early work that I did, almost nine years ago.”

“This goes to the core of our banking system,” he said, “and how are we verifying identities and how are we verifying incomes.”

In Yan’s controversial study the vast majority of mortgages went to buyers listing their occupation as home-maker, followed by students, and managers. HSBC and CIBC were the dominant lenders.

Unlike the HSBC whistleblower, Yan had no access to internal banking data regarding the purported origin of funds behind these mortgages taken by Chinese diaspora buyers.

But in an interview, Yan said what he found most interesting back in 2015, was suspicions that Chinese migrants were often buying homes with bulk cash, weren’t accurate. The truth was more complex and seems to be clarified by D.M.’s mortgage findings in Toronto.

“It’s about that global flow of capital, and how it’s multiplied by Canada’s mortgage and lending system,” Yan said. “Because you have to remember, one of the biggest conclusions about my study was that it wasn’t bags of cash that were being used to purchase Vancouver homes outright. They were loans being used. So now, I’m thinking, this is where my study connects up to what you have discovered in Toronto.”

“The interesting story here,” Yan added, “is what happens in Toronto real estate may not repeat Vancouver, but it perhaps rhymes.”

Probably the most famous Chinese property owner from Yan’s 2015 study areas is Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou. In 2009 her family bought a home in Vancouver’s Dunbar neighborhood for $2.73 million, land titles show. In 1998, ten years before Vancouver Model transactions started to surge in Vancouver real estate, the home was sold for $370,000. The home is now valued at almost $6-million.

Ashleigh Rhea Gonzales, a former RCMP data scientist who recently published a criminology thesis finding Chinese diaspora underground banking causes significantly more money laundering into Canada’s real estate than previously estimated, said that D.M.’s findings resemble her own Vancouver Model research.

“This whistleblower’s allegations of widespread mortgage fraud at HSBC Canada align with some of the first-hand accounts from staff of some Canadian financial institutions that I have come across in my research on money laundering in British Columbia,” Gonzales said.

Gonzales, who worked for RCMP’s anti-gang unit in British Columbia until 2023, says she found reports of mortgage fraud accelerated “during the uptick in the Canadian housing bubble after the Vancouver 2010 Olympics,” and continued to surge from 2015 to 2018.

With all this considered, and comparing data sources in this story with previous evidence confirmed in British Columbia’s Cullen Commission, The Bureau estimates that from 2014 to 2023, well over $200-Billion in Vancouver Model and Toronto Method funds could have poured through underground diaspora networks and Canadian financial institutions into Toronto and Vancouver’s real estate.

A federal official not authorized to comment publicly also examined D.M.’s banking leaks for The Bureau, and called this information “explosive.”

The official said money laundering is increasing in Canada, and D.M.’s belief that Chinese-income mortgage fraud has boosted home prices in Toronto is likely true, but also should apply for Vancouver and Montreal real estate prices. The official noted that other nations require tax agencies to verify incomes for mortgages, which isn’t the case in Canada.

“It matters for our next generation because of the impact on the housing market,” the official said.

Queen’s University professor Christian Leuprecht – editor of Dirty Money, a new academic text that probes how Ottawa’s weak regulation has “turned the Canadian federation into a destination of choice for global financial crime” – also reviewed some of D.M. ‘s leaks.

“It’s not a new problem, but you’re taking it to the next level,” Leuprecht said.

“Why does this matter? Because organized crime isn’t just laundering their ill-gotten gains, like any good business person, when they buy real estate, they generate a down payment, then get a mortgage for the rest. Why buy one property when you can buy four?”

“Do you know how many mortgage frauds we have in our books?”

The Bureau’s review of HSBC Canada emails and D.M.’s text messages, shows he came to believe numerous employees at the Aurora branch had direct knowledge of faked Chinese income mortgages, and a veteran manager with oversight of more than 10 Greater Toronto branches knew about broad and questionable mortgage lending for Chinese diaspora clients.

Months after D.M. blew the whistle internally he exchanged texts with another employee, identifying colleagues that they believed had knowledge of diaspora mortgage scams.

The texts suggest D.M. believed HSBC Canada and other Canadian banks continued to hold vast amounts of suspicious foreign income mortgages, which could cause systemic loan quality risks if Toronto’s real estate prices decline.

“Do you know how many mortgage frauds we have in our books,” D.M. texted to his colleague. “It’s insane.”

“She told me,” the colleague replied, referring to an HSBC branch manager.

“She was like, if you do come, you gotta be prepared for the mortgage payout.”

“These people showed fake income and got mortgage,” D.M. continued. “Now interest rate is high, they can’t cope.”

“Other branches did the same thing too,” his co-worker replied. “I heard there’s a lot.”

“Absolutely,” D.M. texted. “All branches engaged in it.”

“This is like the unspoken secret,” his co-worker concluded. “I’m pretty sure other banks have it too. My Aunt have no income and got a mortgage for 700k. They just need a Covenanter from China.”

Generally, in mortgage contracts a covenanter takes responsibility for the loan if the primary borrower defaults.

Internal records reviewed by The Bureau confirm that on April 18, 2022, D.M. sent a lengthy complaint email to senior HSBC Canada executives, informing them of allegations he’d learned from his colleagues.

In it, he alleges that an Aurora manager had informed him of a complaint letter posted to the branch, that accused mortgage brokers and branch employees of colluding in scam mortgages emanating from Mainland China fraud networks.

Pointing to specific examples, D.M. claimed that another branch colleague had admitted processing numerous loan applications without meeting his clients, because a branch manager delivered her subordinates foreign income client applications so “they did not have to get sales themselves.”

“Surprisingly all these clients he would get will have foreign income most of the time very inflated like 400k or 670k a year,” D.M. wrote. “To me that’s suspicious, but he never questioned the branch manager because in Asian culture it’s disrespectful to question elders.”

D.M. also informs his bosses that one Aurora bank manager opened up to him, saying she believed allegations of mortgage fraud collusion involving some branch staff.

“She said yes, she knows specially in Mainland China there is a team who would even answer emails and phone calls verifying [Chinese income] but it’s a sophisticated and well organised scam,” D.M. ‘s email to HSBC Canada managers says.

His complaint explains that he continued to press an Aurora bank manager on her knowledge of fraud allegations.

“When I asked for such a serious issue if she raised a HSBC confidential [complaint] or not she evaded my question,” D.M. wrote. “Now we all love numbers, but I don’t think the bank will like these kinds of numbers achieved through this way.”

Describing why he contacted HSBC Canada executives directly, the whistleblower’s complaint says he felt confused and isolated, but D.M. decided “local leadership if not participated, at least turned a blind eye,” to Chinese fake-income scams, forcing D.M. to “bring up a serious issue against people of superior positions.”

“I could not have stayed silent, in fact I could not sleep well thinking about it,” his April 2022 complaint says. “It reminds me to some extent what happened with the Home Capital Group.”

“The whole thing is wrong on so many grounds,” D.M. continued.

“Now I know one more reason why Canadians and permanent residents are not getting into the housing market. It’s not only HSBC such things are happening across other Canadian banks as well.”

In the Home Capital case, the Ontario Securities Commission fined the prominent Ontario-based subprime mortgage lender in 2017, alleging Home Capital failed to disclose several of its mortgage brokerages had major problems with faked-income mortgages.

D.M. concluded his four-page complaint to senior executives, writing: “I recommend all mortgage deals of this branch in the last 3 years at least if not longer with Foreign income be probed.”

“Bank statements can be verified directly with the foreign banks or use a reputable third party to verify,” he suggested. “When we find someone with Fake ID or trying to impersonate someone we call the cops. But these people, both staff nor clients who did fraud were reported.”

Hours later on April 18, 2022, an HSBC Canada executive emailed back: “I am going to refer this to our Fraud and Risk teams and they will investigate your concerns.”

“The Implications are Broader”

The next day D.M. continued to hound HSBC Canada managers with emails to support his allegations, spotlighting the absurdity of massive Chinese remote incomes claimed by diaspora buyers.

He pointed to one woman with a $1.6-million HSBC Canada mortgage.

“The client claims to be in Canada but [is] a office supervisor in China. [In the] age of remote working in which country [does] a office supervisor makes 400k please tell me,” D.M. wrote.

“[W]hen I asked the co-worker she said her job is not to use the brain or be a police, when I asked do you think she makes that kind of money and how is she doing her job being in Canada to be an office supervisor in China[?]”

Pointing to another document, D.M. warned his managers about Ms. Chen, who claimed to make $721,000 annually as “project manager” for a Beijing telecommunications company, to secure a $1.89 million mortgage.

Again on May 4, 2022, D.M. emailed executives, suggesting internal records for an Aurora client named Ms. Lin had been altered soon after D.M. blew the whistle on fake Chinese income loans.

His email, which included Ms. Lin’s client profile, warned: “Something interesting happened yesterday, they added a China address to go with [the] story of working in China, please see below.”

The Aurora branch banking records disclosed to The Bureau show that Ms. Lin owns three homes in the blocks surrounding Pacific Mall in Markham.

“The client was onboarded on 24th March with Canada address only and Canadian tax residency,” D.M.’ s email continued.

“She claims to be working in China and have foreign income, so the story she is stuck in Canada due to Covid is very interesting. Suddenly yesterday she decided her address in China. Someone saw the discrepancies and the branch team decided to change it.”

“To me that’s a red flag done to align with the story portrayed.”

Next, D.M. exposed Ms. Lin’s foreign income claim.

“She works for Food processing company, a logistics officer making 273k a year,” he wrote. “I don’t know which logistics officer can work when physically in a different company and also who makes 273k working as a logistics officer.”

Citing another internal banking record, D.M.’s email pointed to Ms. Lin’s $273,000 income and said “it’s interesting how they did the verification.”

The email continues to explain that branch records showed Ms. Lin and her husband had a joint mortgage with a balance of $497,000 at CIBC.

But suddenly during Covid-19, Ms. Lin applied for a new mortgage for $1.2 million with HSBC Canada.

“When I see such things I can’t stay quiet,” D.M.’s May 2022 email says. “[I] was assuming with the new rules things will stop, [but] declining the mortgage or retraining the staff is like treating the symptoms.”

He added that many suspicious Chinese income loans had been “flagged by our Fraud Team already.”

The whistleblower’s scathing assessment ends with the observation that D.M. didn’t believe “someone woke up and decided to scam the bank, but [worked with] a sophisticated network of agents who are training people what to say and answer.”

“The implications are broader and as a responsible bank and citizen we have to,” request investigations from the Canadian Revenue Agency or Ontario Provincial Police, D.M. asserted.
D.M., who asked not to be named because he could face reprisals, filed a four-page whistleblower complaint with HSBC Canada managers in April 2022.

The Bureau asked Gonzales, the former RCMP data scientist, to review some of D.M.’s documents and conclusions.

“From what I have reviewed, D.M.’s findings align with what appear to have been commonplace practices by some groups of staff complicit from the front line, middle office, and back office and sanctioned by management,” Gonzales wrote, adding “whether knowingly or not depends on the individual work cultures.”

The Bureau also asked Stephen Punwasi to review D.M. ‘s leaked banking documentation.

Punwasi is a financial expert who founded Better Dwelling, a real estate analysis website with a large following of young professionals trying to understand why they’re excluded from home ownership in Canadian cities.

He also provided analysis for British Columbia’s 2018 report into Vancouver Model money laundering in casinos, real estate and luxury vehicles.

What Punwasi explained to the report’s author, former RCMP executive Peter German, is that even though Vancouver Model money launderers don’t comprise a majority of buyers in Vancouver, their willingness to overbid on home sales causes ripples that sends prices skyrocketing, especially during times when political turmoil inside China triggers increased capital flight.

“In 2015 and 2016 Ontario saw this flood of money from China, just like British Columbia, and it was not just to do with immigration, it was due to President Xi’s political crack down on corruption,” Punwasi said. “I think we’ve seen that capital flight in Ontario and B.C. in two big cycles, also including 2020 and 2021.”

The Bureau asked Punwasi if the banking records disclosed by D.M. help to explain Toronto’s real estate price surges.

“Absolutely,” he said, pointing to the case of Ms. Lin (who claimed a $273,000 remote-work income in China) and her three homes surrounding Markham’s Pacific Mall.

Property buyers that aren’t shopping for shelter, but for capital flight or money laundering vehicles, are what Punwasi terms the “marginal buyer.”

“The marginal buyer is like an exuberant buyer on crack, so if they are motivated to move as much money as possible,” he said, “the larger the mortgage they can get, it helps them to overpay for homes, and that can cause the price to launch.”

“So if you see a townhome in Toronto going for $2-million, you don’t know if it is mortgage money laundering or someone buying a place to live. You just have to compete with the going price.”

Punwasi says housing prices are a powerful political issue that will shape the next federal election.

But at the same time, young generations are confused by competing explanations on the causes of Canada’s housing affordability crisis, Punwasi believes, whether its lack of housing supply due to restrictive zoning bylaws, or increased demand due to recent immigration surges, or other factors that make Canada’s housing bubble an outlier in the Western world.

“There are so many conflicting narratives right now that people find it hard to believe the scale of impact that money laundering can have on Toronto real estate prices,” Punwasi said. “But no one has thought it through, that having criminals run our renting stock is a liability.”

Punwasi also believes that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government has decreased scrutiny of money laundering in recent years.

He points to new data uncovered in a ministerial inquiry from Conservative MP Adam Chambers, who is a proponent of tougher money laundering laws, which found sharp declines in Canadian Revenue Agency audits of FINTRAC leads.

“The systemic corruption in housing has been snowballing,” Punwasi said, “to where it’s turned into, maybe the banks don’t need to check where the incomes are coming from, and now whole generations can’t find stable shelter.”
Adam Chambers, a Toronto-area Conservative MP who unsuccessfully tabled a private members bill on stricter anti-money laundering laws, found CRA money laundering reviews are decreasing.

“Delete, delete, delete”

HSBC Canada emails reviewed by The Bureau show that while the bank appears to have responded to some of D.M. ‘s recommendations in 2022, troubling mortgage applications and problems with existing Chinese income loans continued.

A January 2023 email to an Aurora branch manager from HSBC Canada’s office in Montreal pointed to a client named Ms. B., who worked at an Ontario government casino, and owned homes across Toronto, in Richmond Hill, Newmarket and East York.

Documents show she obtained an HSBC Canada mortgage for $1.26 million in 2016, and that HSBC Canada staff “confirmed” in July 2021 that she was earning $345,000 with a remote work job in Beijing.

Despite her incredible claimed income, documents show, Ms. B. was having trouble paying at least one of her three mortgages.

An email from a “Senior Loss Mitigation” employee in Montreal to an Aurora branch employee says: “client is going through a tough time … her income is limited … I know she collect rent and she use it to pay her second mortgage. Please review the situation with the client to see if there is any special agreement available to her.”

But Aurora’s branch wrote back to the Montreal branch: “What we have told her is … if she really can’t pay, then she just have to put her house for sale … but she doesn’t want to do that.”

In an interview D.M. told The Bureau this case was typical.

“What they are doing is AirBnBing these properties,” he said. “But they can’t manage with higher interest rates.”

He said during mortgage application interviews at the Aurora branch he would often look across his desk and ask questions without letting clients know he was looking at their income claims from purported Chinese companies on his computer screen.

“Most of these people don’t even know what type of company is in their job profile,” he said.

And documents reviewed by The Bureau show that mortgage applications consistent with Fintrac’s 2023 Chinese money laundering report continued in Aurora.

In May 2023, D.M. emailed a senior HSBC Financial Crime Compliance investigator, writing “Just came across two profiles of clients and I have strong evidence these mortgages were also obtained with fake docs and fraudulently.”

When the investigator responded “I will take a look,” D.M. replied: “One had a CDA student loan of 10k and making 700k in China. Makes no sense, there are many other anomalies.”

In interviews, D.M. told The Bureau he waited “patiently for a year” after reporting his Chinese-income mortgage concerns to HSBC Canada managers, before concluding the bank’s response was insufficient.

“This has been going on for seven years and no one spoke up,” he said. “In my first meeting last year, they asked me a lot of questions, like why didn’t you use the normal channels? But I had no faith in the normal channels.”

“Many bank staff were obviously involved,” D.M. alleged. “It was not one or two employees turning the blind eye but the entire system, someone verifying those fake offer letters and pay stubs, or their bank statements from China.”

D.M. said his concerns also included HSBC Canada’s proposed sale to RBC, which was announced in 2022, about six months after D.M. ‘s April 2022 internal complaint. The sale was approved in December 2023 by Canada’s deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland.

Christian Leuprecht, among other experts interviewed for this story, agreed that D.M.’s allegations of widespread Chinese-income frauds at HSBC Canada could raise questions about whether Freeland, Canada’s finance minister, had knowledge of mortgage lending investigations inside HSBC when she approved the sale.

Freeland directed RBC to “establish a new Global Banking Hub in Vancouver,” and “maintain Mandarin and Cantonese banking services at HSBC branch locations,” a Department of Finance statement says.

Ultimately, D.M. says he chose to share his story with Canadian citizens partly because he felt pressured to erase evidence from his whistleblower complaint emails.

A June 2023 email from the bank’s personnel department says “we hereby demand that you immediately and permanently delete any and all HSBC information on any personal email accounts.”

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