Hundreds of workers reportedly received social assistance checks, between 2016 and 2019, while they were moonlighting – sometimes below minimum wage, according to Quebec. They worked in particular in the cutting of meat or in the transformation of wood. Eighteen employers in total were identified.
The sleuths of the Ministry of Labor and Social Solidarity (MTESS) have been working on this network since 2018, in collaboration with police forces. Their investigation, which includes searches and seizures, has been dubbed “TARMAC”.
The “workers not declared by the network are sometimes new arrivals who know little or nothing about the protection regime offered by the labor laws in Quebec”, affirms Yannick Chouinard, investigator of the Ministry of Labor and Social Solidarity in a legal document dated early November, obtained by Press. The network allegedly used “various schemes, including a money order scheme linked to billing, which aim to conceal employment income from workers, especially workers receiving social assistance.”
The amount of the alleged fraud is not known.
In the viewfinder of the investigation: Hector Rodriguez, Hector Lopez-Ramos, Beatriz Guerrero Munoz and Francisco Davila Ruiz, a quartet at the head of an alleged network of agencies including YULEmbauche, RYSCO and Entretien RO-MAX, as well as several numbered companies.
According to testimonies gathered by the investigator, the employment agencies knew that some of their workers were receiving a social assistance check at the same time and even used “different stratagems aimed at concealing” their employment income. where the accusations of fraud that threaten them. There is no indication that the agencies appropriated welfare checks.
“I didn’t know exactly how it works”
Paulo *, a Haitian asylum seeker, had just arrived in Quebec in 2017 when he was recruited by a network company in front of a metro station in western Montreal. The agency placed him under a false identity in a pork processing plant in Sherrington, Montérégie, and paid him in cash.
Paulo was on social assistance at the time, he explained in an interview with Press, in mid-November.
“I didn’t know exactly how it works, how it works,” he said. The worker is angry with his former employers, who have never informed him of the rules in force in Quebec. Paulo had to reimburse Quebec, in addition to paying a penalty. “They fined me. I think I paid $ 5,000. ”
He is all the more angry with these agencies as the placement ended in a dramatic fashion. He was seriously injured after two or three weeks of work: his hand was mutilated by the blade of a machine supposed to separate the rind from the meat, explained Paulo with the help of Frantz André, a Montreal activist who helps asylum seekers. The worker claims to have received “not even five minutes” training to use the machine. “It was the first time I had seen a machine like this. ”
His work injury claim was complicated by the fact that he was working under a false identity, without a license.
I am still in pain. I still have a lot of pain, especially in winter. Now I work as a security guard, because I am no longer able to work in other areas.
Paulo *, Haitian asylum seeker
Paulo’s story was first told in a CBC report in 2018. It was the release of this article that triggered the Labor Department’s investigation, the organization admits in court documents. .
Stéphane Handfield, of the Common Front of Social Assistance Persons of Quebec (FCPASQ), denounces the complexity of the rules governing social assistance in the province. It is therefore not surprising that a newcomer to Quebec may have been confused.
Even for people who work there, it takes years to understand the system. People who call customer service to ask questions often get responses that change depending on the employee they’re talking to.
Stéphane Handfield, from the Common Front of Social Assistance Persons of Quebec
“An investigation of a complex nature”
The Specialized Investigations Center of the Ministry of Labor and Social Solidarity – the social assistance police – orchestrated a series of seizures and searches in spring 2019 against the employment agencies implicated by TARMAC. Some $ 100,000 in cash was seized, 83,000 pages of documents were washed away and bank accounts were frozen. In the previous months, spinning mills had been carried out.
Since 2019, several investigators have been dissecting the list of the agency’s 4,500 workers – 1,650 of whom received social assistance at least once between 2016 and 2019 – to cross-check details with state records. The contents of 10 seized cellphones – hundreds of thousands of messages in total – must also be analyzed. No criminal charges have yet been laid.
The investigation is lengthening, to the chagrin of the four individuals targeted, who denounce the repercussions on their lives. They have twice asked the courts to refuse the extension of the seizures made by investigators more than two years ago.
According to the Ministry’s claims, “this is the most important fraud ever committed against MTESS,” Judge Robert Marchi noted in a confidential decision, but obtained by Press, last April. The magistrate agreed to extend the seizures until this fall, given the complexity of the case. “This is a large file and it is a complex investigation. ”
PHOTO SARAH MONGEAU-BIRKETT, PRESS ARCHIVES
The Montreal courthouse
All the speakers will be back at the Montreal courthouse on the 1ster December to discuss once again the extension of seizures.
Me Richard Tawil and Me Martin Suback, who represent MM. Rodriguez and Lopez-Ramos, in addition to Mme Guerrero Munoz, did not want to comment on the matter. Me Bolivar-Rubin, who represents Mr. Davila Ruiz, did not recall Press.
“The investigation is still ongoing,” MTESS explained by email. “No comments will be made. The Department also does not comment on the investigative techniques used. ”