But the scam is bigger than ‘just’ tricking people out of life savings – the real game is to double dip tax credits with loans twinned as mortgages to embezzle cash from investment income that people file as if paid a loan from personal income. It means people become unwitting coconspirators in massive tax evasion to divert tax from public wealth to the benefit of banks selling loans, and their agents selling investments.  

It works because financial advisors and sales reps swear oaths to lawyers handling loans to sell investments peoples’ signatures identify them to debt to promissory notes in the small print of commercial paper. It’s legal and banks are immune from prosecution. It’s that easy.  

Banks have crafty paperwork to hide their role in tax shelter schemes. In Crawford’s case, about 300 investors were apparently saddled with about $22 million in trick bank loans they knew nothing about – paid to a crafty lawyer evidently taking about half as much again from investors signing as ‘Makers’ of Non-bank Notes who still wonder where the money went.  

It sounds a bit like the ABCP Third Party Notes scandal in the largest $32 Billion bankruptcy of a financial conduit in Canadian history with taxpayers bailing out banks that want to be rid of Non-bank Notes in default. It’s the same with the USA in the largest ever trial for tax evasion at US2.6 Billion involving bankers, lawyers and accountants. In the United Kingdom banks are in the news for not being open with British Prime Minister Gordon Brown questioning runaway debt that Crawford wants a ‘Responsible Lending Act’ with regulations to put a stop to irresponsible lending.  

Crawford proposes a simple ‘Reverse Onus Rule’ that lenders must prove identity validation and financial due diligence before approving loans to create debt. It would stop the problem before it starts, if: 

1. Lenders and debtors are fully involved and both sign awareness of borrowing intentions,

2. Lenders must provide proof of identity in lending decisions to settle collection issues.      

Isn’t that how it’s supposed to work? It could be so easy… all it takes is one call from a bank to check identity and validate third party representations to avoid financial and social impacts of trick loans. In all these cases, banks say they trust third party representations, if things go wrong it’s always the customer’s fault with the onus of proof on them to prove they were tricked into debt. In court, clueless defendants are called ‘Sophisticated Investors’ and judges rule no credible evidence of wrongdoing by banks that leaves innocent Canadians on the hook for ‘Sitting Duck’ loans. Some pay from family savings, or selling or re-mortgaging their homes to off debt. Some take second jobs. Some die in shock, and some commit suicide. After nine-year litigation a bank has spent hundreds of thousands to finally win a summary judgement for Crawford’s passage into an $80,000 debt without trial. 

Today, taxpayers around the world have paid some fourteen trillion dollar as about a quarter of everything the world produces to cover bad debt in so-called sub-prime mortgages and commercial paper. The USA is talking about a ‘Bad-bank’ to recycle toxic financial instruments.  

Crawford has filed a complaint with the Upper Canada Law Society concerning highly suspicious irregularities in his case currently before the Toronto Court of Appeal on January 30, 2009, three days after the Minister of Finance announces the 2009 budget.  
Crawford refers to Canadian experience as reason for regulations long overdue. He is optimistic Canada's Minister of Finance will show leadership in a Canadian approach that links financial regulations and consumer protection with socioeconomic stimulus initiatives for a sustainable 2009 budget.