Two St. Albert residents say they were targeted over the weekend by strangers claiming their lost phones were inside their homes. The incidents, on Aug. 9 and 10 in different neighbourhoods, involved separate groups.
St. Albert RCMP say it’s unclear if the groups are connected to larger groups, but similar scams have occurred in Eastern Canada and the U.S.
“This is a way for the scammers to gain access to your residence and case the house for a future crime/theft, or they may steal items in your home while looking for their cell phone,” read a press release from the St. Albert RCMP.
In both cases, the residents spoke to the strangers either through a security camera, closed door or window. Both refused them entry to their homes before calling the police.
On Saturday morning, Kendyl Weir, a St. Albert resident who lives in Erin Ridge, said her family was at Severus Place swimming when her home surveillance system sent her an alert. She explained that she noticed three or four people standing on her lawn, and they weren't leaving.
Weir said she notified her husband, and he spoke to the strangers through the security device, asking if they could help them. She said the strangers immediately responded, saying that they had their phone.
“So I just chimed in and I said, ‘We don't have your phone. I have no idea what you're talking about.’ That's when they started swearing,” Weir said. She explained that they got more heated and kept saying that their lost phone's location was showing up at her house.
As they did not leave their property, Weir said she told them she was going to call the police to have them removed. The strangers said they weren’t going to leave, according to Weir; however, after she called them and they were on their way, she saw the strangers get into their car and leave.
She told the police they were driving a grey Tesla with Ontario plates.
“Four police officers pulled them over and were questioning them,” Weir said, explaining that that's what she saw when they arrived home. “They claimed, of course, they did not come to my house, and that they went to another house and got their phone back, and when the police pulled them over, magically, their phone was found.”
Two days after this incident, Weir received a notification on her phone stating that one of her tires had low air pressure. When she went to check what happened, she noticed that one of her tires was slashed. Weir said she believes this could be a form of retaliation for posting what car they were driving on Facebook.
Weir said the officer she spoke with after her tire was slashed told her this was a common scam in Ontario; however, she said her file was closed soon after the incident on Saturday.
“But he really just closed the file right away and didn't do anything, obviously, until my tire got slashed.”
She also explained that the strangers who were on her lawn live near her and are members of the community.
A similar incident occurred on Sunday afternoon, when another St. Albert resident of Lacombe Park East, who asked not to be named, said strangers rang her doorbell twice. She checked her doorbell camera and saw a man saying he had lost his phone and that it was tracking to her address.
She told him she didn’t have it. Looking outside moments later, she saw two more people at the end of her driveway, one with a full-sized suitcase and bicycles loaded with gear.
“When he saw me, his demeanour changed,” she said. “He rushed up my driveway and showed me his phone through the window, pointing to a tracker that supposedly showed his phone inside my house.”
She called a neighbour for help and phoned the police.
Neighbours confronted the group, prompting the woman and another man to leave quickly in different directions. The first man stayed in the area briefly before walking away. Police stopped him nearby and spoke to him about the incident, and he claimed that his parents lived in the area. The police followed up with them and confirmed his statement.
The source also noted that later, when reviewing the footage, she noticed the stranger who was at her door appeared to have a knife on him. At this point, she followed up with the RCMP.
“So I wanted to call back and talk to the officer. And so I spoke to him that night when he was back on shift. And you know, his whole demeanour about the thing had changed. He was kind of like making it out to not be a big deal,” she said. “I understand that a crime didn't occur, and there's nothing to arrest them on. But I would have felt more comfortable had they known. These are people that we need to keep an eye out for. They're in our community.”
Both residents said they shared their experiences to alert their neighbours and the St. Albert community about the scam.
“It’s just like, stay vigilant, you know, reinforce security around your home and your properties,” Weir said. “People are really bold and really brazen, because they’re doing it in their own neighbourhoods, to their own neighbours, completely unprovoked.”
