Woman who bilked travellers gets reprieve

A Fort Erie woman who repeatedly claimed she has access to thousands of dollars to reimburse people who were bilked out of an allinclusive cruise she promoted, has yet to turn over the cash, court heard Friday.

Karen Gushue, also known as Karen Robinson, was scheduled to be sentenced Friday in an Ontario Court of Justice in St. Catharines on charges she violated the Travel Industry Act by acting as a travel agent without first being registered to do so.

Friday was Judge Joseph Nadel’s latest attempt at sentencing the 49-year-old.

In previous court appearances, Gushue claimed she had access to more than $26,000 which she planned to turn over to the Travel Industry Council of Ontario (TICO) to reimburse the victims.

“She’s held out this carrot to me,” the judge said Friday. “The only reason I didn’t sentence her earlier is this promise of $26,000.

“She has been saying this stuff for months, and not a dollar has appeared.”

Lawyer Daniel Kayfetz told the judge his client had a family member deposit bank drafts on Monday, then requested the money be deposited into his trust account.

It is the policy of the financial institution, he said, to hold the drafts for five business days before releasing the funds.

Nadel agreed to postpone sentencing until Dec. 13, with hopes the money Gushue claims she has access to will materialize by then. Gushue was a member of the Royal Canadian Legion branch 230 in Ridgeway. Between August 2016 and February 2017, she organized and promoted two vacation packages at the branch.

The first was a four-day cruise package to the Bahamas in February 2017. The second was a trip to Hawaii.

It was during the Bahamas cruise that guests discovered their packages only covered the flight down to Florida and that alcohol was not included. They had to make their own arrangements and pay for their return flights.

The Hawaii cruise never happened.

Formed in 1997, TICO is a notfor-profit corporation that administers the Travel Industry Act and the Ontario Travel Industry Compensation Fund.