MONTREAL – A full week after Earl Jones vanished, allegedly with their hard-earned savings, dozens of his clients are still trying to navigate a maze of law enforcement agencies and securities regulators in an effort to report their losses and register formal complaints.
Left stunned and devastated by the sudden loss of education funds, retirement nest eggs and dreams for the future, some have gone straight to Quebec’s Autorité des marchés financiers (AMF).
Others have sought direction from their local police station, or the securities regulator in their home province.
“There has been a bewildering lack of co-ordination,” said Bill, whose 73-year-old mother had invested with Jones for many years, and has now lost her life savings.
Bill, who spoke on condition that his last name would not be published, was on his way from Toronto to Montreal yesterday to help his mother deal with the crisis.
“There have been a lot of reports about this affecting the seemingly well-heeled golf and country club set, but that’s not at all the case with my mother,” he said. “She worked her whole life, is single, lives in a modest townhouse, and she had all of her retirement funds – everything she had planned to live on her entire life – just vanish.”
[More]
Updates:
9:32 am EDT, July 17th, 2009 — Complete coverage of Earl Jones fiasco