The Parole Board of sa国际传媒 has allowed convicted fraudster Ian Thow a two-day extension of his Mexican vacation. No one has found a way for his victims to take a vacation from the misery he caused them.
Many of the people he cheated were left destitute by a man who used trust and friendship as levers to pry money out of anyone he could. While they struggle to make ends meet, the man who ruined them is going to sun himself on the beaches of Mexico. They can be forgiven for thinking there鈥檚 a shortage of justice in the justice system.
Thow was a high-flying investment adviser in Victoria who ingratiated himself with the rich and famous, as well as people of more modest means. Smooth and charismatic, he had a talent for convincing people to invest in his schemes, all of which turned out to be bogus. In May 2005, he declared bankruptcy, with 73 former clients and unsecured creditors claiming he owed them $32 million. He fled to the U.S. that summer.
In 2007, the sa国际传媒 Securities Commission determined that Thow had used his clients鈥� money to support his lavish lifestyle in a massive Ponzi scheme.
In 2009, Thow was arrested by U.S. marshals in Portland, Oregon, and returned to sa国际传媒. In 2010, he pleaded guilty to 20 charges of fraud totalling $8 million, and was sentenced to nine years in prison. He was ordered to pay restitution totalling $3.8 million. He was granted full parole in October 2012, after serving less than a third of his sentence.
In March, the parole board gave Thow permission to leave the country for a week鈥檚 vacation, and this week allowed a two-day extension to the trip.
The board had concluded there鈥檚 little risk that Thow won鈥檛 return and that he is making progress in his rehabilitation, including starting to make payments on the $3.8 million the court ordered him to repay.
Given how well he is doing, should we begrudge Thow a little R&R in Mexico? Yes, we should. The few thousand dollars spent for a Mexican vacation wouldn鈥檛 make much of a dent in the millions he stole, but any one of his many victims would have appreciated receiving that money. It would perhaps not be spent on a vacation in the sun, but to buy necessities and pay some bills.
When the parole board ponders granting parole, the review focuses on whether the inmate is likely to commit a violent offence, such as murder, assault or pointing a firearm. Fraud is not considered a violent crime, but it still inflicts pain and injury, psychological and physiological.
Victims who testified at the commission hearings told of the trail of misery left in the wake of Thow鈥檚 predations. Many were retirees or people trying to prepare for a comfortable retirement; some were persuaded to remortgage their homes or draw on lines of credit to fund their 鈥渋nvestments.鈥�
People who had expected to live a comfortable retirement in homes they had paid off are forced to make mortgage payments out of meagre pensions or are trying to pay down bank loans. People who sought to be independent in their old age are forced to rely on family for support. Health problems increase with the stress and fear accompanying financial ruin.
Thow鈥檚 early release from prison, theoretically, was to allow him to begin leading a productive life. But there鈥檚 something wrong if he has the means to take a Mexican vacation while his victims still struggle to recover from the damage he inflicted.
Let him keep enough for life鈥檚 necessities. Beyond that, every penny he earns should go to repay those he cheated.
