Scammers attempting to cash in on missing Sullivan kids case: SAR group
A Halifax search team warned Tuesday that "fraudulent individuals and organizations" are impersonating them and asking for money under the guise of trying to find Lilly and Jack Sullivan, the two Pictou County children who have been missing since May 2.
"Please be advised that we do not request donations via third-party fundraising platforms like GoFundMe or direct messages," the alert from Halifax Search and Rescue said in part.
In an interview with CBC's Mainstreet Halifax on Wednesday, Paul Service, the chief director of Halifax Search and Rescue, said the organization recently learned about an online fundraiser purportedly intending to help launch a drone search for Lilly and Jack Sullivan.
"At the end of it, it listed Halifax Search and Rescue as a beneficiary of the search if they didn't use all the funding. And certainly, we're not aware of that campaign at all, we're not endorsing it," Service said.
He said it's unfortunate that someone would try to take advantage of the case of the missing Sullivan children, but he's seen it happen with other high-profile searches.
"There's potential opportunity, you know, [there's] high traffic in the media right now on the file, lots of attention — so they're able to generate based off of that interest," he explained.
Service said the fake fundraisers tend to originate outside Nova Scotia. He said he's seen one from Ontario and another from the United States.
"So they're really not local and that's something that people should be looking for."
Service said the latest fraudulent fundraiser was brought to his attention by people who saw it online and asked him about it.
The Halifax team gets its funding from the Halifax municipality and the provincial government and also carries out some local fundraising efforts, he said. He pointed out search and rescue organizations hold their fundraisers within the community, citing as examples the Sheet Harbour SAR fish derby and the Pictou County SAR raffle.
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