Surrey business owner Parminder Sanghera says he has been living in fear after receiving a series of threatening phone calls demanding cash.
On July 8, Sanghera, who owns a trucking company, said he answered a call asking him to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars or face the consequences.
“If you don’t pay us, we’re gonna burn your Range Rover and then [the extortionist] said [they] were coming in 20 minutes,'” he told CBC News.
Sanghera immediately informed the police, who arrived on the scene shortly afterwards. He says he answered several more calls from the extortionist that day, including a video call during which the caller warned that authorities would be powerless to protect him.
“We are staying mostly at home, and we have to wake up in the middle of the night and look around at everything,” Sanghera said.
Several business owners who say they have received similar threats aired their grievances at a special meeting last week organized by the Canadian Trucking Association of B.C. (CTA-BC), which says a growing number of South Asian business owners throughout the industry are facing extortion threats.
Surrey Mayor Brenda Locke, along with local members of Parliament (MPs), members of the Legislative Assembly (MLAs) and police officers, were in attendance.
There are growing concerns about reports of South Asian businesses being targeted with violence and extortion across the country. Police and political officials in Ontario, Alberta and B.C., say they’re investigating similar acts, while Edmonton police say incidents in their city have been orchestrated by a criminal network in India.
The association’s president, Amit Bhardwaj, says more needs to be done to better protect business owners in B.C.
“If we don’t deal with things out in the open, then they get shoved under the rug, and they become non-issues,” he said.
Last December, a similar meeting addressed a series of shootings tied to extortion attempts, which targeted homes and businesses in Metro Vancouver.
Extortion threats have been reported in several B.C. cities, including West Vancouver, White Rock, Surrey and Abbotsford, through physical letters, phone calls, and social media apps.
Jas Arora, who owns Highway King Transport Limited in Abbotsford, says he has been receiving extortion calls for more than a year.
“[It has] been actually getting worse and worse,” Arora told CBC News. “Now they’re talking [to] people [who] are working for me, and it’s threatening them.”
Despite multiple reports to the police, the intimidation persists, even disrupting personal moments such as his mother’s funeral.
“I was very emotional with my mom passing away, and they [kept calling] the same day.”
What concerns Arora even more is that the calls aren’t just empty threats.
Surrey RCMP said it made two arrests in late December 2023 following a shooting in White Rock in connection to extortion threats.
But the problem extends further to South Asian business owners in other provinces who have been targeted with gunfire after refusing to pay up.
In Ontario, police arrested a 23-year-old man from Abbotsford, B.C., on Dec. 8, 2023, in connection to extortion threats that they say have “caused grave safety and security concerns among our community members.”
Edmonton police said in January that they made six arrests tied to extortion threats, shootings and arsons.
“It’s really unfortunate, and I’m really scared for my kids and my family,” Arora said, adding that his trust in the local police is wavering.
The RCMP says it has established a national team to help co-ordinate investigations and information sharing about extortion schemes targeting South Asian businesses in B.C., Alberta and Ontario.
Mounties say the team is a “nationwide alliance” of police agencies that are all investigating extortion and violent threats, which have been tied to shootings and arson.
In a statement to CBC, Minister of Public Safety and Solicitor General Mike Farnworth said he recognizes the significant concern within the South Asian community regarding the ongoing extortion attempts.
“I agree that it is imperative that community members, elected officials, and law enforcement work together to collectively address this important public safety issue,” he said.
A wave of violent extortion attempts against South Asian-owned businesses across Canada have police searching for the source. CBC’s Jamie Strashin breaks down the damage done and the links to international organized crime.
According to the minister, the province has allocated more than $100 million annually into specialized enforcement and intelligence programs targeting guns, gangs and illicit drug activities to ensure British Columbians are safe from organized crime.
“We are also building on B.C.’s gun and gang strategy through the development of a new provincially funded Integrated Gang Homicide Team (IGHT) that is dedicated to investigating project-based gang-related homicide incidents and increasing gang-related intelligence co-ordination in the Lower Mainland.”