Men dragged Brampton mother by car to steal her son's Air Jordans, police say
CBC
A Brampton mom says she was dragged by a car and seriously injured while trying to help her 12-year-old son sell a pair of high-end sneakers to someone they met on Facebook Marketplace.
Vashtie Doorga posted an online ad to sell a pair of Air Jordans in the recently relaunched "Military Blue" colourway and found an "adamant" customer. The mother and son decided to meet around 7:15 p.m. on June 26 in a residential area near Dixie and Father Tobin roads.
A short time later, Doorga found herself bloodied on a roadway after being dragged by a black Tesla driven by men she didn't know. They had stolen the shoes and left her behind.
"I have a lot of scarring damage and pain that's unbearable. I can't sleep. I can't open a bottle of water myself, I can't wash my hair myself. It burns my body when I have to bathe. I can't drive anymore," Doorga said in tears in an interview with CBC Toronto.
"I'm scared … living in fear."
Police across the Greater Toronto Area have issued warnings to beware of such frauds. Toronto police recently issued a public warning about Marketplace scams, saying the number of complaints related to the platform reported in the city this year crossed the 500 mark by May, with damages totalling over $800,000.
Marketplace scams are the second most reported frauds, according to statistics released by Toronto police in May.
Even Facebook has listed measures for Marketplace users to recognize scams in its "shopping safety" section.
Doorga said her son wanted to help her by starting a shoe resale business because she is a single mother.
To surprise her son with his first pair to sell, Doorga says she lined up outside a Nike store at the Bramalea City Centre and got the last available pair of the high-end shoes. She says she wanted the money her son would make from the shoes to go into his first business bank account when he turned 13 in a week.
"It was like Willy Wonka with the golden ticket," she said.
The teen designed a logo for his new business he named "The Real Deal" and posted an ad on his mother's Facebook Marketplace account.
Within two weeks, the pair received messages from a few prospective buyers. One of them, Doorga said, was "adamant."
"I really need it," the man said in Facebook Messenger texts viewed by CBC Toronto.
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