Canadian sentenced to three years probation for bilking elderly

March 28, 2011 | 12:20 pm

A Canadian woman convicted of operating a mail fraud scheme with her ex-husband targeting elderly victims was sentenced Monday in Los Angeles to three years probation.

Carrie Elizabeth Hope, 35, of British Columbia, was arrested in 2007 and charged with wire, mail and telemarketing fraud against the elderly. She pleaded guilty to one count of mail fraud, according to federal court documents.

Mark Eldon Wilson, also of British Columbia, was arrested in the same case. Wilson is still fighting extradition, said Assistant U.S. Atty. Ellyn M. Lindsay.

According to a statement from the U.S. attorney’s office at the time, the couple ran a telemarketing scheme from 1998 to 2001, in which they hired telemarketers to sell fraudulent credit card protection programs to customers across the United States, including in Los Angeles.

They did business under the names American Fraud Watch Services and Debt Service International. Lindsay called Hope’s sentence appropriate considering her lack of any other criminal record and her three young children, who remain in Canada.

“The main perpetrator of the scheme is her ex-husband,â€