The same day Port Moody Rev. Tom Cheung was identified as the man who died in a fiery crash at the Peace Arch border crossing, family and friends came across a cloned version of the GoFundMe page obstensibly set up to siphon off donations from the authentic page.
“Someone actually copied the page and created a fraudulent one,” said Peter Teh, a spokesperson for the Port Moody Pacific Grace MB Church where Cheung was the lead pastor.
Teh said he and friends of the family were told about the fake page Wednesday morning, May 8. They immediately contacted representatives of GoFundMe.com to inform them of the scam. Within an hour, the fake page was taken down, said Teh.
Teh said he can not confirm how much money had been donated before the fake page was taken down, but that the family was consoled by the donations that kept pouring in to the legitimate page.
By Thursday afternoon, the family’s GoFundMe page had raised over $91,000 of its $100,000 goal.
In a message to donors, the page notes Cheung was the family’s main provider and that the money would be used to help the family support their basic costs of living and education.
Of the nearly 300-person Cantonese congregation, many have been supporting the family with cooking, cleaning, counselling and financial arrangement, said Teh.
And while there are other pastors in the church to take care of weekly services, Teh says it’s impossible to replace someone like Cheung, who had worked in ministries across Venezuela, Mexico and China.
“He was a great, great pastor,” said Teh.
The deadly crash occurred las week when a Porsche Cayenne slammed into the back of Cheung’s Toyota van, sending both vehicles into the bushes just 300 metres from the Canada-U.S. border.
The collision set off a fire in Cheung’s vehicle and he was pronounced dead at the scene. The driver of the Porsche was taken to hospital with injuries that were not considered life threatening.
Peace Arch border crossing shut down in both directions due to accident caused by speeding SUV which hit multiple cars. Driver under arrest, bald male escorted by police taken by ambulance. No word on other injuries or occupats of van. #wsdot_traffic #globalbc pic.twitter.com/zaZObzDWpm
— vick grewal (@VickGrewal) May 2, 2019
— With files from the Canadian Press
