From Cuba, yet another broken heart | Toronto Star
From Cuba, yet another broken heart
Like Brampton's Erin Standen, John-Barry Livingstone claims he was taken advantage of by a spouse who left soon after arriving in Canada.
Two years after his Cuban wife left him, John-Barry Livingstone is left with more than a broken heart.
When his three-year financial commitment as spousal sponsor to Vilma-Rosa Morales-Rodriguez ended last April, the Toronto architect received a $3,800 bill from the province for the welfare benefits his wife has collected.
Stories like his — and that of a Brampton woman whose tale of crushed Cuban love appeared in Thursday’s Star — occur often, according to immigration lawyer Sergio Karas. Many of his clients come seeking help after a sponsored spouse abruptly leaves — five or six a year from the Dominican Republic alone.
“On a resort, in the tropic sun, when you have too many margaritas and pina coladas and these guys are sweet-talking you, you are vulnerable,” Karas said. “I have people coming into my office, saying, ‘I met this person; I want him here; how quickly can he be here?’ Then (the sponsored spouses) came here and leave them.”
In the past decade, 10,563 Cubans came to Canada as permanent residents, the majority under spousal sponsorships or family reunification.
According to an immigration official, marriages of convenience have become a concern at the Havana visa office. In a quality assurance exercise in 2011, officials contacted a sample of Canadians who had married and sponsored Cubans. About one-third of those relationships had ended soon after the new spouse’s arrival in Canada. Fraud and misrepresentation were often cited as the reason, leading officials to review applications more closely than before.
Livingstone, 56, said he met Morales-Rodriguez, 27, at a park in Cuba in April 2007 while he was on a bike tour. After four return visits, he married her on Dec. 24, 2007, and sponsored her to Canada.
The former Cuban civil servant joined him in April 2009. But Livingstone said she left his home as soon as her 11-year-old daughter arrived in Toronto a year later — while he was on a business trip to Chicago.
The Star tried to reach Morales by phone for comment, but the number was no longer in service. An email to her was not returned.
“It’s the allure of the Caribbean. It’s the novelty of a young woman showing attention to an old guy like me. You do things sensible people don’t do,” Livingstone said ruefully. “My friends had warned me to be careful, but I never listened. I have myself to blame.”
The story of Brampton single mom Erin Standen, whose Cuban husband left her three days after arrival, has drawn an online debate about the flaws of Canada’s sponsorship program and the sponsors’ willingness to gamble on a relationship born during a vacation fling.
“It is a sin when this happens and it is crazy that some women actually didn’t know the intentions of their husbands. Sending the money on a regular basis and supporting their boyfriends is a number one alarm,” said one online comment.
“If they still love you and want to be with you when you don’t support them your relationship might have a better chance.”
Livingstone said he was emotionally fragile after losing both his parents in January 2007, just months before he went to Cuba.
In the months after, he sent Morales-Rodriguez $200 to $250 a month to support her. He said he gave her his mother’s 1-carat diamond engagement ring, which she still has. He also bought a $322,000, two-bedroom condo so he could have room for Morales and her daughter.
Livingstone said he didn’t see any warning signs, other than her being “huffy” and reluctant to get intimate.
He said Morales-Rodriguez started taking English lessons and computer courses at George Brown College shortly after her arrival. He said she would fly to Cuba to visit her daughter every three months, at his expense.
He said he was devastated when she left and decided to email her in the summer of 2010. Miraculously, she responded.
At a meeting at Scarborough Town Centre, Livingstone said, Morales-Rodriguez claimed she had moved to a shelter because he yelled at her and it upset her daughter. He said she’s planning to divorce him once legal aid comes through.
Livingstone said officials at the Canada Border Services Agency said he couldn’t withdraw his sponsorship after his wife had arrived. He is now stuck with the $3,800 bill, under a Supreme Court ruling that provinces have the right to collect such payments from sponsors.
Under more recent immigration rules, sponsored spouses must remain married for two years before receiving permanent resident status. It can be revoked if they are found guilty of marriage fraud, but the process is lengthy and lawyer Karas said Ottawa needs to expedite it by banning appeals.
