Shady secret of the Shaky Lady (Beggar rakes in the cash, then heads home in a Lumina)

Toronto Sun ^ | By MIKE STROBEL

[Grig]

She wears a shabby red jacket. Her hair is grey and scraggly under a faded purple kerchief. A garbage bag covers her legs. People throw money on it.

Lots of people. Sometimes they line up.

"She got here about 11," says Const. Paul Stone, 50, on traffic duty at a construction site. "She started shaking as soon as she sat down. She's just rakin' it in now."

At Harvey's across the street, photographer Alex Urosevic and I do some figuring.

Thirty people in 15 minutes, Alex counts. Fifty in the time it takes me to eat a veggie burger and sip a coffee.

So, be very conservative and say 50 kind strangers an hour, a toonie each, five hours a day, five days a week.

That's $2,500 a week. Net. I mean, what's the overhead? How much do blue thermal pants and a garbage bag cost?

Several people in the area have told me she usually has two burly men keeping watch over her. Some think they're her sons.

If they're around, I can't spot them in the throngs.

"Please help me. I'm sick and poor. I will pray for you," says the cardboard sign around her neck.

I toss in a toonie. She gives me a toothless grin and croaks. The shaking is remarkable. How could you say no?

Shopkeepers and security staff say she has haunted Bloor between Yonge and Bay for at least a year.

"I was struck by her wretched appearance," says Agnes McKenna, 74, who lives nearby.

"I wondered, how could anybody be so heartless as to dump her on the street?

"A couple of weeks ago, coming home from a meeting, I see this woman suddenly get up, spry as a chicken. Her face becomes alive, she packs up her buggy and off she goes.

"Makes you feel like a fool, to be taken like that."

Toronto Police Const. Andrew Hassall once saw a woman so torn up about the Shaky Lady she bought her a $200 coat at The Bay. The beggar croaked her thanks, waited for the woman to leave, then threw out the coat. Hassall couldn't persuade the kind woman she'd been had.

The Shaky Lady is "the prima donna of this sort of thing," says Hassall. "She's been a thorn in our sides for years."

But the cops are stuck. Panhandling is legal.

For a while, I hide by the construction site behind the Shaky Lady. They are laying fibre-optic cable.

I can see each person approach the woman.

I see horror, pity. I see $10 bills, a few 20s. She tucks them under the bag. I think our income estimate is low.

At 4:30 p.m. she gets up, chucks the sisters' chicken fingers in the garbage and heads west on Bloor. There is no shaking. She moves faster and faster.

... I round the corner. A car, a Chevy Lumina, speeds in reverse.

A man drives, another sits in the back. The Shaky Lady, kerchief off, crouches in the passenger seat.

Caught without cover, I give chase. I can't read the plate. Alex is an alley away, trying to cut them off.

But the Lumina pulls out on Balmuto St., by the Uptown Theatre, then west on Bloor.

By the time I hail a cab and yell "follow that Lumina," it's gone.

Who knows where?

But I'm guessing it's not to a shelter for the homeless.

[another cricket]

pointed them to the nearest church.

Sadly churches now have to be careful as well. My church has decided that we will no longer give money. Food and clothing, yes, and we will arrange a place for you to stay but you will not walk out with cash. We got burned too often.

a.cricket

[Bohemund]

I always thought that guy looked too clean to really be homeless.

[scholar]

...but you will not walk out with cash.

My church didn't hand out cash even to parishioners. If there were specific needs such as rent, car payments, etc. they wrote a check made out to the appropriate payee.

[linn37]

our church was geting abused too. We have a deal with the local struck stop to provide a meal for anyone without money. The bums were ordering steaks and big deserts so we changed it to the Buffet meal only.

My brother-in-law stopped at one of them with the WILL WORK FOR FOOD signs and offered a meal and a days wages for some post hole digging and the bum said no thanks.

[freedox]

The only ones who get MY money are the ones who are smart enough to bring a dog with them. The sight of a quivering little pooch at their feet, remaining loyal to a master who has nothing.......yep, that'll sucker me in every time.......sighhhhhhhhh.

[BlueLancer]

"The only ones who get MY money are the ones who are smart enough to bring a dog with them."

I have to plead guilty to that one as well ... I guess we're just a couple of old softies after all.

[Liberal Classic]

This is not uncommon. On my way to work there was this hobo who would ask for handouts. I would give him a buck or two depending on the weather. So, one day I'm at a party with some friends, when who do I see but Mr. Hobo wearing clean chinos and a sweater. I finally asked him how long it took to wash off the shoe polish that he applied to his skin, but he wouldn't answer.

One of the ways you can tell about these people is to give them food instead of cash. I used to carry around canned goods, such as fruit and chili, and give it to beggars at intersections. The ones who are out for dough will not take canned food, nor will they let you feed them, because they want your money. Someone who is really a hobo won't turn down a meal. The fakers don't want your charity, they want hard currency.

This is my test, anyhow. Don't know how reliable it is, but it seems ok.

I asked the guy on the side of the road, "hey you need a can opener?"

"No," he replied. "I have a .45!"

[Ditter]

I knew I wasn't the only person to notice that guy. Am I telling the truth or what? LOL I have started to ask him where he had his shirts done because I was looking for new laundry but decided to ignore him instead.

[Spook86]

I saw a similar story in the Arizona Republic a few years ago. The newspaper dispatched a reporter to observe some of the "homeless" in Phoenix. One apparently homless family had the panhandling routine down pat. Everyone in the family--including children--were working separate street corners. Business was brisk, and the family apparently raked in several hundred dollars in less than three hours. At the end of the day, the "family" walked to a late-model mini-van, parked behind a nearby building, and drove away. The reporter followed them to a $150,000 home. Neighbors claimed the family had been begging for years, claiming homelessness and poverty. According to the neighbors, the family netted $1,000-$2,000 in a "good week."

[Melinator]

These people are harmless. They'll cheat you out of a couple of bucks "for a meal" and pay for a modest lifestyle (including a chauffer driven Lumina).

Big Government on the other hand will take 50% of your income at gunpoint, "for the Children", and pay for lifestyle that would make Donald Trump blush.

[Atticus]

I do NOT give money to beggars. You might as well give the money to the nearest liquor store owner, because that's where it's going. I do give money and have donated a valuable used car to a nonprofit organization that actuall feeds hungry people, takes them off the street, cleans them up and preaches to them. I remember once I was on a crowded subway in NYC (pre-Guliani) when a manacing black man came in from the next car and shouted "Listen up!" Everyone immediately assumed we were going to be robbed and the subway was silent. Then, he shouted "I am not going to rob anyone." The sighs of relief were audible. He then explained how he had just gotten out of prison and needed money so he would not go back to a life of crime, etc. Out of the 80 or so people on the subway car, at least 65 contributed at least a quarter, and many people forked over a dollar.

[MotleyGirl70]

The Shaky Lady, kerchief off, crouches in the passenger seat OF A RED FORD PICKUP TRUCK.

Is this really the women trying to scam some money for her bid as governor of Florida.

[Grig]

He then explained how he had just gotten out of prison and needed money so he would not go back to a life of crime, etc. Out of the 80 or so people on the subway car, at least 65 contributed at least a quarter, and many people forked over a dollar.

And we wonder why they vote for the Dems...

[jimtorr]

I never saw them in the really posh and touristy places, or in the really dumpy places like Brixton and Pecham, just in the inbetween places. McDonalds tasted the same to me over there, it was the only thing that did taste the same it seemed.

The lady I mentioned was near the center of tourism, on Oxford Street at Marble Arch.

McDonalds in Britain must have really gone downhill by the time I got there in 1991. I tried the McD's at Marble Arch, The Tower of London and in Norwich. Burger King on Tottenham Court Rd just off Oxford St. (near the British Museum) was even worse, terribly greasy. The only decent burgers I found in the whole country was at the Burger King on RAF Lakenheath. Thats a U.S. air base east of Cambridge.

[patent]

When I was in college, scraping my way through financially, I came out of a grocery store one day. The guy outside was panhanding. He wanted "37 cents, man, just 37 cents." I looked up at him. He was wearing a brand new polo from the gap, decent jeans (I forget which kind now) and good shoes. Between the two of us I was the one who looked more like a beggar.

Some of these people make far too much money in this country. In other countries people starve.

patent

[Grig]

I spent the vast majority of my time there south of the river, so I wasn't in the nicer spots as much as you probably were.

I went to several different McD's and they all seemed the same to me. There is a Burger King south of Mitcham however that had the first drive thru window in the UK. Because it was the first, they used the US plans so you have pull up and then reach over and roll down the window on the passenger side to deal with them!

[Uncle Meat]

In Boulder, Colorado there is a beggar at virtually every intersection where the traffic is good. Cracks me up to see a young, healthy college student sucking the cash out of the liberals pockets.

Downtown Savannah,they have a group of young vagrants[filthy clothes,barefeet,dreadlocks,face piercings like you wouldn't believe] that come in the store,buy beer and junkfood and pay for it with atm cards.What they do is go to small towns by bus and hit old people up for money.They rake in so much money,they have bank accounts.

[Chemnitz]

I know a minister who bragged about wearing rags so that people would donate to him and his wife. They had $3,000 cash in the bank and no debt but he wore ragged shirts and kept his kids poorly dressed as well. The children weren't even clean.

The best con job I heard about was true. A well dressed man came to town and went to all the ministers. He told each one, "I heard you are the best preacher in town. I want to join your church." Then he said, "Before my funds transfer to the local bank, could you give me a little to buy some things?" He got $20-100 from each minister, then left town. When they compared notes they realized how he had played upon their vanity. That's pan-handling with style.

I used to help a few people. Then our house was marked by their beggar's union. I heard the same story over and over. "I was driving to Florida to visit my dying mother and I ran out of cash. I have to see her. Could you spare a few dollar?"

[cathalcom]

are you serious about mcdonalds?! the mcdonalds on grafton street in dublin, which i presume is not much farther ahead than london, has oak panelling and sells cafe latte

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