A recent capture of America’s “Most Wanted Deadbeat ” - a man on the run from U.S. authorities for not paying child support and using a false alias in Canada -came down to a cherry pit, a local restaurant and a quick Google search.
A recent capture of America’s “Most Wanted Deadbeat ” - a man on the run from U.S. authorities for not paying child support and using a false alias in Canada -came down to a cherry pit, a local restaurant and a quick Google search.
On a November evening last year, Bear’s Den owner Scott Winograd was alerted to a complaint from one of his regulars, a middle aged man going by the name “Joop Cousteau, ” who was sipping a custom cherry coke with precisely eight maraschino cherries. He claimed to have broken a tooth on a cherry pit, a fact Winograd found odd since maraschino cherries do not have pits.
“He came across as really charming, the nicest guy you’ve ever met type of thing. He would spend time with the staff, chatting everyone up. His stories won the staff over - he’s a doctor, he’s this and he’s that, ” Winograd recalled.
But as he began listening in on stories “Cousteau ” was telling his staff since first dinning at the Bear’s Den in late fall, he noticed some inconsistencies. At first, the man claimed to have been an Oxford graduated doctor, who had left his practice to become the vice-president of Google.
The tooth complaint was handled by staff that evening and the next day “Cousteau ” appeared with “sketchy ” dental paperwork, claiming Winograd may be partially liable for roughly $30,000 of alleged damage.
“You’re shaking me down for money, is what’s happening here, ” Winograd thought to himself, though over the next few weeks in December and into the restaurant’s final month of operation in January, Winograd maintained his friendliness and even attempted to build a relationship with the man, and his wife while secretly conducting his own detective work.
“I started going down the rabbit hole, going a couple pages into Google about him, ” Winograd said. “He’s a bit of a turd, he’s screwed people over with businesses he’s had. ”
It turns out that “Cousteau ” is actually Joseph Stroup, who had been on the run from paying child support since July 1998.
Back in August 1989, Stroup was ordered to pay child support for his four children in the amount of $100 per month. However, he told the court he was unemployed and medically disabled and his support was reduced to $14 per month, though failed to report his successful Internet business which sold for more than $2 million. Upon the court learning this in 1996, the child support order was modified accordingly. He subsequently failed to pay child support from June 1996 to present.
Winograd - who has become known in the community after slamming the NDP leadership recently over the closure of his restaurant last month and is now seeking nomination for UCP in the new Banff-Kananaski ED riding - said it was his Google search that saved him from falling into Stroup’s trap.
He invited Stroup and his wife into the restaurant one evening and bought the pair dinner.
“I wanted to make sure it was him, ” Winograd said, because the photo on the U.S. website was 20 years outdated.
“He didn’t make too much of an effort to hide his appearance. He still had a moustache, not too many people have a moustache now a days, ” Winograd said. “By the end of the meeting, I knew this was the guy. ”
Winograd contacted Cochrane RCMP and later, the Office of Inspector General's website, where he found the “Most Wanted Deadbeat ” poster of Stroup. Within an hour U.S. officials were calling him, including the FBI.
Over the next few weeks, Winograd was instructed to text a U.S. Marshall each time he had an interaction with Stroup up until the closing of his restaurant.
“Rarest name, ” Winograd said. “If you’re hiding from the law, you think you’d go with John Smith. ”
Canadian Border Service Agency ultimately arrested Stroup on Feb.1 and ran his name through law enforcement databases. Once they found his active warrant in the United States, Stroup was deported on an immigration violation.
“We used the latest data analytics to locate and track Mr. Stroup, ” said Todd Silver, senior communications specialist of the Office of Inspector General and U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. “We provided leads to the CBSA, and they were the arresting agency. ”
“Mr. Stroup will be arraigned in Federal Court in the Western District of Michigan, and will face charges of failure to pay court ordered child support obligations. If he is found guilty, he could face jail time and restitution. ”
