Home in Amherstburg, Ont., unlivable after family spent $155K on renovations, police looking for contractor

Honestly, the amount of stress and trauma that this person inflicted on us is. Crazy. Tonya Azevedo walks into a home she's owned for 20 years and has visions of the memories she and her two kids made here. This would have been our family room. Azevedo and her husband hired a family friend who claimed to be a licensed contractor to add a two-storey addition onto the home and build a brand new garage. Azevedo remortgaged the home that was nearly paid off to cover the cost of the $200,000 project. Every time I come here and see what's left, You know, of a home that I raised my two children in and all of the happy memories and the things we did as a family is just gone. The work started in March and she gave the contractor separate payments in the months that followed that eventually totaled $155,000. Then she began to notice questionable workmanship. Dirt used to fill concrete blocks, live electrical wire under drywall and a sewer pipe that ruptured. So concerning, the town's building department shut down construction after finding what they call deficiencies, including that parts of the foundation didn't comply with the Ontario Building Code. To be honest, I was just too trusting of him. We shouldn't have listened to him. Had just done some more research. Azevedo said the rest of the loan was used to undo some of the mistakes, and now they've run out of money, forced to live with family. She reported this to the Windsor Police Amherstburg Detachment in October, and on Tuesday, police have issued an arrest warrant for Jesse Flaherty. CBC News spoke with Flaherty on Monday. At the time, he said he wasn't aware police were looking for him and he didn't give permission to broadcast the recorded conversation. She had indicated to me that you were a licensed contractor, but is your license still valid? He said, um, I'm a sole proprietor, licensed contractor. I guess it expires, so I had to renew it, but I'm insured. My bank account is under my business name and my name, so I'm pretty much my company. He went on to say as well, they pretty much fired me and didn't give me the opportunity to fix any issues. Flaherty is wanted on fraud over $5,000, uttering a forged document and obtaining more than $5,000 under false pretenses. Windsor Police say his company, MBS Home Solutions, was dissolved in November 2024 for non-compliance, yet he continued to operate under that name. There is an important difference between just a bad job and deliberate deception. So if someone just does poor work, and that is usually a civil situation, but if there's evidence that they deliberately lied to get your money, it can become criminal. Right now, there's been no heat in the home. The family is without a washroom and there isn't power to much of the house. The hardest part for Azevedo is not being able to fix this for my children. To have everything stripped away from them and as a mom, just not being able to fix that. Jason Vio, CBC News, Windsor. We asked the Better Business Bureau how you can protect yourself when hiring a contractor. Here are their tips. Always ask for three references. Ask for the name of the agency that has licensed the contractor and verify that license independently if you can do it yourself and check a company's reputation on the Better Business Bureau website.