For 19 years, the federal government paid pension benefits totalling about $133,000 to In Kun Kang.

The trouble is, she was dead.

Now, a London man is charged with defrauding Canada’s pension system out of the money.

RCMP say a couple of decades ago a man was legally given control of his mother’s bank account to help with her finances.

“He was legally entitled to conduct business on the account and take money from the account,” Cpl. D’Arcy Cartier, of the London detachment of the Mounties’ O Division, said. But when his mother died, he didn’t bother to notify the federal government.

“Her Canada Pension Plan and Old Age Security continued to be deposited to the account,” Cartier said.

Employment and Social Development Canada first identified the overpayment of benefits and contacted police last year, RCMP said Wednesday.

How the overpayments were identified, and why it took so long, is unclear. All a department spokesperson could say is it’s up to people to “to follow the law and provide accurate information.”

The RCMP investigation was complex, Cartier said. “It involved digging through some of the bank accounts . . . in order to identify who was actually receiving the money,” he said.

Charged with fraud over $5,000 is Myung-Joon Kang. He’s to appear in court in London Oct. 10.