A beauty queen had to return her Miss Universe Canada title just 24 hours after she was crowned on Saturday after organisers found that a clerical error resulted in her wrongly being named as the winner of the pageant.
Ontario native Denise Garrido, 26, was filled with so much emotions after being crowned Miss Universe Canada that she nearly knocked the crown on the stage while blowing kisses to the crowd.
According to Canada.com, pageant officials announced on Sunday that an employee putting up the judges' scores into a computer had made a mistake and the actual winner of the competition was Riza Santos, an actress and former Army reservist from Calgary, the New York Daily News reported.
The officials said that for the past ten years, the task had been handled by someone from a Toronto law firm, but the person wasn't available this year, so an employee did it.
Garrido, who actually came fourth in the competition, told the Toronto Star that her heart sank when she heard the news, asserting that it had been an ultimate dream of hers.
As a consolation, the pageant said that Garrido will make a few official appearances alongside Santos and will serve as a judge in the 2014 pageant.
