Different scams continue to proliferate

What do a grandson in jail, a foreign prince, national lotteries and credit card companies have in common?

They’re each the basis of different scams, and they continue to be ever-present across the country and in the Flathead Valley.

According to a February report completed by the Consumer Sentinel Network for the Federal Trade Commission, more than 1.8 million complaints of scams, fraud, identity theft and other associated crimes were reported in 2011.

Montana crimes accounted for 4,410 of the total. Of those, credit card fraud and government documents or benefits fraud topped the list of identity theft complaints, while debt collection, prizes, sweepstakes and lotteries and impostor scams led the list of fraud and other complaints.

In Flathead County, a multitude of scams are regularly reported to law enforcement officials, among them the ever-popular “grandparent scam.”

One person targeted by the scam was the mother of Donna Brown.

“She got a phone call and thought it was her grandson, apparently saying he’d went up to Canada and met some people, then got stopped at the border and busted for drugs,” Brown said. “He said he was in jail and needed $6,000 to get out.”

Like most scams, there was a time factor. The caller told Brown’s mother that the money had to be wired that day because a hearing was coming up. Initially skeptical, she called back and the same person answered.

“She got all the way to Walmart with the money,” Brown said. “Then a woman at Walmart questioned her and made my mom not do it. I was really thankful.”

When her mother got home, she called the number back and confronted the person, who told her, “That’s OK, I know where you live, have a nice life,” and hung up.

The intervention by a Walmart employee, however, was no random bit of luck.

Speaking on a consumer fraud panel on March 9 during National Consumer Protection Week, Consumer Protection Bureau Director David Vladeck said Walmart employees are trained to intervene when they believe someone wiring money has been scammed.

“They are training their personnel to talk to the person and ask, ‘Why are you sending this money?’” Vladeck said.

Jonathan Rusch, special counsel for fraud prevention at the U.S. Department of Justice, said on the same panel that the grandparent scam first surfaced in Japan. He said the first words said on the calls are usually “It’s me,” causing the grandparent to say the name of a grandchild and allowing the caller to agree.

Vladeck said such scams long have been run out of Canada, Jamaica and Ghana and now also are being traced to places such as Spain and Costa Rica.

“The Royal Canadian Mounted Police arrested a group of people in Montreal working full-time doing the grandparent scam aimed at older Americans,” Rusch said.

Another common scam plays on the false awarding of lottery or drawing winnings. Kalispell resident Rose Behrens was the target of one such scam.

“They called and said I had won some sort of drawing,” Behrens said. “It was for some large amount, which is what tipped me off.”

The caller told her she would have to give him her bank account information for him to release the money to her. In an attempt to determine the caller’s intent, she told him she would have to tell him later, that the information was in her purse and not nearby.

“He said, ‘No, I need it right now or I can’t give you the money,’” Behrens said.

Behrens said the caller also brought up her husband’s name. She informed the caller that he was dead, and said the caller responded with “That’s good.”

After refusing to share any information, Behrens reported it to the Flathead County Sheriff’s Office. She was informed that the office had received several complaints about the same scam.

The Montana Department of Justice tracks scams throughout the state and offers email scam alerts as well as an 800 line for reporting scams and other fraud.

Among its top 10 tips for avoiding fraud, the department tells consumers never to give out personal information solicited over the phone or Internet, never wire or give money to someone you don’t know and use common sense. If it sounds to good to be true, they say, it probably is.

For more information on scams and to sign up for alerts, visit doj.mt.gov/consumer. To report a scam or other fraud, call (800) 481-6896.

Reporter Jesse Davis may be reached at 758-4441 or by email at jdavis@dailyinterlake.com.