A 93-year-old woman was the victim of the so-called "Grandparent Scam," in which senior citizens are tricked into thinking a loved one is in danger, and are deceived into giving money away. In this incident, she handed over $2,000 to a stranger.
The incident took place around 1 p.m. on May 26th, 2017, when someone called the victim at her home near East 20th Street and First Avenue in Manhattan. The grifter called and claimed the victim's friend had been arrested and was stuck in jail on Rikers Island. According to the NYPD: "The individual asked the victim for $6,500 in cash to bail out her friend; the victim told him she could only provide $2,000. The individual subsequently arrived at the victim's residence and took the money. When the victim became suspicious she called her friend directly and discovered that he had not been arrested."
The police released surveillance images of the suspect, who is wanted for grand larceny. He is described as having a slim build; he was last seen wearing a blue hooded sweater with white stripes on its arms, a black shirt and dark colored pants.
The suspect (NYPD)
In the "Grandparent Scam," the scammer poses as an elderly person's grandchild and claims to be in an accident or in trouble and need money immediately. C. Steven Baker, director of the Midwest division of the Federal Trade Commission, told us in 2014 that the scam started in Montreal: Criminals would scan obituaries and gather details about deceased individuals and their survivors—the widows/widowers, plus the names of the grandchildren. Then they'd call a grandparent and either pose as their grandchildren or their grandchildren's friend, saying there was an accident and they needed money. And the grandparents would fall for it.
With social media, there are more avenues for scammers to collect information to convincingly pose as people's friends or claim to know their friends.
Anyone with information in regards to this incident is asked to call the NYPD's Crime Stoppers Hotline at 1-800-577-TIPS (8477) or for Spanish, 1-888-57-PISTA (74782). The public can also submit their tips by logging onto the Crime stoppers website at WWW.NYPDCRIMESTOPPERS.COM or by texting their tips to 274637 (CRIMES) then enter TIP577. All calls are strictly confidential.
