Sheriff Warns of Phone Scams
Every day, scammers come up with new ways and stories to fraudulently pressure people into sending them money or taking their money.
The Sheriff’s Office is sharing a few recently reported actual incidents of unsuspecting Will County residents to assist you in being aware of tactics scammers are using. As more victims come forward to report, we will share some of their stories:
*On November 16th a resident reported that he received a text message that stated the message was from his General Manager from the victim’s place of employment. The (fraudulent) General Manager’s message asked the victim if he could help him with purchasing several gift cards for the other employees as a Christmas surprise.
The victim agreed to help, traveled to a nearby store, and purchased one Sephora card for $250 and four Footlocker cards for $250 each. The victim was then directed to scratch off the security code on the back and send a picture of each of the cards, via text, to the person impersonating his GM.
Later, the impersonating GM asked the victim to purchase an additional eight gift cards for $250 each. The victim then became suspicious and attempted to call the phone number which was then disconnected.
The victim contacted his place of employment and he was advised that his General Manager never called him regarding purchasing gift cards and that the phone number/text was not the GMs.
Deputies and the victim checked the website for the place of employment and discovered that it contained a list of all employees, which included a picture, full name, and job title. It is believed that the scammers used this website to gain the information needed for the scam.
*On November 20th, Deputies were dispatched to a residence regarding a potential kidnapping. Upon arrival, deputies spoke to the father of a young teenage girl who stated that he received a phone call from an unknown man who advised that he had kidnapped his daughter.
He was further advised that the father needed to pay $2,000 in order to get his daughter back. The father was directed to get the money and meet the caller at a nearby Currency Exchange. The father stated to deputies that during the conversation he could hear a girl talking frantically in the background but he could not determine if the voice was his daughters. The caller also never used the daughters name which caused suspicion.
The father called 911 and met the first officers who arrived at the Currency Exchange parking lot; however, no one showed up. Other law enforcement agencies were also dispatched to assist and conducted a welfare check on the daughter who was at the location where she was supposed to be.
The daughter was safe and had no idea that this incident was taking place. Deputies attempted to call back the phone number, but found it to be fake.