That is so sad. I'm sure the elderly fall for it all the time, especially if they have Alzheimer's or something. My best friend's mom lived by herself when she was first diagnosed with Alzheimer's and different "charities" called and asked her for money all the time. My best friend's parents noticed the drain on her bank account and were able to get the money back and some restrictions had to be made on her phone calls and what she watched on tv. Pretty sad, really.
Even sadder is what happened to my best friend's grandfather. He lived in Arizona with some people who he thought were his friends. They began to starve him and the guy so-called friend tried to drown him in his own swimming pool. My best friend's brother came to visit him and noticed something was drastically wrong. My best friend's parents took him out of his home and moved him to Fort Wayne after he got out of the hospital. Doctors were shocked he still lived and even the brain damage he had is being recovered, now that he is nourished. He is lifting weights and doing kalesthenics every day. He was in the military at one time and still keeps up the exercise regiment. I think being in such good shape is what saved him. The so-called friends have charges against them and are facing the U.S. Justice system. I'm happy to report this happy ending to the story. I know that there are other stories with less happier endings. Mel -----Original Message----- From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Martin G. McCormick Sent: Monday, March 10, 2014 9:52 PM To: Just Chat; Where Anything Goes ... Almost! Subject: The Things People Do for Money My father got a phone call a few days ago from a female who opened the conversation with "Hi Grandpa." My father said, "hi, Rebecca," his one and only grand daughter. The voice said, "I am in Las Angeles for a funeral and I had an accident and need two-thousand Dollars." By this time, my dad realized that the voice was wrong and had an accent similar to people from the Northeastern United States. Rebecca was born in Oklahoma and really has what you could call a standard American Midwest way of speaking. My father also knew that this is a fairly common scam in which somebody calls and claims to be a family member in some sort of trouble, far away in a strange city so he started playing with this person's head. He is a retired psychologist and decided to see how long he could keep her going. The scammer finally hung up when my father said something like, "I'll send the money to your mother and she can get it to you. There were many other things wrong with the woman's story that didn't fit what we know to be true, but that scam takes several forms such as the scammer hacks somebody's gmail account or a facebook or twitter account and sends messages that are not too specific with details but might be true. The people that actually call someone on the phone have the most nerve since they don't really know what the person they are impersonating actually sounds like. They just keep cranking out the phone calls in hopes of scoring Dollars from somebody who takes them seriously and doesn't exercise diligence. I have heard of this scam before, but that was the first time I knew anybody who actually had somebody try to pull it off. Martin ======================================== The Just-chat E-Mail forum is guaranteed malware, spyware, Trojan, virus and worm-free To modify your subscription options, please visit for forum's dedicated web pages located at: <http://mail.tft-bbs.co.uk/mailman/listinfo/just-chat> You can find an archive of all messages posted to the just-chat group at either of the following: <http://mail.tft-bbs.co.uk/pipermail/just-chat/index.html> or: <http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]> You may subscribe with your RSS reader at the following URL: <http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/maillist.xml> --------------------------------------- ======================================== The Just-chat E-Mail forum is guaranteed malware, spyware, Trojan, virus and worm-free To modify your subscription options, please visit for forum's dedicated web pages located at: <http://mail.tft-bbs.co.uk/mailman/listinfo/just-chat> You can find an archive of all messages posted to the just-chat group at either of the following: <http://mail.tft-bbs.co.uk/pipermail/just-chat/index.html> or: <http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]> You may subscribe with your RSS reader at the following URL: <http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/maillist.xml> ---------------------------------------
