well identified who I was and he was a
mr. woods yes sir yes he said did you
know you were 13.5 million dollar says
no you know it got to a point that we
was just you know doing a lot of
transferring and I was like you know
when it's just gonna end they making
people are idiots and stupid the suspect
that I'm dealing with he literally
thinks I'm on my deathbed I'm dying but
he still calls me all the time and wants
me to send them that check these guys
will do anything it takes to keep
getting money it reeks a huge financial
and emotional havoc on a family if you a
person that has conscience you cannot do
this stuff if you don't have a
conscience is nothing team as far as I'm
concerned this is one of most despicable
crimes that can be perpetrated
we see this problem is not going away
older consumers tend to be targeted by
scammers because sometimes they're more
trusting sometimes they're alone we do
have some evidence and some other
investigations where the scammers are
actually buying and procuring lead lists
of elderly folks these lists you know or
what they're waiting go they're
transferred back and forth so over 20
individuals see right now they feel like
they're invincible they don't think we
can touch them so the more do we can
start bringing these days back in
charging here in the US and putting them
in our prisons maybe we can send a
message we have an intelligent student
that's been established and we use our
National Intelligence Unit often for
these investigations identify those
victims that are sending money get try
to get that money back whatever we were
able to recover back to them and then
make them aware of the part that they're
playing the fraud and try to get it
stopped the partnership of jolt is just
fantastic partnership it involves our
agency it involves other agencies the
intent was to try to have the same
impact in Jamaica that we had seen in
Canada as a result of those bilateral
partnerships jolt has been invaluable to
us in helping us to further our
investigations since we have placed
inspectors in Jamaica it's been night
and day we can actually work these cases
now we have one case charged here and
had it not been for the partnership and
our spectres on the ground there in
Jamaica and the assistance of ice that
never would have happened
I think the biggest way to prevent this
type of scam from reoccurring is
education we're doing a lot of
prevention and education throughout the
country with these schemes and so I
think we really have to target the
people around them and look after them
this is the baby boom generation now
moves frankly some of them are moving
well out of the retirement age and the
last bit of them are now in retirement
we have the single largest generation in
American history so some of those folks
are caregivers some of them are needing
care their children and their
grandchildren are now seeing the
incredible challenges both emotional and
financial associated with caregiving one
in four Americans touch caregiving in
some way they're either providing care
directly themselves to a loved one or a
family member they're thinking of their
parent as they were in their 30s in
their 40s and sometimes it's scary to
realize that that strong individual who
carried you on their shoulders who
taught you how to balance their
checkbook is prey to a scam that they
would not have been we think a way to
reach vulnerable population is not to
get them to call but to get someone
they're connected to who's worried about
them to call so caregivers can actually
be maybe a real frontline it's probably
the single most important audience that
we should be focusing on right now
we did a pilot project last year with
the US Postal Inspection Service that
was very successful we partnered with
them on a mailing that went to only
washington state folks and they were
between the ages of i think 40 and 70 i
had it a lottery prevention message and
it also had our call center phone number
on it a lot of people call that number
this was a way of leading them to more
information we're a real person picks up
the phone many of the volunteers for
these call centers have been victims
themselves or have had family members
that have been victims so they're able
to say quickly and right up front look
this has happened to me the peer-to-peer
communication here is invaluable peer
counseling can actually reduce a
person's vulnerability to fraud by fifty
percent I think the biggest challenge
for us in this fraud prevention world is
to try and do more collaboration I think
that people pay more attention when AARP
is working with postal inspection
service with the FBI with local law
enforcement the real magic happens when
law enforcement crosses over with social
service agencies social service agencies
cross over with academics academics
where all of these different people who
would play a role in this get together
in a room and say how can we
collaboratively fix this the US Postal
Inspection Service has been a great
partner of AARP s for many years we have
cooperated with them in these reverse
boiler rooms going back to the mid-90s
they've provided us leads on victims
they provided us leads on bad guys that
we've interviewed they've been a great
partner it's a horrendous problem right
now that we have to tackle you know I
want consumers to be safe I want to put
these scammers out of business that's
what I want to do next to protecting our
children is probably the second most
important thing that we should be doing
as a law enforcement agency so now is
the time for a sustained effort a
sustained effort over a period of time
you know 10 years maybe more we need to
have our foot on the gas on this thing
over a long period of time it's our job
to protect those that can't protect
themselves
you