Local Police Warn about Increase in Convincing Scam …
Mountain Brook Police have seen a recent uptick in citizens receiving scam calls that are often scary and very convincing. Officer Megan Thomas says scammers are posing as law enforcement over the phone and are trying to scare people into paying thousands of dollars to “avoid arrest" - maybe accusing the person of missing a jury duty summons, saying a “warrant is out for their arrest.”
"Something that we’ve seen recently is that scammers even know where somebody’s children went to school, and were using that as more pressure to get this person to give thousands of dollars to avoid arrest or whatever else," Thomas said.
She says they will keep you on the phone, tell you to go from bank to bank to bank, and they might ask you to get gift cards and read out the numbers over the phone.
She says the best thing you can do if you feel like something seems off is to hang up the phone and then call the non-emergency number for your local police department, even if the Caller ID says the call is coming from your local police. If you disconnect the call, the scammers usually don’t have a way to call you back.
