Tulsa Police Warn Of New Phone Scam Targeting Grandparents

The Tulsa Police Department Financial Crimes Unit is issuing a warning about a scam that targets older citizens.

Lt. Andrew Weeden calls it the "imposter scam" or the "Grandparent scam" and said it has conned people out of anywhere from $5,000 to $10,000.

He said how it works is scammers will use social media to identify a victim's family member and where they live. They will then call the victim when they least expect it to claim their family member was arrested or seriously injured in a car accident. The scammer will then demand money for bail or medical care in the form of a wire transfer, gift card, or bitcoin.

Lt. Weeden said the scam is not necessarily new but has increased in danger recently as they have had reports in Tulsa of scammers sending someone directly to a person's house to collect payment. 

"We have had a couple of cases recently where somebody has been scammed and the instructions on the phone were to go to your bank, take out money, and then wait for the knock on your door and hand over a large sum of cash to somebody that shows up at your door," said Weeden, "This is dangerous for obvious reasons; somebody now is showing up at your door and you do not know what their intentions are."

Lt. Weeden said the best way for a person to protect themselves is by hanging up the phone immediately, calling another family member to verify the information, and most importantly remembering time is on your side. 

"Anytime somebody is pressuring you, they are demanding that you do something right now, very quickly, and they do not want you to hang up the phone; those should all be red flags that it is a scam," he added.

Lt. Weeden said scammers typically target older people in these types of scams because of their financial stability, and vulnerability and they tend to have large families.