'She Was Under Duress': Owasso Woman Loses Thousands In Life Savings To Scammers

An 80-year-old Owasso woman is devastated after giving up more than $150,000 of her life savings to scammers.

She says it started from an email from LifeLock but when she Googled a number to call them, it took her straight to a scammer.

The woman’s children are beyond upset that someone took advantage of their mom like this, and they wish the bank would’ve asked more questions before letting her wire so much money.

An email started it all, saying there was suspicious activity on her account.

She says she couldn’t remember the password to her account, so she tried to find a phone number for LifeLock, but she got a scammer instead.

After that, they overwhelmed her.

"She was under duress,” said Amy Head, her daughter. “I've seen the phone records; this guy called her non-stop for several days. It is just one call, one text, after another."

The scammers had her transfer $150,000 to buy gold bars, then met a man in the parking lot in Owasso and handed them over to him.

Her son wishes the bank would have seen the signs and been more vigilant.

"Especially when someone who's never done a wire transfer in their life, all of a sudden wire transferring $150,000?” said Mike Willey, her won. “Red flag! Never done cash withdrawals like that? Red flag! I think the bank teller actually when she did the cash withdrawal, the bank teller said, 'Someone's going to have a fun weekend!"'

They hope sharing their story will teach other people the red flags and make sure all family members know about the scams that are out there.

"We understand that, most likely, the money is gone, we're never going to see it again, but if we can stop someone else from having to go through it, that would be very beneficial,” said Willey.

They say it’s important to always look out for the older people in our lives because they often have the most to lose.

"We are America, we are free, we can do whatever we want with our money, but in these situations, we all should watch out for the elderly,” said Head. “The neighbors and family members."

They say LifeLock has been working with them and doing an investigation of what happened.