A familiar phone scam is resurfacing in southwest Iowa. Pottawattamie County Sheriff Jeff Danker says an elderly woman in the Council Bluffs area avoided becoming a victim over the weekend after receiving a call from someone pretending to be her grandson who said he needed $2,000 to get out of jail.
“She called and said she wasn’t going to send the money right away,” Sheriff Danker says. “She called and verified where her grandson was and that he was okay.” Danker says these scammers will do their homework and they know just who to call.
“A lot of times, we’ll get an individual that actually knows the grandson’s name and will say, ‘I’m in jail and I need this amount of money, would you wire it to me?'” The sheriff says some scammers take it a step further and use a bit of a scare tactic.
“Other times, somebody will be representing themselves as a law enforcement agency, stating, ‘Your grandson so-and-so is in jail and he is going to need X-amount of money go get out of jail.'” Sheriff Danker says unfortunately, there have been local cases where victims have wired money to the scammers.
By Karla James