On April 18, the man, who was in Pennsylvania at the time, received a call from perpetrators claiming to be holding a gun to his father’s head, a Solon police report stated. The callers said they would only release the man’s father if he drove to a nearby Walmart and wired a $900 ransom to someone camped out in Puerto Rico.
Conned out of exactly $911.50 (with service fees), the 22-year-old was convinced of the scheme’s legitimacy because the perpetrators were calling him by his first name.
The incident allegedly took place over the course of five hours, and apparently at no point during the entire duration did the young man think to call, ask to speak to or text his father to ensure there was actually a gun being pressed to his head. Only after he transferred nearly a grand to an offshore account did the man reach out to his dad, who was actually quite safe and at work.
This article appears in Apr 25 – May 1, 2018.
The same thing happened to me this past Friday! Same exact story. Im from willoughby, live in key west, Florida.
The same exact thing happened to me this past Friday. Im from Willoughby, live in Key West, Florida now and still have an Ohio area code. This is nuts. I have the receipt with Puerto Rico address.
This is dangerous. I don’t know there are still some people who will fall for these scams. Since years ago, I can find complaints and reports filed by people regarding similar scams online, at sites like http://whycall.me. We need to keep informing our family about this scam.
A Walmart? If there weren’t chumps to be scammed, there wouldn’t be scammers.
I keep an NFL ref’s whistle by the phone. I hope I’ve broken a lot of eardrums.
It’s an Acme Thunderer. It’s made in the UK. World’s finest. 70,000 fans won’t kill the shrill!