:: Resident falls victim to work-at-home scam
Laramie resident Deb Truman struggles to make ends meet on her Social Security checks each month so when an e-mail came to her saying she could earn money at home, she hesitated but in the end decided it was worth the risk in order to earn some extra cash for Christmas gifts for her children and grandchildren.
Her desire to earn some extra money has sent Truman on a frustrating, financially-straining ride as she faces paying her bank back thousands of dollars.
Truman said she received an e-mail from a Mike Davies with a yahoo.co.uk e-mail address about a work-at-home opportunity. She began exchanging e-mails with Davies, inquiring about the opportunity.
One e-mail stated, “We have a job offer available for you in response to your initial requesting the job search directory is for USA/Canada only. We based in UK. We have been receiving orders from Northern America, which we have not been able to process completely since we do not have a payment receiving personnel in these areas. We have decided to recruit payment officers online hence we will be needing a representative to process our payments in these areas. If interested get back with this information.”
Another e-mail, responding to a question from Truman about why they needed “payment officers” in the United States, states, “The reason why I need someone in the USA is because most of our customers pay us in the United States of America checks and it can’t be cashed where I’m.”
The e-mails state that checks will be sent to the payment officers, such as Truman. They are able to keep 10 percent of the amount of the check and send the rest of the money via Western Union to a list of clients that Davies provides.
The money that Truman sent were all to James White and John Malm, both in Accra, Ghana, West Africa.
“I was a little naïve,” Truman said, but added that she wanted to tell her story, to let others know what happens when they fall victim to scams, and to hopefully prevent someone else from falling victim to this or similar scams.
Truman said that she cashed numerous checks at her bank and only once did a teller hesitate because the total amount of the checks being cashed was slightly above the normal amount the bank approves.
She said that after a week or two of cashing checks she was contacted by the police about the checks. She said an officer interviewed her twice and at one point told her that she could get “90 years for this.”
After being contacted by the police she went to her bank and she said she “was quickly ushered into an office and asked ‘how do you expect to pay all this back?’”
She said that the bank officers then asked her to sign a loan agreement for an unspecified amount. She said that she signed the agreement in order to be able to leave the bank that day.
Her bank froze her accounts as well, prohibiting access to any funds she had left in the accounts.
She said that she did not receive any paperwork after signing the document. On advice of an attorney, she wrote her bank a letter that the agreement was signed under “duress” and that she would not honor the agreement. She said that she has not heard back from the bank.
Truman said that her Social Security checks were being directly deposited into her account, but she has since switched them to being mailed directly to her.
Truman said that she does plan to work with the bank to pay the bank back, but said that it will take time.
She said because her account was frozen she was unable to pay some bills, but added that “thankfully” her landlord was understanding and has given her extra time to pay rent. She said that fortunately her utilities are included in her rent so no utilities were cut off.
Police report
Laramie Police Commander Dale Stalder of LARC (Laramie-Albany County Records and Communications) said that the report shows that the scam that Truman was involved with was similar to the well-known Nigerian scams. According to the police report more than 10 checks were cashed over about a three-week period at Laramie Plains Community Federal Credit Union totaling $8,850. He said 10 of the checks were for $500 each.
Stalder said that according to the police report, the investigation showed that bank employees said that the checks (one cashier and the rest traveler’s checks) all looked legitimate. It wasn’t until the bank processed the checks, sending them to the original banks, that they were notified the checks were counterfeit.
He said that initially the officer did treat Truman as a suspect until the investigation showed that Truman did not know the checks were fraudulent. He said as far as the bank recouping the monetary loss, it is now a civil matter between Laramie Plains and Truman.
Stalder said that the officer wrote in his report that bank officials will “attempt to settle the financial problem” with Truman.
