Typically, a grandma in Seaford, New York, hangs up the phone on alleged con artists. But she made the decision to act differently this time. According to Jean Ebbert, she recently got a call from a man posing as her grandson.
He claimed that he had been in a car accident and required $8000. Because she doesn’t have a grandson old enough to drive, Jean immediately saw that someone was trying to fool her.
She then made the decision to play along, which is not something the police advise because it can be risky. It turned out that the former 911 operator had a few tricks up her sleeve. In the video below, she describes what she did.
When the suspect arrived at Jean’s door pretending to be a bailsman, the police were prepared to seize the opportunity because Jean ‘played the game’ and called them before the scheduled pick-up time.
When the culprit started to walk away, she gave over an envelope containing paper towels, and the cops made the arrest. The doorbell camera captured the arrest.
Unfortunately, ‘grandma’ frauds rank fifth in terms of phone scam reports and cause billions of dollars in losses each year.
In this case, Jean played the game very skillfully and declared, “Bored grandma 1, bad guy 0,” with the alleged con artist now in jail.
Never agree to give money to anyone who calls, says Jean. Police advise people to avoid sending gift cards, prepaid cards, or other forms of payment and to safeguard any information they publish online since ‘bad guys’ may use it to defraud them.