John Oxford
MOULTRIE — Moultrie residents should be wary of a phone scammer using the Moultrie Police Department to bilk money from unsuspecting people.
Moultrie police spokesman Dave Underwood said someone has been calling residents recently posing as someone representing the Moultrie Police Department. The scammer states he is collecting donations to buy body armor for the department’s officers.
Underwood said the department does not solicit funds from the public to pay for items such as body armor. Those are purchased using grant money.
“(The caller) is not from us,” Underwood said.
Anyone who receives a call from this person is asked to contact the Moultrie Police Department at 985-3131 or the anonymous tip line at 873-3198.
This case is one of many scams being put to the public in myriad forms.
Just recently, a Moultrie bank official wrote in a letter to the editor of The Moultrie Observer that folks locally are being targeted by scammers who send bogus checks to these individuals. The scammers tell the recipients that they have either won lotteries or have become heirs to large sums of money.
Banker Bill Harrison said some people actually deposit these checks, and part of the deal from the scammer is that they return a portion to cover taxes or other bogus fees. Some of the recipients do that and are left with a loss when the check they deposited turns out to be fraudulent.
Fraud schemes appear daily on the internet, ranging from people claiming to be foreign royalty who are trying to secret money out of their native lands to other bogus gift arrangements, all of which require that the recipient provide personal information which can lead to identity theft.
Harrison advised the public to follow the old adage, “If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.”
