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Scammers Use Police Deaths To Snare Victims

March 6, 2006
Many scams take advantage of local and national news events to set up their victims for a score. If the victim has some awareness of an event, the scammer has found he has a better chance of convincing the victim of parting with money.

After Hurricane Katrina devastated the Gulf Coast last year, scammers quickly took advantage of people's knowledge of the event and their desire to help by setting up a number of bogus charities and phony relief operations.

The death last week of two upstate New York police officers, killed in the line of duty, provides an example of how scammers use tragedy at a local level.

Within days of the officers' deaths, police say a scammer was working the phones, contacting upstate New York residents and asking for donations to help the officers' families. Many generous people made contributions.

However, police say none of that money will ever get to the officers' families, since it was all a scam.

New York State Police say no police agency or organization uses telemarketers to solicit donations. Police say that victims could lose more than their donations, since in this case the scammer appears to be asking for personal information that could also lead to identity theft.

New York State Patrolman Andrew Sperr was killed in a shootout with two suspected bank robbers after he stopped their truck. New Hartford, New York police officer Joseph Corr, 30, of the New Hartford Police Department, was gunned down while pursuing suspected jewel thieves.

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