SALT LAKE CITY — Scammers are getting more and more savvy with how they try to trick you over the phone.
Picture this: you get a call from a man, claiming to be a police officer, saying there’s been an accident and your loved one’s in pain.
“There’s a person in the background screaming, crying, hyperventilating,” said Melissa Goodman. “He thought it was me. They knew our names. They were calling us by my name, by his name.”
On Friday, Goodman’s husband was in his car, on the go, trying to find his wife who callers said was hurt and owed them $10,000.
“It was so believable. Completely believable. Even the guy on the other end of the phone, he was also panicking,” said Goodman. “They said if I pulled anything crazy, I would be killed in a shootout.”
The couple would later learn they were targeted by a scam popping up across Salt Lake.
“The more technology’s out there, the more people are out there and things people can access on the internet,” said Lt. Aaron Cheshire with the Taylorsville Police Department. “They’re just going to get much more savvy with their information.”
Last week, journalist Bryan Schott at the Salt Lake Tribune received a similar phone call. The caller also knew his daughter’s name, had the same story as the Goodmans, and played a recording of a woman screaming in pain.
1/ I just got a phone call from someone identifying themselves as a "West Valley City police officer" telling me my daughter had been in an accident.
— Bryan Schott (LOL, I'm not gonna pay $8) (@SchottHappens) May 5, 2023
Turns out I had been targeted by a very elaborate and disturbing scam.
Here's what happened
“All I hear is just this really hysterical crying. I can hear someone who’s there with her, asking her to take a breath or drink some water,” said Schott in a video posted to TikTok.
In the video, Schott said he knew something was up when the alleged police officer refused to tell him where to go.
“I’m pretty convinced that this is a scam, so I put him on speaker phone and I text my daughter,” said Schott. “I say, ‘Are you okay?’ And she immediately comes back to me and says, ‘Yeah, I’m fine.’”
@schotthappens I was targeted by a very disturbing and sophisticated phone scam. Beware! #scam #scammers #scammeralert #phonescam #phonescams #phonescammer #scammerstory ♬ original sound - Bryan Schott
Thankfully, both Schott and Goodman’s husband caught on to the trick and didn’t pay a cent.
Officers are warning the public to be alert that these scammers are smart. They urge you to call police or loved ones if you sense something is off.
