Scammers target Beaufort County elderly as residents report hundreds of thousands in losses
Elderly residents in Beaufort County reported they have been swindled out of thousands in November after investigators saw scam attempts pick up over the summer, according to the Beaufort County Sheriff’s Office.
There have been at least five complaints in the last month to the Beaufort County Sheriff’s Office of scams targeting bank accounts in which scammers pose as bank representatives or employees from fundraising platforms.
In total, the reports reached $159,418 so far, said Master Sgt. Eric Calendine with the Sheriff’s Office’s Southern Investigations team.
In one case, on Nov. 8, a bank employee reported that an 86-year-old man was told by a scammer pretending to be a representative from ActBlue, an actual online fundraising platform for Democratic political campaigns, that he would be able to meet President Joe Biden in exchange for $24,296.
In other cases, a woman on Hilton Head was tricked into making a $78,350 wire transfer to a company called Excell Transportation, while a 67-year-old man, also on Hilton Head, had $34,820 taken from three bank accounts.
Among the most common scams seen in Beaufort County, said Calendine, are computer and bank scams where scammers will pretend a person’s computer has been infected with a virus to target their personal information or call pretending to be a bank representative to say their account is at risk.
“We are a target-rich environment in the sense of retirees,” Calendine said.
Once or twice a year, said Sheriff’s Office spokesperson Maj. Angela Viens, the area will see scammers posing as deputies telling people they have missed jury duty or have a debt to pay to the agency and will tell them to do so using gift cards.
“We’ve had people box up $30,000 in a shoe box and FedEx it [to scammers],” she said. “We have been very proactive to educate people, especially the aging population because they fall victim to it so often.”
During Hurricane Ian, two different groups targeted Beaufort County by stealing people’s mail and “washing checks,” Calendine said. They do this by using chemicals to remove the handwritten recipient names on checks or altering the payment amount before depositing the money.
“A lot of people don’t report it because they’re embarrassed,” Calendine said.
Picking up in Beaufort County
The reports are a common occurrence, Calendine said.
Over the summer, scammers attempted to get $889,100 via wire transfers from 15 accounts linked to Beaufort County residents. In actuality, $589,000 was stolen after police were able to intercept the money.
“This goes on every day and, in most cases, you can’t get it back,” Calendine said.
In June, a Hilton Head woman was the victim of a romance scam and lost over $150,000, the Beaufort County Sheriff’s Office announced in a Facebook post that month.
A Hilton Head woman reported to police in July that she had been scammed out of $130,000 by two men claiming to be agents with the CIA. The woman ultimately handed over her money to the fake agents at a Hardeeville Walmart.
In September, a 77-year-old woman in Beaufort lost over $800,000 after becoming the target of scammers who told her she would have to buy gold to protect her assets after her account had been hacked.
“They use fear of my account has been hacked ... to go after you,” Calendine said. “[They] make you do what they want you to do. It goes on and on.”
How to protect yourself
The U.S. Federal Trade Commission warns that the telltale signs of a scammer will be someone calling who pressures you to act immediately before you can verify what they said. Below are steps you can take to protect yourself from potential scams.
Do not accept calls from an unknown number
Never give your name or other personal information over the phone in response to a request that you didn’t expect
Do not fall under pressure to act immediately. If they are a legitimate organization, they will not pressure you to make a decision immediately
Do not make payments to someone insisting you pay them in wire transfers, using gift cards or with cryptocurrency
Anyone who thinks they have been the victim of a scam or fraud may call their local police department or submit a tip to the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center at: https://www.ic3.gov/.
