While we waited at pickup for Scout, we had 20 minutes left when I received a weird call. Apparently, a heavily-accented Indian man needed to inform me that my social security number had been stolen, and I was currently wanted for drug trafficking. This was so urgent, that they said I would be arrested within 45 minutes if we didn’t get to the bottom of this.
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A few seconds in, I told the kids, “Ok guys…listen up. You know how I always tell you that there are great people in the world…but some bad guys too…here is one of the bad guys.” I proceeded to tell them that he was trying to get all of my secret account information, so that he could then go into mine and dad’s bank accounts to steal everything we had worked so hard for! This got their attention, so they listened up. I told them…”Buckle up….This is real life!”
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I spent about 20 minutes on the phone with this joker. He asked for my name…to which I answered “Violet” the color in front of me at that moment. Then he asked for my last name. “Tree” for obvious reasons. He asked for the last four of my SSN, and I said 8679. (I wanted to add 305) He said it would take a minute, but that he needed to look it all up. AND WHAT DO YOU KNOW!!! HOLY COW!!! He had the file right in front of him…and YEP…I was a money launderer and drug trafficker. (I told the kids “can you believe this guy! I gave him fake information, and he is lying and saying that he has my file!”)
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He told me I was being watched at that very moment. I asked him what I was wearing. He told me that it was another agency..but that he just knew that they were watching. (I covered the phone and said, “not true” to the kids.)
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He told me that if I didn’t work with my local police department — which is really difficult and he will handle it if I would like — that I would be sleeping in jail that night. I told him, “Our local authorities can’t even handle our homeless crisis around town…so I bet I’m okay.”
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He told me that he needed to know how many bank accounts I had — and the names of the banks, and approximately what cash I had in the accounts. He assured me he didn’t need the account numbers! (”Yeah right” I told the kids.) I said, “Bank of Nonsense has about 300K, and B.S. Bank has another 75K.”
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He then told me another agency was adding up what I “owed” — which came to be about 250K. (Watch kids — he is now going to say that he can help me more if I provided the account numbers.) He then said that if I would like him to take over the situation he could — and all I had to do was give him the digits of the account number — but I didn’t need to provide the routing number so I was still secure. (HAH!!! I told the kids that he must think we are total morons!)
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There were many other things…and Navy and Dash were glued to their seats. It all came to a head, when I asked where he was located. He said, “Of course Washington D.C. ma’am”. I told him I used to live there — and where exactly is the office. (I told the kids that he is really in another country, and won’t know where to say the office is, in Wasington D.C.) He said…”I can only say Washington D.C. for security reasons.” (Uh huh!)
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I finally said — “Oh I get it…we need to stay safe, but I am a real foodie. What is your favorite restaurant in D.C.?” (Kids — he won’t know this either, so he will probably say McDonalds or something) He for sure had caught on by now…and surprised even me at his answer. He turned from a man in a call center with a lot of noise in the background…to a demonic voice that had gotten closer to the phone with all background noise cut out from a covering hand…and said what kind of sounded like something inappropriate. (I told the kids…I don’t have a clue what he just said.) I then took it off speaker and said…”what…I didn’t hear you.” He then repeated what I kind of thought he might have said…and it was vile.
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I hung up immediately.
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I then explained that people all over the world get caught in these things called scams or cons…and it is awful! People lose all of their money, and they have their lives ruined…and that was a real life example of someone in the world who was trying to do that to us! I then told them how it would obliterate our family…and this was a terrible reality in our world today. I was grateful for the real life example. I was also grateful that Dash and Navy kind of caught on to what was happening…and were appalled. As Scout would soon be with us, Dash and Navy were dying to tell him everything about it!
We had about a minute left before Scout would be at the car when Pippi quietly said, “Mama?” I was wondering if this was a little much for her. I was fine until the crazy end…but her tone was sweet and innocent…so was it all a bit too much?
With a paper and pen in hand, she said, “Could you please tell me all of your bank account numbers, and how much you have in them?”
WHAT!!!!
Real life experience GONE WRONG!!!
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