Atlanta police are warning the public about phone scammers who defrauded at least two people out of thousands of dollars by posing as high-ranking officers and threatening them with arrest if they did not make immediate payments over the phone.
Though this type of phone scam is not new, scammers have begun to “spoof” the actual phone numbers of law enforcement agencies and use the actual names of APD command staffers, Detective Brian Hill said at a news conference Tuesday afternoon. When scammers spoof a phone number, the number and caller ID appears on the recipient’s phone as if the call is coming from a legitimate source.
The newest development is the use of the names and personal details of high-level APD employees, a spokesman told The Atlanta-Journal Constitution. Scammers have begun to impersonate real police officers in order to intimidate victims into transferring money to them.
According to warnings from multiple sheriff’s offices, the practice has begun to spread beyond the city as scammers target metro-area residents using specific details from other law enforcement agencies.
Atlanta police have been actively investigating the scam calls since October and noted two victims who separately came into precinct offices to report the fraud. Police shared few details about the cases because of the ongoing investigation and declined to identify the victims. Hill did not specify exactly how much the victims lost, but said the amount ranged into the thousands of dollars.
In a phone call with the AJC, another police spokesman emphasized that one woman lost “a significant amount of money” when she believed a scammer was a high-ranking APD official.
According to police, the scammers call victims using spoofed phone numbers and tell their targets they have outstanding warrants that must be cleared immediately with a payment. The scammers threaten the victims with arrest if they are hesitant to pay, and falsely claim they are tracking the victims through their phones. They work to keep the victims on the line until they pay by using real personal details about APD employees and continuing to threaten them with arrest if they hang up or ask for more time.
“We want to let the public know that there’s no way that any members of the Atlanta Police Department command staff would reach out to any citizen regarding any type of bench warrant to elicit any type of funds,” Deputy Chief Charles Hampton Jr. said.
Hampton encouraged anyone who has received one of these calls to get in touch with investigators. Information from those interactions could help aid the investigation, he said.
Other law enforcement agencies in the metro area have warned of similar scam attempts. In early May, sheriff’s offices from both DeKalb and Douglas counties warned of scammers calling county residents and threatening them with non-existent arrest warrants or missed jury duty. In DeKalb, scammers have even offered to meet potential victims in the parking lot of the sheriff’s office, spokeswoman Cynthia Williams said in a news release.
At Tuesday’s news conference, police explained how to avoid such scams. First, no law enforcement agency will demand payment for legal fines over the phone using apps like CashApp or money transfer tools like Green Dot cards. In Atlanta, court payments are typically made at the courthouse or online through an official payment portal.
For those who receive such a call and suspect a scam, the best strategy is to stop talking, hang up and call the police precinct directly, Hill said.
Anyone who believes they have been contacted by scammers posing as Atlanta police officers are asked to contact the department’s homeland security unit at 404-546-4230 or Crime Stoppers by calling 404-577-8477 or visiting stopcrimeatl.com.
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