The elderly are often targets of phone scams, including one that his Corpus Christi in late 2015. Callers pretend to be from the IRS and demand payment in back taxes immediately. Hang up, says the Corpus Christi Police Department, and never give your personal information over the phone.
Phone scammers believed to have plagued the Coastal Bend this time last year have been caught. Police busted a scam phone call operation in October that was operating out of India. As many as 700 people were involved in the scam, posing as IRS collection agents and calling numbers across communities such as Corpus Christi. The callers targeted the elderly, threatening people with arrest and fines if they did not immediately pay back taxes.
“This is totally bogus,” said accountant Alvin Reagan, president of Bowman & Reagan, CPA, in Corpus Christi. “The IRS does NOT collect money over the phone. They send you letters.” Reagan spoke to Corpus Christi Business News last year about the ongoing scams.
“Another thing, the IRS does not ever use local law enforcement,” Reagan continued when asked about threats to victims of an imminent arrest. “They don’t need to. They want you to keep working. The idea that someone would show up at your door and take you to prison is ludicrous. Their job is to collect money, which they can’t do if you are not working.”
The India operation has nine call centers targeting U.S. citizens. About 9,000 people were swayed by the calls, sending more than $47 million as a result. The call center is believed to have collected up to $150,000 a day over the last year.
Police raided three buildings in October in Thane, India, a suburb of Mumbai, arresting 70 people accused of operating the nine call centers housed there. Some 600 employees assumed to be calling people to help them manage their bank accounts or purchase insurance are under investigation.
When callers successfully bullied people to pay up, those people were told to purchase gift cards for iTunes and other retailers to transfer the funds. Some were asked to deposit money directly into bank accounts.
Anyone demanding an instant electronic payment to stay out of trouble is not legitimate, Reagan said.
“These people can be aggressive,” he said. “They will try to bully you. Don’t stay on the phone with them. Hang up.”
Another scam encourages people to put their money into trusts or corporations with the promise they will not have to pay taxes on it. The money is never seen again.
“It’s best to follow the old rule: If it looks too good to be true, it probably is,” Reagan said.
The Corpus Christi Police Department sent out a media release last year warning residents of an increase in the IRS scam calls in the area.
The commissioner of police in Thane, India, Param Bir Singh, said the arrests were significant but not necessarily the end of the scam. He told reporters he expected to find more call centers in the future.
Anyone who has given money to these callers should contact the police on the non-emergency line at (361) 886-2600. The information will be used in the ensuing investigation.
