JACKSON – The Jackson Township Police Department is warning its residents about a recent phone scam circulating the community.
On March 22, a resident told Officer Matthew Cilento that he was contacted by an unknown man who claimed he was a United States Marshal assigned to the Southern District Border Patrol in Texas.
The scammer told the victim that they needed to verify his identity or an arrest warrant would be issued for him and his bank accounts would be frozen. The victim was then asked to take all of the money out of his bank account and deposit it in a Bitcoin terminal, sending photos of the receipts to the unknown man and that the money would be returned to him the following day.
As a result, the victim deposited $19,000 into Bitcoin. Hours after completing the transactions, the victim reported the incident to police headquarters.
Police want to make residents aware that law enforcement agencies will not contact you by telephone seeking payments in Bitcoin in order to verify your identity or to avoid having a warrant issued for your arrest.
“Do not provide these callers with any bank account information or obtain gift cards or make deposits into electronic accounts for them,” Jackson Police said.
If you believe you’ve been contacted by an unknown person attempting to commit a scam, report it to the Federal Trade Commission at reportfraud.ftc.gov.
