An 84-year-old man was scammed out of $12,500 after a phone call from a phony police officer and a phony grandson, each giving the elderly man a story that $12,500 was needed to post bond at a distant police department.
The same scam succeeded in parting a total of $2,521 from a 79-year-old woman in town just recently, .
"The scam [...] is an old one, and unfortunately very common," said Capt. Frederick W. Komm, commander of the investigative services bureau and a spokesman for the department,
Komm gave this account of the more recent incident:
On April 10, the man received a call from someone purporting to be an "Officer David Rogers" of the Buffalo, NY poice department. The caller said the Darien resident's grandson, Joey, had been arrested and needed money wired to him to post bond.
In another conversation, a caller said he was Joey, and although the victim said the caller didn't sound like his grandson, he agreed to send the money.
Police investigating the incident said two phone numbers were used in the calls. One was untraceable, another may be from Montreal, Canada. The money was wired through Western Union to a location in Lima, Peru.
