Delitzsch (dpa / sn) – An 83-year-old was robbed of his valuable coin collection by fraudsters in Delitzsch (Northern Saxony district). As the police said on Thursday, the man was called by several people who claimed they were police officers. They alleged that a family member of the pensioner had caused a serious traffic accident and demanded bail of 100,000 euros to protect the family member from imprisonment. Instead of the requested amount, the man offered his coin collection as a deposit. A few hours later, the 83-year-old handed the coins to an unknown woman who posed as an employee of the public prosecutor’s office. The Leipzig police do not want to quantify the exact value of the collection, since it is about perpetrator knowledge, it ranks in the upper four-digit range.
A police spokesman said that such cases often involve a group of scammers. They specifically called older people and kept them on the phone until a courier picked up the money or valuables requested. The purpose of this practice is to distract victims long enough so that they have no opportunity to verify the story being told or to contact family members.
