Offenburg (dpa / lsw) – Once again, a woman has fallen for scammers who swindle money with so-called shock calls. The police headquarters in Offenburg announced on Friday that the person called had handed over cash and valuables worth around 190,000 euros to the criminals. The perpetrators had therefore pretended to be police officers. The woman’s daughter caused an accident in which a pregnant woman died. Money should be handed over for the bail. With countless calls, they kept the mother on the phone. Only after the money had been handed over did she contact her daughter and the scam was exposed: She had not been involved in an accident at all.
The police keep reporting on such scams and warn people not to let themselves be put under pressure by such calls. “Hang up immediately on calls like this,” the officials advise. You should never give money or valuables to strangers or reveal personal data or information about your financial and personal circumstances on the phone. If in doubt, you should contact the police – for example by dialing 110.
Many of those called in the Ortenau, in the Rastatt district and in the city of Baden-Baden also took this to heart on Thursday, the message said. In another case, however, only a bank employee became suspicious and informed the police. Detectives found it difficult to convince a couple that the call was a scam. “A supposed judge had previously convinced them so much that the couple only refrained from handing over money of around 33,000 euros after contact with the real granddaughter,” the police wrote.
