Minnesotan Falls Victim To Scary Kidnapping Scam
There are a lot of scams going around at any given time but this one is incredibly scary. A kidnapping scam has been reported in a city just a few hours from the Twin Ports.
Like I said, there seems to be so many scams going around Minnesota and Wisconsin over the past few years. A recent scam was reported in Wisconsin, targeting residents via voicemail.
With this scam, scammers were leaving voicemails on phones posing as a sergeant with the local police department. From there, they were given a phone number and told to call them back immediately or face the consequences. Of course, this is a scam.
Another Wisconsin resident was also scammed out of $18,000 dollars. That is how realistic these scammers can be! The Neenah resident was conned by a scammer who said the resident's granddaughter was in a car accident and needed money to be bailed out of jail.
This scam is above and beyond the average scam though and it was first reported in Brooklyn Center, Minnesota. Brooklyn Center is just a few hours from Duluth, which means it is very possible it could happen here - or that scammers would try to con residents here.
The local police department shared scary details of the scam on their Facebook page recently. According to their post, they received a call the day prior from a clerk at a local gas station. A customer also called in to report the situation.
The Brooklyn Center Police Department shared that a male came in and was on his way to Walmart to pay off his daughter's captors. The man told the clerk that his daughter was kidnapped and he needed to take money out for the ransom.
Thankfully, due to the courage of the clerk and the customer, the man was found before he went into Walmart. The police knew this was a scam, as they had received one other report with the exact same scenario.
The man was obviously frazzled and was tracked down via his license plate, which the callers had made a point to try and remember. The male told police he had heard a "screaming female in the background" of the phone call when the scammers dialed him up.
Once the scammers got the man scared thinking his daughter was kidnapped, he was told to wire money to a female name. What in the world is wrong with people? This is not your ordinary scam. Scammers have to do some intense research to learn who does and doesn't have kids.
Usually a scammer will call or text a victim but to ask them to meet in person or to do research on their family takes things to a new level. Plus, the terror the scammers are causing to parents with this scam is also on another level.
If you hear anything about a scam like this or similar to this, make sure that you report it immediately. It is probably a scam and there is nothing stopping it from popping up right here in the Northland.