Something happened to me Thursday that freaked me out and quite frankly scared me. I can’t give details because I was told not to. I’m sitting at home and I get a phone call, the guy on the phone asks me my name and I tell him and he says he’s from a bank in Canada and did I just make a charge on my credit card and he gives the number. I said no and he said someone with my name opened this card in September and made a $7600 charge.
I’m thinking this is a scam and he’s going to tell me he can help me and ask me for money but he says I’ll connect you to the fraud department for the New York Police Department. I thought yeah right, the fraud department sounds like suspicious, made up thing. He transfers me over and a guy claiming to be a cop is on the line. he asks me my name and asks me a few questions and some details about my call from the bank. I said, this sounds like a scam so he gave me his name and badge number and told me to look him up on the NYPD website which I did and he was there. We talked for several minutes then he told me he’s transferring me to another officer in the fraud department. I get a woman on the phone and she gives me her name and badge number and I look her up and she’s on the NYPD website. We talk for several minutes and she tells me that whoever charged that $7600 bought guns with it. Then she runs my name and drivers license number and I hear her talking to some guy on the phone and I hear the guy say my name and say money laundering after it.
The women asks me again did I make that charge and I say whoa, wait a minute, what’s going on, there’s some mistake. I’m still thinking this is a scam but she tells me these are serious charges. Then she explains that some guy is a head of a crime ring that launders money and has offshore bank accounts and that my name comes up as being an associate of his and that millions of dollars were laundered under my name and drivers license number.
Obviously none of this is true, I had nothing to do with it. She tells me that I cheated 240 people out of their money and I was being sued by all of them. I’m freaking out thinking if this is a scam it’s a complicated, involved scam but I talk with this officer for several more minutes and she goes into great detail about all my alleged crimes and tells me I have to talk to the FBI.
So she tells me to go on this certain app so we could talk and when I download the app I meet with her on it and she could see me only phone but I couldn’t see her. And she connects me to an FBI agent. So far she hasn’t asked me for money or any personal information like my social security number or bank account numbers etc. I meet with a guy with on video with a guy with the FBI emblem on the wall and we talk for several minutes and he asks me some random questions. He said this crime ring is a multi country crime ring. I talk to him than he transfers me back to the woman officer. She tells me she’s going to send me 4 documents and to read them all so I understand them. She says my best move would be to cooperate fully and the documents were involved and specific.
They said like I was involved in some serious crimes and listed the crimes and other info. I’ve been talking with this officer all along and she explains that to solve this situation and prove whether I’m guilty or not they are going to surveil me 24/7 and check where I go and who I talk to and my information has been sent to the CIA. She says to keep my phone on me at all times. And she tells me I can’t tell anyone about this situation, not family, friends or coworkers, nobody.
At this point too much has gone on for me to think its a scam but I said, that will isolate me and I can’t get help from anybody and she tells me option two if I don’t want to be surveilled is to go to the police department and tell this story to them and they’ll arrest me and hold me in custody until this case is solved and I’m proven guilty or innocent and that could take months.
She tells my best option is to be surveilled on my phone and that they’re making a case for my case to be a priority. So starting Thursday I had to keep my phone on at all times and the officer talked to me all through the day. I had to keep my phone on even when I went to bed. I told her I had to go to work and she asked if I could take the day off. I said no and she told me to call her in the morning and she would explain the rules of the surveillance I had to follow at work. I even had to keep the phone in the bathroom when I took a shower so they could hear me taking a shower. She told me that when I went to work to keep the phone on in this app at all times so she could hear who I talked to and to check in with her every half hour. I talked with this woman a lot and told her I was innocent. She said it had to be proven. I told her I got off work at 2:00 and she said we were going to meet with the FBI again at 3:30. So I met with the FBI again and she asked me some questions and again stressed the charges and how serious they were.
She told me the surveillance and the meeting with the FBI was being recorded and given to the CIA and if it went to trial it would be admitted as evidence. So I had been being recorded for a day and I kept my phone on and then about 4:30 the officer texted me to call her and I called her. As you can imagine I was overwhelmed by all this and I asked her how long they were going to surveil me and she said it could be weeks but told me again they were making my case a priority. Then at 5:00 she texted me to call her. She told me she has some good news. It turns out they finally proved me innocent and the surveillance was going to end and I could get off the app and go back to my normal life. I said I told you so and that made her laugh. She told me they would mail me a certificate that said I was innocent so I couldn’t be recharged again in the future. Of course I was relieved and was just thankful the ordeal was over. I had been really worried, they made it sound like I was heavily involved in this crime ring and I was thinking they would find me guilty and arrest me but the whole thing is going to blow over. The whole thing made me think that life can throw you a curve ball at any time. I could have went to prison for years even though I was innocent.
