Is this a scam?

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CatholicSam

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This was a first! I just got a collect call from a prison inmate who says he lives on our street and knows my husband. I doubt that he got our number from my husband, but he sounded desperate to get hold of someone on the collect call. He said no one else would answer the phone once they heard it was collect. So I talked to him and he wanted me to do a 3 way call so he could explain “what went down” to someone. I told him we only have basic service and not the 3 way calling. So he asked me to call a lady and ask her to come to Tuesday visitation and to try and take his collect call at work. I called her and told her the message. Then he called me back to see if I was able to get in touch with her. Apparently he’s come up with a “new plan” and this could “bring him home” but he has to talk to her about it first in order for it to work. When I told him I got in touch with him he was very thankful and told me that he would show his gratitude to us when he got home :eek: I told him not to worry about it. He asked me to call the lady again and tell her the time of the visitation. I did it but it sounds like she probably won’t be able to make it after all.

I feel a little wary that there is a prison inmate (who I don’t know other than his first name and alleged address–I don’t even know why he’s in prison) that knows our names, knows we have a baby (she was making noises), knows where we live, knows our phone number, knows my husband works during the day on weekdays, and is going to show up to show his gratitude when he gets out of prison. Did I do the right thing? I just kept thinking of the corporal work of mercy “Visit the imprisoned”. Was this a scam? Am I silly for being nervous?

By the way, I told my husband and he thought I was brave and good for doing it. And I’m also a bit of a recluse and prefer to stick to myself usually.
 
Hmm. Prison inmates are not allowed to make a series of phone calls, from my understanding. My worry would be that he was calling from somewhere like Africa and the collect call charges will be astronomical. I would call your phone service provider immediately and verify where the incoming call came from. If it wasn’t a local or states-based call, I would then do my best to have the charges removed from your account. I would be worried that he called back a series of times to have you keep accepting the charges…

Was the lady you called able to corroborate any of his story?

God bless you, Sam. You have such a caring heart and certainly the merit of what you did will not be lost on God, as He knows your intentions. I pray that you are safe and not out of any money!
 
Well hold it. Does your husband know any prison inmates? That seems to be the key to this whole story?
 
Princess_Abby said:
Hmm. Prison inmates are not allowed to make a series of phone calls, from my understanding. My worry would be that he was calling from somewhere like Africa and the collect call charges will be astronomical. I would call your phone service provider immediately and verify where the incoming call came from. If it wasn’t a local or states-based call, I would then do my best to have the charges removed from your account. I would be worried that he called back a series of times to have you keep accepting the charges…

Was the lady you called able to corroborate any of his story?

God bless you, Sam. You have such a caring heart and certainly the merit of what you did will not be lost on God, as He knows your intentions. I pray that you are safe and not out of any money!
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Change your phone number, somehow this person will try to pull you into something and/or put you ond your family in danger. I cannot go into details but becuase of a past situation very close to me, I’m assured this will lead to problems. I give you this warning, that is unless your Husband and/or you know this person, it will lead to nowhere but trouble. You may want to call the local/state police and talk to a detective that may know about prison and telephone scams -
 
jrabs said:
Well hold it. Does your husband know any prison inmates? That seems to be the key to this whole story?
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No. The guy said he lived on our street and quoted an address that is on our road. We often take walks and say hi to the neighbors on the street if they’re outside. Sometimes they introduce themselves. We’ve been here 2 years, so it is possible that we have met this guy. I just don’t remember it. And I am almost 100% certain that we didn’t give him our number. But if you know an address, it is easy to find the number. I did a reverse lookup of our street/zip code and came up with 13 names, including ours.

The phone number that showed up on the caller ID was a local number, so I didn’t even think that this could be a long distance or international call :eek:. He said the calls were a dollar each and he would pay us back–I told him not to worry about it (it was only 2 calls, and I’d rather not have him visit us :o). Also, the automated message from the collect call company said something to the effect “This is a collect call from a prison inmate and will be recorded.” I was so surprised I don’t remember if it said the name of the prison or not. But that is a good idea to call the phone company to check.

The lady knew who I was talking about and said she would come to the visitation (until I told her the time, then she said she had to work). The guy told me to tell her that Bellsouth can take collect calls from customers, so I assumed she worked at Bellsouth, which is more or less local (at least in-state, and we have unlimited long distance).

The poor guy just sounded so desperate to be able to get in touch with this person and said that if he could get in touch with her he could come home. When I helped him out, he sounded genuinely relieved and grateful. I hope that’s the case and that it’s not really some kind of scam or worse.

Bennie P, thanks for the advice. If you would be so kind as to PM me about it I would very much appreciate it.
 
I think this is pretty simple. Don’t accept any more calls from him. Don’t contact anyone for him. Don’t accept calls for him. If the guy really needs help, he should contact his lawyer.
 
Ramalama said:
I think this is pretty simple. Don’t accept any more calls from him. Don’t contact anyone for him. Don’t accept calls for him. If the guy really needs help, he should contact his lawyer.
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Yes, but that doesn’t help me with what I’ve already done 😛
 
Ramalama said:
I think this is pretty simple. Don’t accept any more calls from him. Don’t contact anyone for him. Don’t accept calls for him. If the guy really needs help, he should contact his lawyer.
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I have to agree with this. He has a court appointed attorney at the very least, and he can work through that person if needed.

Personally I would call the police and let them know this is happening. Prison service is one thing when it’s on your terms and you know all the risks and details - getting an anonymous call out of the blue is a totally different issue.

~Liza
 
estesbob said:
I am afraid you are in for a rude awakening when you get your next phone bill
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I’m on hold with the phone company now. Next up–the police!

But now this guy knows where I live, knows when my hubby’s not here, etc. etc. I’m more nervous about that than the phone bill. In the time from the last call with him to now, it couldn’t have gone up too terribly much if he is scamming us. What I’m scared of is some kind of retribution 😦
 
If you dialed anything other than numbers such as a # or * you need to contact your phone company asap. But since you only have basic phone, you may be ok. There is a scam (usually out of a jail or prison) that tricks people into forwarding all their calls to another number.
 
lizaanne said:
I think you might mean this one: snopes.com/inboxer/scams/forward.asp

~Liza
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This exact thing (except it actually was prison inmates doing it, not someone pretending to be in prison) was highlighted in the local news here in Phoenix about a week or so ago, and was instantly what I thought of when I read your post, Sam.

Can you call your hubby at work and ask him to call you back? Just to make sure you still receive phone calls at your house.

How awful. 😦
 
I hate to agree with everyone else but this smells fishy to me… And it is very easy from the internet to track down your address just through your telephone number!

If your number is listed or even if you had an old number in the past at the same address that was listed then that is a way that he can use the internet to track your information down. You can get the family names of brothers and sisters who live at the same address too… A very scary thought… All that is needed is for him to do is to go to the whitepages listings on the internet that has the residentials numbers like one would see in the phone book.

Please be very careful… If he lied about even knowing your husband then that is enough of a red flag to give you enough reason to cut everything off! I hope you didn’t give him any little clues like that you live near this or that shopping mall for example…

Just because the guy is in prison doesn’t mean he can’t get access to a computer… :eek: Especially if it is a minimum security prison.

And who even knows if this joker is in jail… He could be a neighbor or someone you know with not the best of intentions.

I will be praying for you and hope that you change your number or get call block at least.

God bless
 
I just talked to the phone company and they said it was too soon to tell if there is a scam going on or not. They suggested we place a block on all collect/3rd party calls so that if the person tries to call, they’ll get a message saying those calls are blocked. But as I said before, I am nervous about possible retribution. The guy already said he’s going to come show us his gratitude when he gets out 😦 Next call, the police (and my hubby’s away from his desk and I can’t get in touch with him either :(:().

And no, I didn’t give him any clues about where I live. He knows where I live :eek: The address! Because he quoted another house on my street as “his address”.

He knows:
  1. I have a baby
  2. My husband is gone during the day
  3. My and my husband’s full names
  4. My phone number
  5. My address
  6. I am a good person (because I helped him)
I know:
  1. His alleged address
  2. His first name
  3. His friend’s first name and her alleged work number
This is a little more excitement than I needed today! And the first time he called I just hung up. Then the second time, a few hours later, I decided to tell him he had the wrong number because my hubby’s name is relatively common. We’ve had people try calling old school friends with his name before (wrong graduation year though), so I thought he must have the wrong “so and so”. Then he tried to get me to do a 3 way call and said that it was hard to get anyone on collect calls. He asked when my husband would be home and I told him a time later than he would really be home since we’re going to Mass. Then I started to get a little more wary and asked what questions he wanted to ask my husband. After I told him again and again that I couldn’t do the 3 way call, he begged me to call the woman and give her the message.

I’m going to take a few minutes and pray the Divine Mercy Chaplet. 😦 This is really not turning out to be such a good day!
 
Yes… this scam is to get you to accept collect calls now he is going to make calls from prison and charge it to your phone. This is big in Illinois. I have no clue how they do it, but you need to contact your phone company and explain what happened and tell them that nobody can make calls and charge it to your phone.
 
Well, possibly, just possibly, since what he really wanted was the 3-way call and not you calling this woman, it’s not really a scam, and maybe you just did a good deed. It’s a crazy world we live in where you can’t do a decent thing w/o getting into possible danger.

Anyway, what you did was good, even if his intentions aren’t. Prayer is the key here, I don’t believe he’ll be allowed by God to touch you or your family.

I’ll pray for your safety too.

Maybe I’m really naive, but I can’t but think you did the right thing.
 
Just got off the phone with the jail, and the lady I spoke with thinks that it’s not a scam :dancing: She’s going to listen to the call and call me back. She said that so many people have the block on their phone that the inmates sometimes have a real hard time trying to get in touch with anyone and want to do a 3 way call. Thank you all for your prayers! I hope that everything turns out fine and that I truly was able to help a neighbor in need (but I probably won’t do this again :().
 
CatholicSam said:
Just got off the phone with the jail, and they lady I spoke with thinks that it’s not a scam :dancing: She’s going to listen to the call and call me back. She said that so many people have the block on their phone that they sometimes have a real hard time trying to get in touch with anyone and want to do a 3 way call. Thank you all for your prayers! I hope that everything turns out fine and that I truly was able to help a neighbor in need (but I probably won’t do this again :().
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You did the right thing in calling the telephone co. and the jail… safety first. 👍

Prayers and God bless
 
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