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| The FTC is cracking down on robocall scams, but if you get such a call, hang up right away. |
For some reason, I have a special, extra hate for those outfits who scam elderly and/or defenseless people of their life savings through fraud, and out of horrible greed.
According to the Federal Trade Commission and the Florida Attorney General's Office, some horrible medical device fraudsters did the following:
"A U.S. District Court has temporarily halted and frozen the assets of an Orlando-based operation that used pre-recorded telephone calls, commonly known as robocalls, to pitch purportedly "free" medical alert devices to senior citizens by falsely representing that the devices had been purchased for them by a relative or friend.
The defendents also allegedly led consumers to believe that the devices were endorsed by various health organizations and that they would not be charged anything before the devices were activated."
If the person receiving the call was duped into wanting more information, they were told to press "1" on their phone where the deception continued.
The FTC says the Orlando ompany operated under several names, including Worldwide Info Services, Absolute Solutions Group Inc, and Global Service Providers Inc.
So the people at those so-called corporations ought to just have a torturous death or something.
Instead, the FTC is planning on trying to recover money from these outfits and return it to defrauded people. Which is great, but doesn't go far enough.
Why doesn't the FTC put the names, photos, and addresses of the chief fraudsters at these companies on line. Yes, I know vigilante justice isn't a great solution, but this makes my blood boil so much I can't help myself.
Some of the names have surfaced. Courthouse News Service published some of the federal complaint against the company, and they list officers associated with the fraud scam.
The three named defendents, Michael Hilgar, Gary Martin and Joseph Settecase, are of course innocent unless proven guilty, but I hope if they are found guilty, they don't just get fines, but a sentence in some horrible jail somewhere.
This isn't the first time scammers have targeted the elderly on a large scale
According to Consumerist:
'"On June 2013, the FTC scolded a Brooklyn-based company for using deception and threats to trick the elderly ito paying for unordered medical alert systems. Around the same time, the Better Business Bureau warned seniors of deceptive telemarketing calls offering free medical alert devices."
So this type of scam is pretty common.
Of course, anyone who gets a call out of the blue from one of these outfits should just hang up, but that's hard to tell a desperate, lonely, or adled elderly person to do.
Buyer beware!!
As a person who worked for Hilgar in 2011 during his energy evaluation scam, I hope he gets prison. I quit after 3 days and posted his craigslist job ad to his victims. The office was vacated that week.
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