Don't be a victim of this 'grandparent scam'

It's the generosity and kindness of seniors that many thieves target in a variety of scams, and one of the most common, "The Grandparent Scam," was used on Vivien Serff, a local woman.

"When I answered the phone, he said, 'Hello Grandma,' and I said 'Hi,' and he said "Do you know who this is?' and that was my first mistake," said Serff.

"I said, 'Well, it's either Kyle or Seth,' so he picked Kyle."

The voice on the other end was really a scam artist pretending to be Kyle to take advantage of Serff. He shared a complicated, detailed story as to why he needed bail money right away.

"He said that he had flown here for his friend's funeral, and then he told me about getting in a wreck and being charged with drunk driving," said Serff. "They play on your emotions and make it sound as bad as they can so that you don't really stop and think about what's going on."

The scammer told Serff the public defender would call to tell her how much money was needed. Her radar was already up, but it sounded an alarm when the "public defender" called.

"Something just didn't sound right," said Serff. "So that's when I asked her for Kyle's full name and his date of birth, and she didn't even have that."

In the last year, the Attorney General's office received 235 complaints about the grandparent scam. They said 57 people lost money, sending an average $4,700 each.

One of those victims was a 74-year-old in Burlington woman who received a call that was supposedly from her son, who was also in trouble and in need of bail money. Concerned and caught off guard, she went to Home Depot and loaded $4,500 dollars on nine different prepaid debit cards. By the time she figured out it was a scam, $2,000 of it was already gone.

As for Serff, after talking with the phony public defender, she called her grandson. "I was concerned about him," she said. "I said, 'So you're not in jail in New Jersey,' and he said 'What!?'"

Serff knows these scammers are pretty good at lying, which is why she shared her story -- to keep others from being victims of the same crime.

"They can be very, very convincing," she said. "They're the scum of the earth!"