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Do Not Call: 61 people charged by feds in $300 million call center scam
Law Enforcement Today ^ | 1/11/20 | Pat Droney

Posted on 01/12/2020 3:29:24 PM PST by Impala64ssa

Sick of “Rachel from customer service?”

Tired of those calls about your car’s warranty?

Had it up to your eyeballs with the IRS calling about your “2016 income taxes?”

This story should bring a tear of joy to your eyes.

In Houston federal court on Thursday, the kingpin of an overseas “call center” that scammed thousands of people out of millions of dollars admitted to coordinating a three-year-operation that bilked thousands of people out of millions of dollars, an ending which was lauded by former Attorney General Jeff Sessions as the first time such a takedown had been made.

The scheme utilized callers at numerous facilities across India who used illegally obtained personal information to impersonate IRS and immigration officials.

These callers, who sounded very convincing, usually would call the most vulnerable, particularly elderly and would threaten them with arrest and jail if they did not pay off their “tax debt” owed to the U.S. government.

Hitesh Madhubhai Patel, 43, pleaded guilty to wire fraud conspiracy, general conspiracy to commit identification fraud, access device fraud, money laundering and impersonation of a federal officer, according to the Department of Justice.

“Hitesh Patel played a prominent role in this massive, India-base fraud scheme that bilked vulnerable Americans out of millions of dollars,” Assistant Attorney General Brian Benczkowski said.

Patel is scheduled to be sentenced on April3. He is looking at a sentence of up to 20 years in prison for the wire fraud conspiracy and five years for the general conspiracy. Both charges carry the possibility of a $250,000 fine.

Patel had been extradited from Singapore to face the charges for the scheme, which ran from 2013 to 2016.

According to the Houston Chronicle, 24 co-defendants in the scheme have been convicted in Texas, Arizona and Georgia, and sentenced to up to 20 years in prison. They have also been ordered to pay millions of dollars in restitution. Several other defendants based in India are awaiting prosecution.

Patel admitted in court that he had realized between $25 to $65 million from victims, according to a news release from the Justice Department.

One of Patel’s co-defendants said that Patel was “the top person in India and the boss for whom the other defendants worked,” according to law enforcement officials. The scam was run through numerous call centers in India. He admitted that he used email and the messaging app WhatsApp to communicate with other defendants, exchange credit card numbers, telephone scam scripts, deposit slips, payment information, all center operations information, instructions and bank account information.

The scripts not only alleged being from the IRS, but also from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, Canada Revenue Agency and the Australian Tax Office.

In the scam, callers claimed they were from the U.S. government and provided personal information about their targets. They would then demand thousands of dollars in “unpaid fines” be reimbursed on the spot, or victims would face dire consequences, such as arrest, public humiliation and deportation.

In one case, when a man would not give in to their demands, he was “swatted”; in other words, he found his home surrounded by police after the call center notified officers via 911 that he was armed and threatening to kill police officers.

Among the threats were fake deportation warrants, nonexistent arrest warrants and phony unpaid income taxes that needed immediate attention. Officials said that the scheme primarily targeted South Asian immigrants and elderly people.

Former Assistant Attorney General Leslie R. Caldwell, when the initial indictments were announced in 2016, said:

“They used a variety of schemes to trick frightened individuals over the phone by tapping into their worst fears—that they would be deported and they would face other problems with the U.S. government or state or local law enforcement.”

The scheme involved having victims buy reloadable money cards or wire money to those involved in the scheme. Victims were told they’d be arrested, jailed, fined or deported if they failed to do so.

The callers would actually talk people through the process and gave them very direct instructions on how to comply with the scheme. There was a network of so-called “runners” in the U.S. who liquidated and laundered the funds.

The cracking of the case was announced in 2016 by Former U.S. Attorney Ken Magidson, who explained that dozens of people and several overseas businesses had been indicted in the international scheme, which cheated more than 15,000 U.S. residents out of $300 million.

Despite repeated admonitions from law enforcement and other authorities in the U.S advising people not to fall for scams such as this, people continue to get victimized. At the time the arrests were announced, Caldwell noted that the government does not do business in the way these scammers conducted it.

“The U.S. government does not operate in this manner,” she said. “We never call to demand that money be loaded immediately onto prepaid cards. U.S. government agencies to not call to demand immediate payments to avoid deportation or to avoid arrest.”

She said it was easy for people to be duped.

“The scammers in this case and so many like this are convincing. They are menacing and they are ruthless in their pursuit of their victims,” said Bruce Foucart of ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations. “They convey authority and a sense of urgency that leaves their victims terrified.”

Among the victims in this case were an elderly San Diego woman who gave over $12,300 after she was threatened with arrest if she didn’t pay a phony penalty on a fictitious tax violation. Another man from California also paid $136,000 to resolve alleged tax violations after being called repeatedly for over 20 days.

Hopefully these arrests are just the tip of the iceberg and these scumbags get put out of business once and for all.


TOPICS: Crime/Corruption
KEYWORDS: arizona; donotcall; fedalivetopigs; georgia; gettherope; h1b; india; scams; texas; woodchipper
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To: DugwayDuke

Can’t fathom why so many posters answer a phone because it rings. Fetch?

My phone only makes noise when my wife calls. Others are silently directed to VM, which I’ve never set up.


21 posted on 01/12/2020 4:21:57 PM PST by coaster123 (XLV-MMXX)
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To: veracious
I use to receive 15 or 20 spam calls a day.

I don't get any now.

Check out the site nomorobo which I have been using for about 3 years.

It's fantastic at catching these calls and ... It's Free for home phones!

They just started offering the service for cell phones for a small price.

NOMOROBO

22 posted on 01/12/2020 4:25:20 PM PST by justme4now (Falsehood flies, and the Truth comes limping after it)
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To: Impala64ssa

Maximum charges, no plead bargaining, trials, convictions, maximum sentences, no parole.


23 posted on 01/12/2020 4:26:59 PM PST by Carl Vehse
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To: DugwayDuke

“All these other methods will no work because the scammers use software where their phone number can be anything they want it to be.”

We actually have gotten a couple of these calls from our own number.


24 posted on 01/12/2020 4:29:10 PM PST by Grampa Dave (Democrats sue Iran over right to use "Death to America" as their 2020 campaign slogan!)
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To: meadsjn

Excerpt:

“Patel is scheduled to be sentenced on April3. He is looking at a sentence of up to 20 years in prison for the wire fraud conspiracy and five years for the general conspiracy. Both charges carry the possibility of a $250,000 fine.”

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

If a multi-million dollar phone scam will land patel in the clink for 20 yrs, how much time should hildabeast, hussein & kerry get for their frauds?


25 posted on 01/12/2020 4:29:57 PM PST by thinden
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To: Impala64ssa

So they only got 61??? There are thousands of crooks to go. The criminals are winning.


26 posted on 01/12/2020 4:32:34 PM PST by mountainlion (Live well for those that did not make it back.)
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To: Harmless Teddy Bear

“Can they go after that company that keeps calling me about “student loan forgiveness”? We have no student loans.”

We paid off our last student loan for our kids, 30+ years ago, and we still get calls that we are late on our payments.


27 posted on 01/12/2020 4:33:19 PM PST by Grampa Dave (Democrats sue Iran over right to use "Death to America" as their 2020 campaign slogan!)
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To: generally
Tell them your SSN is #042-68-4425 and your name is Harrison J. Bounel.

These Social Security scammers call me to tell me my Social is going to be shut down due to “unlawful activity on the account”. . . Oh, do I have fun with them. I make up a name, social security number and zip code, and wonder of wonders, they find my account. Amazing. . . And even more amazing my fictional account is the one that is about to be shut down due to unlawful activity. WOW! How could I have come up with a random account that just happened to mirror the one they were obviously calling me about with the exact same problem? Man, am I good or what?

So, once I have established I am who they are looking for (a mark), I proceed to play with them, being as difficult as possible. Everything I provide them is bogus, made up on the spur of the moment. What fun. If they ask did I ever live somewhere, I respond, I lived just down the road from there, no matter where it was. Or I let my illegal alien cousin use my SSN while he worked there! LOL!

28 posted on 01/12/2020 4:48:25 PM PST by Swordmaker (My pistol self-identifies as an iPad, so you must accept it in gun-free zones, you hoplophobe bigot!)
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To: justme4now

NOMOROBO is an incredible and free invention for plain citizens.

Our ET grandson set up our old Comcast home number to forward the scam NOMOROBO calls to our county fraud phone #.

One can only imagine how the scammers felt when They heard,”County fraud division, how can we help you.”

We cancelled our old Comcast system, when we cut the cable 3 years ago and Comcast business does not allow NOMOROBO on their system. So our ET grandson set up our system to forward bad calls to our VM which doesn’t exist.

The NOMOROBO for cell phones is so effective after about 5 months of use, we don’t receive these calls on our cell phone. We had one sneak by in 3 years, and I reported it to
NOMOROBO. We never got another call from it.


29 posted on 01/12/2020 4:52:48 PM PST by Grampa Dave (Democrats sue Iran over right to use "Death to America" as their 2020 campaign slogan!)
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To: Impala64ssa
“The U.S. government does not operate in this manner,” she said.

Their MO involves different schemes and strategies. Hilarious.

30 posted on 01/12/2020 4:57:15 PM PST by dragnet2 (Diversion and evasion are tools of deceit)
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To: mountainlion

Mike lee, mormon dirtbag, Utah wants to import 500000 Indians so they can perpetuate their fraud closer to their new homes. Lee is a disgrace. As for the Indians, a good use of nuclear testing for both India and Pakistan is not unreasonable.


31 posted on 01/12/2020 5:00:41 PM PST by Okeydoker
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To: Impala64ssa

I am a big fan of of a hellfire drone strike.
Bastards stealing money from old people.


32 posted on 01/12/2020 5:02:06 PM PST by hadaclueonce ( This time I am Deplorable)
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To: Impala64ssa

I hope they stopped Rachel from Cardholder Services......she got me to answer a couple of times using a phone number in my area code. The state AG office has a complaint website and it appeared to be full of calls from Rachel.


33 posted on 01/12/2020 5:02:06 PM PST by Ben Hecks
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To: Impala64ssa

There a new operation using the same tactics....


34 posted on 01/12/2020 5:03:04 PM PST by stockpirate (Anyone who believes Epstein killed himself is a fool)
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To: Impala64ssa

Hate to admit it but the plague of Indian telescammers has made me grow to dislike like Indians. Yep, i just said that.


35 posted on 01/12/2020 5:23:57 PM PST by Wilderness Conservative (Nature is the ultimate conservative.)
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To: Okeydoker
Mike lee, mormon dirtbag, Utah wants to import 500000 Indians so they can perpetuate their fraud closer to their new homes.

They came, not for the Bill of Rights, not for the Constitution, not for the personal responsibility, but for the economics, crime and chain migration.

Twenty years later, whites were a minority in their own country, and the Second Amendment had been revoked by the votes of the aliens.

36 posted on 01/12/2020 5:26:07 PM PST by bkopto
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To: veracious

Telemarketing in general should be illegal.

There is NO reason for a company to call a phone number (landline or cell) to hock a product or service when there are more than ample non-invasive avenues of selling said product/service.

TV, radio, newspapers, magazines, billboards, signs, internet, mail, etc, etc, etc.


37 posted on 01/12/2020 5:33:14 PM PST by 2CAVTrooper (Political Science degrees, so easy Obama has one.)
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To: Impala64ssa
This story should bring a tear of joy to your eyes.

No. I'll shed a tear of joy when some of these bastards are hanging from the gallows. They steal all of our property all the time -- our phones, our phone services and our time if we are lucky. If we have dementia or are gullible and can't tell them to shove off, then they steal a LOT more.

I find it amazing after 20 or 30 years of this crap that they still find marks to con.

38 posted on 01/12/2020 5:39:22 PM PST by ProtectOurFreedom
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To: umgud
Life, no parole.

My, you are lenient today.

39 posted on 01/12/2020 5:41:37 PM PST by ProtectOurFreedom
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To: umgud

Dissolved in acid


40 posted on 01/12/2020 5:43:22 PM PST by MrEdd (Caveat Emptor)
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