Full Notification

We are advising the community about a telephone scam reported today by a citizen. The citizen stated she received a phone call from someone (Suspect #1) who claimed to be from the Dallas Police Department. The suspect stated that he was calling because someone had made charges on her credit card totaling thousands of dollars. The suspect somehow correctly provided her with the last four digits of her Social Security number and threatened that if she did not cooperate with him she would be arrested and jailed for the credit card charges. When the citizen did not believe the story, she was asked to name a police department so they could verify the charges. After she mentioned the El Segundo Police Department, another voice (Suspect #2) came on the line and claimed he was with the El Segundo Police Department and that the she was in fact responsible for the charges mentioned and that if she did not cooperate she would be arrested. After questioning the callers further, they apparently became frustrated and hung up on her. The citizen stated the caller(s) spoke with an unknown foreign accent.

Please note that nobody from the El Segundo Police Department will ever call you and tell you to cooperate regarding fraudulent charges on your credit card and threaten you with arrest if you do not comply. This phone call was a complete scam intended to frighten the victim into complying. Fortunately, the citizen was aware it was a scam and was not victimized.

We remind everyone that telephone/e-mail scams like these come in all forms but they often have common factors:

• The caller claims they are with a law enforcement/government agency and threaten to arrest you if you do not comply with them
• There is an urgency to caller’s demands and they insist action must be taken immediately
• You are asked to provide personal confidential information such as your Social Security number, credit card number or bank account number
• You are asked to pay via pre-paid debit card

Please do not fall for these scams and if you are ever in doubt about a situation feel free to contact our non-emergency number (310) 524-2760.