Scammers thought they were digging for a victim, instead they got a 6 News reporter

LANSING, Mich. (WLNS) – “It’s OK if you don’t believe. You can disconnect the line so I can go with the legal procedure. But once you’re going to get arrested, and once you’re going to lose each and everything. Then you cannot blame us that we have not tried to help you out.”

That’s pressure point. That was how “Acting Deputy Director of Customs and Border Protection Pete Flores” was going to wrestle a payment or personal information from this reporter. The problem? Here’s the real Flores in a press conference in El Paso three weeks ago:

“Well, Good morning everyone. I am pleased really to be here today, in El Paso for this event.”

The caller was a scam artist and part of what federal officials call a growing scam activity. The scammers call an unsuspecting person, identify themselves as someone whose name can be tracked on a website as a federal law enforcement agent and allege there is a warrant for their arrest for drug trafficking and money laundering.

Unfortunately for this scammer – the recipient of the call was a reporter who put the call on speaker and recorded the more than 41-minute call. The call audio was shared with Youssef Fawaz, a spokesman for the Detroit office of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection. He called the interaction “wild” and “crazy.” And while he says his office is getting about one call or email a day about this particular type of scam, this was the first time he has heard the scam in a recording.

“Sadly, right people are being scammed by this and it makes me worry too because of the persistence that they have. They’re constantly just going at you even after you told them that you’re a reporter that you know this is a scam, they continued. You know their scam, they continue,” he says. “That’s what we’re concerned with is that the unsuspecting individuals that that are on the other end of that line may actually believe them because of the persistence. It’s it’s truly concerning to us.”

Despite being told multiple times that the reporter was recording the call and knew it was a scam – the scammers followed up with their threat to have Lansing Township Police arrest this reporter on the federal warrant – with another phone call. This time instead of a number in Idaho, the scammers spoofed the Lansing Township Police Department telephone number.

SCAMMER 2: I have called you to tell you that ah I have received the information from the U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers

HEYWOOD: Yeah.

SCAMMER 2: in the fight against you and I do believe that you are complete familiar about that, sir.

HEYWOOD: Sure.

SCAMMER 2: OK. So, why did you disconnected the line when the officers tried to speaking to you about the situation?”

HEYWOOD: I did not disconnect the line, but they told me you guys were going to come and arrest me. So, come get me.

SCAMMER 2: [Phone disconnects]

Transcript of scam phone call from “Lansing Township Police Officer Jennifer

In the original, 41-minute plus phone call with the first scammer, the caller refused to hang up after promising the police were coming to arrest this reporter. Instead, the scammer tried to convince this reporter to hang up “to prove” the reporter was “running away” from the charges.

That first scammer threatened this reporter with arrest by the Ingham County Sheriff Department. Then, he said the information and warrant for charges of drug trafficking and money laundering had been sent to the Lansing Township Police Department.

Challenged on the change of agency the warrant was sent to, the scammer responded, “Just wait for like 30 minutes, baby. You will get to know.”  Ultimately, the scammer ended the call.

That was shortly after 11 am Thursday. The second scammer, impersonating a non-existent Lansing Township police officer called about 1:40 p.m. That call lasted less than two minutes.

6 News recorded both phone calls. However, because they include personal details about the reporter the recordings won’t be shared in full.

Both Joseph and Fawaz say scammers are getting better at getting your hard earned cash out of your bank account — and part of that is using the internet to collect public information about, your friends, your family, your work history — essentially anything you put on the internet could be fair game for the scammers.

“These scammers are doing their homework. They’re going on to public records websites and actually learning about the individual that they’re attempting to scam,” says Fawaz.

The scam is officially called a “government impersonation scam,” and the Federal Trade Commission reports the Customs and Border Protection scam is the third most reported in the nation. Scam calls claiming to be the Social Security Administration or the Health and Human Services/Medicare are the first and second most common calls.

This year alone, the FTC has logged complaints for 9,194, with a total loss of $2.45 million. The median loss is $565 – and that’s down 2.4 percent from 2023.

So far in 2024, the FTC reports 127,660 scam call reports related to “government impersonation.” That’s resulted in $379.14 million, with a median loss of $1,000 per scam victim – but those scam calls over all are down 15 percent.

John Joseph is the Chief of Police for Lansing Township. He says residents in the township have fallen prey to these types of scams in the past.

“Yeah, we’ve seen anything from a few thousand all the to over $150,000,” he says of the money taken by scammers and reported to his agency. “And, you know, those are significant losses for those people and, typically, what we see – because I’m sure there’s more cases that go unreported than that are that go reported because people are embarrassed. And they shouldn’t be, because they’re just a number of a growing group of people, and without the information, they can provide, whether it’s to us or state or federal partners, you know, we’re not going to be able to put an end to this.”

Three hours after the first call, a second scammer called and identified himself as Officer Jennifer from the Lansing Township Police Department. The scammer noted the previous call from Customs and Border Protection – and when challenged with the previous scammer’s own words that Lansing Township Police were coming to arrest the reporter and the reporter was waiting – the second scammer hung up. Joseph confirmed the department does not have an employee by the name of Officer Jennifer.

The second scam call came from the Lansing Township Police Department number. That’s known as spoofing a number and scammers have the technology to fake the number that shows up on a caller ID on your phone. “If law enforcement is interested in coming to arrest you, you know, we’ll show up at your door in full uniform with the police car,” Joseph says.

The first number was from an Idaho area code telephone number. The scammer pretending to be Flores originally stated he was calling from Texas. Here’s how he responded when challenged about having an Idaho number.

“No, no, no, no, no, no. The number you’re talking about – the number, right, which is showing to you, yeah,” the first scammer said about the incongruency. “We are calling you from the automated switchboard satellite phone.”

Joseph says the scams are successful because they prey on the target’s basic humanity. “People, generally speaking, are good-natured and want to do the right thing,” he says. “And that’s what’s being taken advantage of here.”

Both Joseph and Fawaz say the right response to there calls it to hang up the phone. If the scammers call back, block the number. And, both say, report the scam call immediately – to both your local law enforcement and to the Federal Trade Commission.

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