Think Politicians Are Trying to Scare You? You're Not Paranoid.

Part I. Personal

Wednesday evening I answered the phone, and a man pretending to work for the local sheriff’s department asked me to identify myself, told me that the call would be recorded because it might be used against me in a court of law, and ordered me to get a pen and paper. He spoke fast and unclearly and with lots of strange background noises. He claimed that I had failed to appear for jury duty and I would be arrested if I didn’t do what he said. (I’d received no notice of jury duty.)

I ignored obvious signs that this guy was a fraud. He was not calling from a local number. He couldn’t pronounce the name of my street. I had to ask him four times before he told me his supposed name, which he didn’t seem totally sure of. He was extremely hostile while claiming to have no choice about behaving that way. And when questioned on things he said, he offered explanations, but the explanations made no sense. He said that because he was required to treat me as a criminal I had to tell him my cell phone number. What? He said I could pay a fine and would get it back the next day, but I couldn’t pay wish cash or check or credit card because the sheriff’s department considered it inappropriate to use a form of payment that included personal information. What? Personalized cash?

I waited through all this patent nonsense (including him doubling the amount of the fine, apparently under the impression that he’d hooked a true sucker) until the guy said I could not come to the sheriff’s department to clear things up but would have to go withdraw the money from the bank (which was, of course, closed for the night, and ATMs have limits). Then I’d have to use the money to buy some kind of card at a grocery store. As soon as he said that, I called 911 on my other phone and asked their advice. They told me to hang up on the guy, and they said it with an air of tired annoyance. My wife, who’s better informed than I, then told me there’d been a news report about this scam.

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