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S.C. task force aims to reduce scams on elderly
5/8/2008 10:43 PM   0 comment(s) on this story E-mail this story to a friend

By SEANNA ADCOX
Associated Press
COLUMBIA -- Advocates for the elderly hope a task force announced Thursday will stop scams that rob the state's seniors of their hard-earned savings.
The state Office on Aging will direct scam victims who call an 800 number to agencies that can help them. The partnership includes prosecutors, the AARP, banks, law enforcement, and the state Revenue and Consumer Affairs departments.
"We're serious about protecting our seniors, and we'll put you in jail," said Lt. Gov. Andre Bauer, who announced the task force.
He noted that an alert bank employee prevented an 80-year-old woman from losing $8,000 earlier this year to a scam claiming she'd won a Jamaican lottery.
John Jenkins, whose sole job at Mount Pleasant Police is to investigate crimes against residents 60 and older, said the woman was about to make a second wire transfer to the scammer when he was called. Jenkins said he gets about five such calls a week, roughly double from a year ago.
"A lot of them are lonely," he said, adding that seniors are drawn to people who claim to care for them and offer them a brighter future.
Elderly advocates also say seniors are often too trusting, may suffer from some level of dementia or don't want to be rude because it goes against their Southern roots.
More than 550,000 -- or 13 percent -- of the state's residents are 65 or older, according to 2006 Census estimates. With that number expected to more than double by 2025, attempted scams are sure to increase too, Bauer said.
Last year, 6,000 people complained of fraud to the state Department of Consumer Affairs. Elderly advocates believe the number scammed is actually much higher, since seniors often are either too embarrassed to call or don't know they can.
"This issue has been grossly overlooked," said Mary Katherine Bagnal, chief executive of Senior Matters Extended Services, which manages geriatric care. "These seniors are losing their retirement to scams. They become a part of the system. They end up on Medicaid because their funds are exploited."
The Office on Aging also plans to develop a Safe Senior Business Network. To join, businesses must agree to a list of ethical standards and to mediate disputes with elderly customers.
Bauer hopes elderly residents will check the list on the Web or call the Office on Aging before deciding who to hire or where to shop. He says it should be available by year's end.
That's welcome news to Janet Bryan, who over the last year managed to recover only $6,000 of the roughly $80,000 her 76-year-old neighbor sent to scammers who offered phony services and decades worth of magazine subscriptions and claimed she'd won a magazine subscription lottery in Canada.
"Families need to be aware their seniors are vulnerable," Bryan said. "If they're not monitoring what's going on, they can get so deep in the hole they can't get out."
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On the Net:
http://www.aging.sc.gov/scams



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