Don’t Fall for Jury Duty Scam
July 5, 2008
I have a friend who actually got a call like this about the same time someone emailed me about this scam.
I know it’s a little bit outside of what I usually post here, but I can see how easy it would be to get caught in this scam and I wanted to let as many people as possible know about it.
Jury Duty Scam
This has been verified by the FBI (their link is also included below). Please pass this on to everyone in your email address book. It is spreading fast so be prepared should you get this call. Most of us take those summonses for jury duty seriously, but enough people skip out on their civic duty, that a new and ominous kind of fraud has surfaced.
The caller claims to be a jury coordinator. If you protest that you never received a summons for jury duty, the scammer asks you for your Social Security number and date of birth so he or she can verify the information and cancel the arrest warrant. Give out any of this information and bingo; your identity was just stolen.
The fraud has been reported so far in 11 states, including Oklahoma, Illinois , and Colorado . This (swindle) is particularly insidious because they use intimidation over the phone to try to bully people into giving information by pretending they are with the court system. The FBI and the federal court system have issued nationwide alerts on their web sites, warning consumers about the fraud.
Check it out here: http://www.fbi.gov/page2/june06/jury_scams060206.htm
Chris-
My husband and I have heard of this scam. My husband works for the Minneapolis police department. I almost had forgotten about it until the e-mail you recently sent. It was good to be reminded of this. It is terrible what people come up with.
Important read this
one thing to remember is that unless your jurry duty letter is sent certified (meaning you have to sign for it) they can’t claim that you have actually received it so they can’t issue a warrent out for you and try to arrest you for not going to jurry duty. I know people who have simply just ripped up the summons and put it in the garbage and no one can claim they ever received it at all.
One thing to remember is NEVER EVER give out any of your personal information over the phone or internet because you never know who is on the receiving end of the deal. If possible go to a real location of the company trying to get the info from you such as if it’s a bank or police dept or court system and talk it over with a real person who works there and ask why they would need the info again if they already have it on file.
If you are worried about it - and want to be safe, just tell the caller “Thank you so much for letting me know - I will call the court and make arrangements to work it out - BYE”
I agree with the person above, I think when they send out jury duty letters, they are sent certified. So if you have jury duty, you will know it. But I always check the caller ID before I answer the phone. I never answer the phone unless it has a name and number. I would think a real Jury Duty Coordinator would have something like the court house name, or the town in which you live somewhere in the ID name. It probably wouldn’t say Unknown caller, Their name & number should be a listed number. The way I look at it, if they can’t tell me the name in which they work under, before I answer the call, why should they expect me to give out ANY of my personal information. Some people are crazy, and come up with crazy things just like this. And they sadly cost alot of people alot, before they know that anything has happened.
Thank you Chris for posting this, I have already sent it to my friends!