Gift-buying mom bilked by Internet ticket scam
Source: http://www.herald.com/content/today/news/broward/digdocs/017756.htm
DAVID GREEN
[email protected]
Update 29th December: The radio station made the mom and her daughter's dream come true. They gave her front row tickets for the show and the girl will be meeting the guys backstage. The guys are only letting 12 fans backstage and she and her mom will be part of that group. When asked what she would say when she met her favorite backstreet boy Brian the girl only replied "I'll probably have a heart attack."
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What Pam Lanouette thought she was buying when she wired $500 to South Florida: tickets for her and her children to see the Backstreet Boys.
What she received: nothing.
Lanouette, a single mother of three who lives in Silver Spring, Md., is one of mushrooming number of Internet scam victims. In her case, she thought she was buying a Christmas present for her three teenagers from someone who answered her online ad. But she wound up getting bilked out of the last of her savings.
``The tickets were supposed to be on the floor, in Row 10,'' Lanouette said by phone from her home. ``They included backstage passes, and we'd be able to go to one of their after-concert parties, and it was supposed to come with a party pack -- hats and T-shirts.''
The only thing Lanouette knows about the scammer is that he called from a telephone in the 954 area code. But so far, Broward authorities have been unable to help her.
The problem: She can't trace the phone number, and privacy laws prevent MoneyGram -- through which she sent him the $500 -- from telling her exactly where the money was picked up.
Lanouette's travails began when her bank balance dwindled to just a few hundred dollars. The plumbing-company office manager decided to spend it on a new vinyl floor for her house.
But Christmas was just around the corner. And her children were frenzied fans of the pop band the Backstreet Boys.
So she placed an ad on Yahoo asking if anyone had tickets to the Feb. 2 Washington show. A man calling from Broward County said he did.
He told Lanouette to send the money to him via Money Gram. Then he would ship her the tickets by overnight mail.
``The day after I sent it, I stayed home all morning,'' she said. ``When I had to go out, I left notes on the door. But it never came.''
Fraud experts say Lanouette's experience has become increasingly common.
The Economic Crimes Unit of the Broward Sheriff's Office receives four to five calls a week from people who have sent money but never received goods -- cameras, printers, computers, DVD players.
``I always tell people, `If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is,' '' said Sgt. Ed Madge, supervisor of the unit. ``If you don't know the person on the other end of the line -- if they're just a name hiding out there in Cyberworld -- then don't do the deal.''
Nationwide, the trend appears even more pronounced.
The Internet Fraud Complaint Center has received 22,000 complaints since the FBI opened it five months ago in Fairmont, W. Va. Most have little chance of getting their money back.
As for Lanouette and her family, this holiday season promised to be bleak.
``It seems like no one can help me,'' she said. ``I have a little girl who's been sick for three months, and she was so excited. Now I let her down.''
Anyone who has fallen victim to an Internet scam should visit the Internet Fraud Complaint Center's website at www.ifccfbi.gov and fill out the complaint form.
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