Shaun says his 80+-year old grandfather, Steve, is being scammed out of over $10,000 a month. It seems Steve recently hired a female gardener who introduced him to a “wealthy friend,” and now he’s loaning them money to pay for groceries, cable, home upkeep, and, get this, bodyguards to protect her from an ex-husband and son who to want to kill her. When the family tries to intervene, Steve says the family is trying to put him in a nursing home and steal his money. Shaun is at a loss. How can he help his grandfather, who doesn’t want to be helped? Shaun’s story, inside…
My grandfather, Steve, is being scammed out of his money by a group of women including his gardener. Steve is in his mid 80′s and lives in Florida. He is retired and recently hired a new gardener. She introduced him to her supposedly wealthy friend who soon thereafter was “injured” in Maine. The gardener has convinced him to “loan” the women money, in cash, to pay for upkeep on her home, groceries, cable, bodyguards to protect her from her ex-husband and son who want to kill her, and many other things.
It is at the point where he is giving these women over $10k a month out of the only account that my parents have access to (so it could be a lot more from his other accounts).
When my parents tried to talk to Steve he says they are trying to put him in a nursing home and steal his money.
He insists that he knows what he is doing and he does not need anyone’s help. We tried calling the Florida Abuse Hotline. Their response was that he can give his money away if he wants to. We recently spoke to his doctor who said that one of Steve’s neighbors was also worried about him, the gardener had been coming around quite a bit.
Apparently another investigation has begun since we spoke to the doctor but nothing has come of it yet. Is there anything else we can do? Any help would be greatly appreciated
Sounds like a con to me. I wonder if a call to the police or FBI would help. Do any Consumerists have any advice on how the family can intervene? Or is it the old guy’s right to do whatever he wants with his money? Leave your thoughts in the comments.
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Also…if he had spent all his money at the track (as my grandfather did) would you still turn him away in his declining years?
More information is needed here anyway.
Is the old guy happy?
Is the lady attractive? Do you want to put him in a home? Are you solvent enough to handle his needs in thirty years if he needs help? Are you relying on that money as a future windfall? Is he getting sex or companionship in a romantic sense?
What if he goes out tomorrow and buys himself a futuristic car that costs 500,000? then crashes it?
Have you spoken to his mayor? Mayor’s actually do stuff, they know all the right law enforcement people, and can probably decern if Grandpa has gone around the bend, or is simply paying for sex.
On the one hand, just because he’s old doesn’t mean he can’t do what he likes. On the other hand, if these are dishonest grifters, he’s in serious trouble.
IT IS ALWAYS BETTER TO OVER REACT THAN UNDER REACT.
Good luck.
@graceless: Best way to get to his mayor is to contact your own. Have your mayor call his mayor, it really does work.
This sounds like my ex-wife.
Gee something like this is happening in the scam capitol of the US ? Who would have thought ?
What is it about Florida that seems to attract an unusual amount of con-artists, grifters, and other assorted scum ?
@Front_Towards_Enemy: I was thinking the same thing – Florida is messed up. Of all the states I’ve traveled to and lived in, FL has the creepiest vibe. I feel safer in Mexico than there.
I agree with the others who suggested hiring a private investigator. If the family has consulted a lawyer, the lawyer would probably have worked with some good
investigators and can refer the family.
It may also help to consult with a social worker in private practice who has experience in dealing with the elderly.
Unfortunately these types of situations are all too common. Elderly who are isolated and lonely are easy marks for this type of scammer.
If you’re confident that grandpa isn’t just getting some high-priced call-girl service and disguising it as loans, call the authorities. This probably won’t be the FBI, but the local police, the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, or the Department of Elder affairs. There are a lot of special laws in FL to protect the elderly from this kind of crap, so even if the victim is “of sound mind”, others can press charges if the people receiving the money can’t show that it is being used for the purposes described and that they have the ability to pay it back. Regardless of whether grandpa is of sound mind, it’s still fraud if he lends them money “for a bodyguard” and they spend it at the mall.
I’m not suggesting you actually do this but, if you beat her ass into a hospital bed one dark night I bet she’d stop.
Three things to do:
1. Install a Nanny Cam without your grandfathers knowledge. You may be surprised what is learned. You can use the information to leverage the people to stop what they are doing and quite possibly retrieve the money that has been pilfered. The video may also be able to be used in court.
2. Hire a Private Investigator to find out everything about the scammers & use the information to go to court, the news, etc.
3. Also start a web blog detailing your struggle, and how things are going. You may be surprised at the help you may garner when other people see what is going on. Very likely they have done this before and you may be able to find other victims.
I wouldn’t automatically assume he’s demented or senile; I know plenty of younger people who fall for “booty traps” too. Getting family nearby and involved is ALWAYS a good idea; the other posts on that were great. You want to make sure you stay on HIS SIDE, though, even if that means pretending you don’t disagree with what he’s doing. If he cuts you (the family) off and won’t talk to you, you can’t really help.
Also, you don’t want to start a confrontation or interpersonal war, because it puts you on his “bad side”; but that doesn’t mean you should just let them keep coming around. If the scammers still won’t back off when your granddad’s surrounded by family, get creative about making their lives hell (preferably in ways you can totally cop to being innocent of) until they DO go away. There’s a lot you can do that nobody can prove isn’t just coincidence, like calling the IRS to get them audited, or, well…
We had a jerk taking advantage of a family friend around here, but after the fifth consecutive time his car was vandalized (keyed, tires slashed, window broken…) when he left it parked outside her apartment, he suddenly began to lose interest. And we all just shrugged and said, “Darn punk kids!”
I was disappointed, because I’d just gotten his address a few days ago and was about to start ordering him massive amounts of gay porn catalogs. *sigh* I did sign him up for the 700 Club as a parting gift, though.
Family is there for you whether you like it or not, as my dad used to say.
Doing some sort of background check or hiring a PI to see if these two have a history of fraud might help your case when you take it to the authorities.