Dad keeps getting in contact with much younger women who are obviously scammers- what to do?
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Anonymous
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My dad (75, widowed when I was a teen) is a very smart, accomplished guy who still works full time and lives alone. However, over the past year he has been in touch with at least a few young women (or so they say) in their 30s over text/WhatsApp or another disappearing text program. I don’t know how contact was initially made.
They have gone like this- they send him pictures of them doing “fancy” things. Driving expensive cars, fancy dinners. Instagram-bragging stuff. They are bankers or jewelers. The first person claimed she was in Boston but I had to do some intense detective work to show how her pictures were fakes, and she was actually in China. Which is shouldn’t have even needed to do to prove she was sketchy! She didn’t get to her “scam” yet but I as 99% sure it was something with crypto. Next person is in LA, from Russia- a “jeweler”. I can tell this person is editing her pics so you can’t really reverse image search her, but I am sure she is not in the US and the pictures are so filtered it’s just ridiculous. The scam has not emerged yet…but I’m sure it will be revealed soon. How can I convince my dad to stop talking to people who are obviously fake people from different countries who have a scam in mind? It should be as easy as thinking “gee why would a very young successful person in the US want to talk to a 75 year old man?” Maybe he’s okay with it since he’s lonely? He hasn’t actually been scammed but it makes me nervous that he is even entertaining these people. What can I do? |
Anonymous
| Oh this happened to a family member! He was also lonely. No advice, but it’s super common. |
Anonymous
| Have him watch Catfish the TV show. Maybe seeing how many of these beautiful women are unattractive fat men might make him think twice. |
Anonymous
| My MIL has continuously fallen for these scams since becoming widowed a few years ago (“successful businessmen”, not young women, but same con). At this point we believe she’s been scammed out of most of her savings, but every legal entity we’ve spoken to has said there’s not much recourse for these types of things because she’s giving the money away willingly (albeit under false pretenses), not because she’s being threatened or coerced. DH and his siblings have done everything OP has done - reverse imaged search the pictures, pointed out he terrible English grammar, provided information on scams, blocked the scammers from her phone - but she keeps falling for them. Our accountant suggested trying to get power of attorney over her accounts so at least she can’t keep giving money away, but she won’t agree to that. |
Anonymous
| Not much you can do, my dad gave away a small fortune this way leaving us nothing. |
Anonymous
This is why wise people on the money forum are always warning people not to count inheritance as a retirement plan. |
Anonymous
| You can say goodbye to any inheritance you thought you were going to get and prepare the guest room for dad for when he's completely out of money. |
Anonymous
| Hire an escort who costs less. It's not a scam if it's the best price he can find for someone to give him some positive attention. |
Anonymous
I did not count on it and got very little. |
Anonymous
| Look up sweetheart scams. Maybe share this with your dad. My mom has fallen for this. He may not believe something like this can happen to him like my mom, but it is soooo common. The FBI even has warnings about it. These scams happen in person too. |
Anonymous
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In our case the scammers are related. Cousin crawled out of woodwork with sob stories. Sibling who has POA won't let mom be evaluated for FTD dementia, but quit her job and has mom funding everything. She also stopped mom from getting another regular dementia screen after she passed one...6 years ago.
It truly is impossible. In my case I cannot protect someone who is paranoid, thinks I am the enemy for being concerned about her judgment and has family, not strangers, but family telling her anything and everything she has ever wanted to hear as she gives them money. We are at least lucky there is enough money there for her to purchase the"love" she wants and still fund her aging care as long as the takers don't get too greedy. I looked into my options in the situation and it's pretty bleak. We are not spending our own money to hire a legal team to "protect" a mother who doesn't want to be protected and who has always been difficult. We may need that money to hire care for her if she gets drained dry. It would be easier to prove strangers are taking advantage. |
Anonymous
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Find him a real human woman with whom to spend time.
He sounds lonely. It's the lonely people who get taken by the scammers. |
Anonymous
My friends dad met another elderly woman in a grief support group. They married within a year, she convinced him to leave her everything, but expected daughters to deal with any aging issues. She was only there for him when he could buy her nice dinners and take her on nice trips, but he wasn’t lonely with her. |
Anonymous
Check for dementia. Sounds delusional and lacking judgement (which is part of the disease). |
Anonymous
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He should see any of our junk inbox on email.
This stuff is always readily available. The “women” contacting him aren’t unique. Show him Catfish or other movies/shows that feature scammers and who they really are behind the fake photos. |