Goodizen :: Scams

New information from the Better Business Bureau Thursday is warning seniors of the latest phone scam that's targeting the wallets of elderly Tri-State residents. Read more:  http://www.abc2news.com/dpp/money/consumer/dont_waste_your_money/Copy_of_beware-of-phone-scam-affecting-seniors1373313302605#ixzz2YaBXaEbQ New information from the Better Business Bureau is warning of the latest phone scam that's targeting the wallets of Seniors. Rose Wright is just one of several Seniors who has dealt with a convincing scam that’s recently hit the area. Wright lives a quiet life in retirement, tending to her bird feeders and saying no thank you to sales people and telemarketers. But she let her guard down recently when a caller woke her up very early in the morning. "I was sound asleep and the woman says they are issuing a new Medicare card, and they needed to confirm my information,” Wright said. Wright -- groggy and a bit confused -- asked the caller to identify h...

With accounting-fraud cases at nearly a 10-year low, complacency might be the biggest fraud risk facing chief financial officers. Large fraud-related restatements of corporate earnings reports have fallen sharply since the financial crisis, but that doesn’t mean that companies aren’t still vulnerable to them. “There still is financial-reporting fraud going on out there,” said Andrew Ceresney, the new co-director of the Securities and Exchange Commission’s Division of Enforcement. And the agency is making a concerted push to uncover it. Last week, the SEC announced the formation of a Financial Reporting and Audit Task Force, which it hopes will catch accounting frauds at earlier stages. Of course, companies have made big strides in improving their internal controls since the Enron-era accounting scandals, in part because of the rules imposed by the Sarbanes-Oxley law in 2002. But accounting experts and regulatory officials say there are warning signs that a new round of f...

Forest Lake police say the young women could face charges. The Forest Lake Police Department was called to the Wal-Mart store at... Forest Lake Police  A juvenile and three adults — all sisters — could face charges after staging a phony abduction caught in a bizarre and chilling surveillance video Sunday night at a Wal-Mart store in Forest Lake. The mother of the young women contacted Forest Lake police about 2 p.m. Monday afternoon and reported that the group had perpetrated the prank, which drew intensive media coverage immediately after it was reported to police and the video was distributed as investigators asked for the public’s assistance. After interviewing those involved, and seeing video evidence on their cellphones, it was determined the incident was a prank, said Capt. Greg Weiss of the Forest Lake Police Department. In the video, the car pulls up to the front door of the Wal-Mart in the 200 block of 12th Street SW about 8:30 p.m. Sunday. The trunk pops open...

Brooklyn prosecutors had been scheduled on Monday to open the trial of an Orthodox Jew charged with paying a child to falsely testify that he was a victim of sexual abuse. Enlarge This Image Damon Winter/The New York Times Sam Kellner was charged after helping prosecutors in child sex-abuse cases. Related Gotham: After Sexual Abuse Case, a Hasidic Accuser Is Shunned, Then Indicted  (June 18, 2013) For Hynes, District Attorney Since 1990, Publicity and Campaign Rivals  (June 12, 2013) Connect With NYTMetro Follow us on  Twitter and like us on Facebook  for news and conversation. Enlarge This Image Richard Perry/The New York Times Charles J. Hynes, the Brooklyn district attorney. But in a dramatic reversal, they told the trial judge that their key witness was no longer trustworthy, indicating the potential collapse of a controversial case that highlighted the complicated relationship between District Attorney  Char...

ROCKY MOUNT, N.C. —  Dark sunglasses obscure his eyes. Silver chains hang from his neck. “Hello, I’m the people’s champ,” Larry Hill Jr. says, staring directly into the camera as a woman and two expensive cars pose behind him.    With those words, the Rocky Mount businessman begins his 30-second plea to local youth . “I want all my young people to think before you act. Trouble is too easy to get into, and once you get into trouble, you’ll be all by yourself,” he says in the YouTube clip  posted last November. In another clip, Hill hands out cash to Rocky Mount children as part of his “ Crime Free Summer Good Deeds Contest ” as the words “Stop the violence” flash on the screen. Despite his attempts to dissuade children from trouble, federal authorities say it’s a message Hill hasn't lived by. From February 2010 to October 2012, Hill’s tax business filed hundreds of “ false, fictitious and fraudulent refunds ” for customers, claiming millions in refunds, accor...

Seventeen months after Fox News became briefly fixated on Republican claims that hundreds of dead voters had cast ballots in South Carolina, those allegations have been completely debunked by an investigation by law enforcement that found no evidence of voter fraud. Fox  frequently  pushes  dubious  allegations of widespread  voter  fraud  that  fall  apart  under scrutiny. The South Carolina  "dead voter" claim  sprang from testimony from Kevin Schwedo, the director of the state's Department of Motor Vehicles, who said on January 11, 2012, that more than 950 residents were recorded as having cast a vote after their reported death date. Schwedo  made clear  that this could have been the result of data errors or voters dying after casting an absentee ballot, but the state's Republicans, led by Attorney General Alan Wilson, seized on the report as evidence of widespread voter fraud. Wilson  took his campai...

Randall Sutton, rear, leaves U.S. District Court in St. Louis on July 9, 2013, after pleading guilty to federal charges. Photo by Robert Patrick of the Post-Dispatch (1) More Photos ST. LOUIS  • Two more defendants accused of a role in what prosecutors have called a “Ponzi-like” pre-arranged funeral scam that could cost as much as $600 million pleaded guilty Tuesday to federal charges. National Prearranged Services' former CFO, Randall K. Sutton, 67, of Chesterfield, pleaded guilty of bank fraud, mail fraud, money laundering and insurance fraud charges. The company's former lawyer, Howard A. Wittner, 76, of Chesterfield, pleaded guilty a few hours later to two counts of making false statements intended to deceive insurance regulators and willfully permitting a felon to engage in the business of insurance. Under a plea deal with prosecutors, Sutton faces up to seven years in prison and Wittner faces up to five years in prison. Both men are scheduled to be sent...

5 March 2013 Last updated at 11:04 ET A building was evacuated due to the Great Victoria Street alert A security alert in Belfast city centre has ended and been declared a hoax. The alert started after the discovery of a suspicious object at a building on Great Victoria Street. The building was evacuated and Army bomb disposal officers were sent to examine the object. They declared it a hoax. Read More @ Source The Secret Meeting that Changed Rap Music and Destroyed a Generation? A letter has surfaced claimed to be written by a former music executive who says he witnessed a secret meeting in 1991 where the prison industrial complex encouraged the music industry to promote rap artists who glorify crime with the goal of encouraging listeners to get locked up in prison, so the private prisons could make more money. It's a very interesting read, but unless others come forward and confirm his story, there is no way to ...

Berlusconi's final tax fraud appeal hearing set for July 30 in Share Share this Email Print Related News Berlusconi's final tax fraud appeal hearing set for July 30 9:51am EDT Italy court convicts Berlusconi on sex charges Mon, Jun 24 2013 Italy's Berlusconi faces verdict in underage sex trial Mon, Jun 24 2013 Italy PM sees no impact on government from Berlusconi trials Thu, Jun 20 2013 UPDATE 4-Italy centre-left sweeps local elections Mon, Jun 10 2013 Analysis & Opinion U.S. considers “zero option” for Afghanistan A simple fix for the divisive U.S. corporate tax debate Related Topics World » Italy » By Roberto Landucci ROME  |  Tue Jul 9, 2013 2:19pm EDT (Reuters) - Former Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi's final appeal against a prison term for tax fraud is expected to be heard in court on July 30, much earlier than expected, his lawyers...

A person who called in a hoax about a gunman on the Massachusetts Institute of Technology campus over the weekend said the gunman was a staff member looking for revenge after the suicide of an Internet activist accused of illegally using MIT computers, the institute said. MIT executive vice president Israel Ruiz wrote in a campus-wide email on Wednesday that the caller indicated the gunman "was retaliating against people involved in the suicide of Aaron Swartz," the Boston Herald reported. Ruiz wrote that MIT's president was identified as the target. Swartz killed himself in New York last month while awaiting trial on charges he used MIT's computer network to illegally download nearly 5 million academic articles from an online clearinghouse for scholarly journals. Critics blame federal prosecutors for his suicide, saying they insisted he plead guilty to all 13 felony charges he faced and serve four to six months in prison or go to trial and face up to 35 years...

SANTA CRUZ, Calif. (AP) — The Pacific Ocean either swallowed an adventurous couple and two young children aboard a sailboat off the Monterey coast this week, or someone played a cruel hoax that wasted Coast Guard resources and tugged at the hearts of coastal residents over two days of desperate searching. The Coast Guard on Tuesday called off the search for a boat that reportedly sank in rough seas far off the Central California coast, saying nothing more could be done and that the family's distress calls might have been a hoax. "We've exhausted the possibilities," Coast Guard Chief Petty Officer Mike Lutz said. The Coast Guard is treating the incident as a rescue, with the possibility the calls came from a trickster. Neither the family nor the boat has been reported missing. Crews started looking for the family by sea and air after receiving their first distress call Sunday afternoon, when the boaters said their 29-foot sailboat was taking on water and thei...

Former Notre Dame linebacker Manti Te'o tells ABC-TV host Katie Couric during an interview for "Katie," in New York that he briefly lied about his online girlfriend after discovering she didn't exist. The interview will air on Thursday, Jan. 24. ((AP Photo/Disney-ABC, Lorenzo Bevilaqua) ) The more that the hoax behind Manti Te'o's and his fake girlfiend, "Lennay Kekua," unravels, the more surreal it seems. The Stanford University alumna fell in love with Mr. Te'o, survived a car accident, and died of leukemia months later. Also, she never existed. A Deadspin report from Jan. 16 details inconsistencies in the media about their love story, from when the two met to when exactly she died. Using public records and social media sites, Deadspin revealed that Ms. Kekua was the creation of Ronaiah Tuiasosopo, a former high school quarterback from California who became a religious musician. Since then, Mr. Tuiasosopo has admitted to the...