Scammers may call anyone on the phone, and they particularly find retired people good targets to fool — but they wasted their time in this case.
Lt. Ronald Bussell, commander of the Detective Division until May 31.
Darien Police Lt. Ron Bussell, commander of the Detective Division, has announced his retirement, but it hasn’t taken place yet. He’s scheduled to retire from the department at the end of the month. Bussell said he just recently happened to receive a call from a scammer who seemed to have a new wrinkle in an old kind of scam.
The caller identified himself as being from the “Marshal Service” from somewhere in upstate New York. He said that Bussell had been named in a lawsuit and unless he wired money right away, police would come and arrest him.
“I played with him as long as I could,” Bussell said of the caller.
He didn’t wire any money, and if he was named in a lawsuit, he knew he wouldn’t be asked to wire money immediately. Often the scammers insist that the person stay on the phone as they go to a Walmart, bank or some other location to wire money right away.
Sometimes the caller says he’s from the I.R.S. and money for unpaid taxes must be wired immediately. In some cases, the caller says you’ve won the lottery; in others, that a family member needs to be bonded out of jail or has been kidnapped. People who receive the calls, particularly the elderly, can become so upset that they wire the funds before realizing that it all may be a scam.
But that’s unlikely to happen to the commander of the Detective Division.
Even when he does retire.