Fake marshal scam in Gela: 9,000 euros to release son from prison

Panic and fear have led an elderly man from Gela to fall into the trap of the “fake marshal scam”. A well-studied scam that has already been carried out multiple times in Sicily. The target was an 87-year-old pensioner, contacted by a man with a clear Neapolitan accent. He claimed to be a marshal of the carabinieri, informing the elderly man: “Your son has caused an accident. He hit a woman and has been arrested for vehicular homicide. Your daughter-in-law is also injured and in the hospital. If you want to avoid a lawsuit or your son going to jail, you must pay a bail of nine thousand euros.”

The person who called the pensioner clearly had all the information about him and his relatives to make the story believable. The eighty-seven-year-old, in anguish, immediately tried to contact another family member, who did not answer the phone. The scammer then called back, escalating the threat and telling the elderly man that if the woman hit died, his son would remain in jail.

The victim replied that he did not have money at home, but the scammer proposed an alternative: to hand over whatever he had at home, and a lawyer would come by. The pensioner then collected all the family jewelry and precious items and handed them over to the fake lawyer. When he realized he had been scammed, as he was able to contact his son shortly after, it was already too late. All he could do was report everything to the authorities.