Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt is asking other states to cooperate in a new federal database that will track scam artists who target military families and try to elude authorities.
“Crooks and scam artists who prey on military families require a particular focus from law enforcement authorities,” Schmidt said. “Kansas law gives our office special authority to go after those who prey on military families, and we are working toward better cooperation with other states and with federal authorities so there is no place to hide.”
He and Kentucky Attorney General Jack Conway, who are co-chairmen of a consumer protection committee for the National Association of Attorneys General, have sent a letter to other states urging them to cooperate with federal authorities on providing information about convictions and judgments.
Schmidt’s office announced the nationwide database, called the Repeat Offenders Against Military Database, or ROAM Database, is available to law enforcement and will include information on civil and criminal enforcement actions against companies and individuals who have victimized military families. According to the letter, scam artists often move from state to state.
“The initial issue this presents is simply identifying who the repeat offenders are,” Schmidt and Conway wrote in their letter, “especially when they may operate under different corporate names.”
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superswagg56 (anonymous) says…
Don't they get enough? Are you saying they can't tell a scam when they see or hear of one? Why should they be protected more than the general public?
vertigo (Jesse Crittenden) replies…
I think it's aimed scammers who specifically target military families. The general public needn't worry about these scammers.
pace (anonymous) says…
Excellent focus, the attorney general's office was in shambles after goofy left. It should be a force to uphold law, not a lawless tool to push political agendas. It needed to focus on frauds and scams, those who pick a population and run their scam. I am sure some of the same tools and focus will be useful on the scammers that focus on the elderly, the ones hit by calamity. and other populations. I hope id theft and and internet crime comes up on their list of interests.
Pywacket (anonymous) says…
It would have been helpful to include information on just what the scam artists are doing so that military families (or anyone) would know to report any contact instead of just deleting the email, hanging up on the phone call, or throwing away the letter---or basically blowing off whatever contact is made, which is what most probably already do.
Because I have a military child (who just returned from deployment), I am contacted frequently by family support personnel--usually volunteer wives and other military family. They email a few times a month and someone calls once a month. The names change, so it's possible I could be contacted and never realize it was a scammer unless I knew what to look out for.
The legit contacts occasionally hold shirt sales or other fund-raising drives. What do the scammers do differently? Do they blatantly ask for your banking info?