Victims Are Falling Prey to Gold Bar Scams: Learn How to Protect Yourself From This Fraud
People are losing hundreds of thousands of dollars of their life savings in easy-to-fall-for schemes
Concern continues to rise as people are being targeted by scammers—especially those in their older years with potentially large life savings. Most recently, five people have been arrested on charges of stealing at least $8 million from older victims by way of a tech support scam spanning ten states, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Missouri said Monday. Some of that money was swindled in the form of gold bars.
Victims like one 82-year-old Missouri resident targeted
Dariona Lambert, 22, Zhamoniq Stevens, 23, Chintankumar Parekh, 51, Mehul Darji, 41, and Sital Singh, 42, were each charged in a new superseding indictment with one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, the district attorney’s office said. Singh surrendered Monday in Newark, N.J., while Parekh and Darji were arrested last week in Michigan. Lambert and Stevens were previously arrested on the initial indictment in June and pleaded not guilty.
The indictment notes the conspirators contacted older victims through telephone calls and electronic messages, falsely claiming that the victims’ savings and retirement accounts had been compromised, the district attorney’s office said. They told their victims to transfer funds to the conspirators to keep their accounts secure, the report says.
In some of these cases, gold bars were bought by victims and then picked up by couriers working for the accused, the indictment says. Couriers worked with a designated “handler,” who arranged transportation for the couriers and shipped the gold bars to others.
An 82-year-old St. Louis woman was one of the victims, who said scammers approached her pretending to be from a computer software support team and falsely claimed that her financial accounts had been compromised. They directed her to pay money to prevent her funds from being stolen, open new bank accounts, transfer her money into those accounts and wire money overseas, in addition to buying about $250,000 worth of gold bars.
On May 1, 2024, Lambert reportedly flew from Gainesville, Florida to St. Louis. Parekh then rented a car and drove Lambert to a parking lot near the victim’s home, and the former took an Uber to the victim’s home to retrieve the gold bars.
At this point, Lambert was met by law enforcement agents and sent a warning message to her partners to alert them to the police presence.
Lambert and Stevens were carriers and were paid in cash, the indictment says, while Parekh, Darji and Singh were handlers who traveled to the victims’ residences in order to pick up gold bars. The group divided to target victims across Arizona, California, Florida, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Texas, Wisconsin, Massachusetts, New York and Ohio.
A motion seeking to have Parekh and Darji held in jail until trial says both are in the United States unlawfully, as Parekh overstayed his work visa and Darji was removed from the country in 2014. When Parekh was alerted by Lambert that she had been apprehended by the police, he fled Missouri for Pennsylvania.
The wire fraud conspiracy charge carries a penalty of up to 30 years in prison, a $1 million fine or both prison and a fine.
How to avoid gold bar and other financial scams
“This case is another example of the FBI being able to stop the scam before a victim gets robbed out of his or her life savings,” said Special Agent in Charge Ashley T. Johnson of the FBI St. Louis Division. “We’ve been successful in protecting victims when family members, friends or businesses become suspicious and immediately notify the FBI in time for us to intervene.”
The DA’s office encourages anyone who suspects they may be or know a victim of a cyber scam to report it to the FBI. You can file the complaint online with the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center at www.ic3.gov or use 1-800-CALL-FBI.
“Many scams use a false sense of urgency to get people to panic and act without taking a moment to think,” explains Julie Beckham, AVP/Financial Education Development & Strategy Officer at Rockland Trust Bank. “I recommend slowing down by reminding yourself, ‘1,2,3—let me see.’”
Your bank will communicate with you if there is suspected fraud or your security is compromised, Beckham notes, but they will not pressure you to transfer funds or take other actions quickly or resort to scare tactics. In fact, in nearly all cases, a bank will not call you directly unless you initiate contact first. If you suspect you’re communicating with a scammer on the phone, you should hang up immediately.
“It’s better to be safe than sorry, so call your bank directly using a trusted phone number or visit a branch in person if any communication with someone claiming to represent your bank makes you feel uneasy,” says Beckham.
You should also be wary of any links sent to you via text message that claim to be from a bank, she adds. Instead of clicking links in an email or text message, go directly to your bank’s verified website or app to review any important account information.
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