- A 77-year-old US man lost Rs 3.7 crore in a phishing scam within two days
- He was deceived by scammers posing as PayPal and IRS agents using fake emails
- The victim wired $300,000 for gold and withdrew another $90,000 from his bank
A 77-year-old US man lost his entire retirement savings of Rs 3.7 crore ($390,000) in just two days after falling victim to a phishing scam that began with a fake email. Jeffrey Maas and his wife had plans for European trips and cruises, but it all unravelled on June 5, 2024, when he received a bogus email about a $691 Norton antivirus charge. Concerned about the charge, Maas called the helpline number listed. A scammer posing as a PayPal agent named "Jason Green" tricked Maas into filling out an online form under the guise of processing a refund, initiating a financial fraud that both his bank and a local coin dealer failed to prevent.
After Maas complied by providing his bank name and account digits, the scammer also instantly gained remote access to his computer, according to a report in Business Insider. Green then told Maas he had accidentally deposited $300,000 into his account and showed him a falsified PNC bank statement as proof.
A second scammer called to warn that returning the money improperly would trigger IRS penalties. The solution, they said, was gold. On the same day, Maas walked into his regular PNC branch in West Orange and wired $300,000 to American Coin and Stamp Co. in Clifton. He drove to pick up the gold himself while remaining on an open phone line with the scammer the entire time.
He returned home and handed the coins through a car window to a man in a black Nissan. The next day, he went back to PNC and withdrew another $90,000 after Green tricked him with a reward form. In a lawsuit filed by Maas in Essex County Superior Court against the bank and American Coin, he alleged that the bank staff guided Maas through both transactions without asking a single question about why he was draining his savings to buy gold and who he was talking to on the phone throughout the transaction.
"He did not ask why Mr Maas was on a call during the entire interaction or who was on the other end of the call. He did not try to assess if Mr Maas was being unduly influenced," the complaint stated.
Maas has also sued a Pennsylvanian named Jaynesh Patel, who is alleged to have retrieved hundreds of thousands of dollars' worth of gold from Maas. Patel has been indicted on charges of conspiracy and second-degree theft by deception.
