334-539-1655

Another scam about legal issues. Supposedly, they had sent documents about some loan that my husband never got, and they said he received a loan but never payback. What f*cken loan? I wanna see how far they would go. This Jim Strong....was a lawyer, then an associate...big accent...couldn't understand the legal firm he was trying to pronounce...ignore these calls.

They just called and every time I asked a question they put me on hold and got such an attitude. Yeah ok Steven McDONALD, well I suppose I will just wait for the police to show up tomorrow morning.

They called me also I thought something was up,I have never gotten a loan!! To make triple sure I went back a looonggg time on my bank records didnt see what ever it was they were trying to talk about!!

the person that called my was Daniel Smith...

These people tried calling for my husband last night. Needless to say, after my several, and I mean several phone calls cussing them out for this bogus scam...my husband has never had a payday loan...they actually stopped answering the phone. At first I had some woman who was completely ignorant, telling me to prove it in court and kept hanging up on me. Then I finally got some man on the phone who was making very smart comments, even made a pretty lude comment towards me and kept laughing. They had one hell of a night last night having me scream at them off and on for an hour. Such a bunch of crap!!

got a call today from a william conner/connor saying i owed money on a,loan. I never dealt with Alabama nor have I been there. have reported this to the proper authorities. unkown company just he was an attorney.

i live in minnesota some [***] named ben evans demanding money or they are going to send cops to my work by friday. i was trembling do i have any worries here i never had payday loan ...Someone please set my mind at ease not to mention he sounded like a voice recording and could not speak very good english

harrasing phone calls threatening court

This is a scam do not worry! Just ignore this! Hopefully justice will be served

thanks even said they were going to inform my boss the cops would be to my job to get me yeah right for 300 doubt it. had last digits of social to im pissed

they are harrassing me every hour on the hour.......

they just called five times in a row who do i report these guys to

You can contact your local police department and tell them this is an ongoing scam that they can see online
on their computer.

thanks is that what you did? what can they do bout it

i got the same phone call as well

and also got one from an other company last week  and the guy on the other end after i told him that the phone number he was calling from was all over the internet saying it was a scam he told me that he could go on the internet and make me a terrorist if he wanted to

so dont fall into there trap and never admit to owing any thing    because you dont owe them a dime

thank.you everyone

thank.you everyone

Phantom Debt Collectors From India Harass Americans, Demand Money

By BRIAN ROSS (@brianross) , CINDY GALLI and MATTHEW MOSK (@mattmosk)
June 7, 2012

Hundreds of thousands of cash-strapped Americans have been targeted by abusive debt collectors operating out of overseas call centers suspected of links to organized crime in India, law enforcement officials told ABC News.

The calls are part of a massive scam, one that appears to target struggling Americans -- especially those who have gone online to apply for payday loans. Armed with personal information from those pilfered applications, the threatening callers, who claim to be debt collectors poised to initiate legal action, have managed to pry loose millions of dollars from their victims -- even when the victims never owed money in the first place.

"This is what we call a phantom debt collection scam," said Jon Leibowitz, the chairman of the Federal Trade Commission. "It's a very pernicious and innovative new fraud."

Working through call centers in India, the commission estimates that the criminals have dialed at least 2.5 million calls, persuading already cash-strapped victims to send them more than $5 million. Some have reported receiving dozens of calls per hour. They are victims like Cindy Gervais, of New Orleans, who went online for a quick loan when her husband's car was hit by a driver who didn't have insurance.

Even though she paid the loan off, the so-called "phantom" debt collectors with Indian accents began calling to say she still owed money.

He more or less told me that if I didn't pay, they were going to have someone on my doorstep to arrest me," she told ABC News. "And that they were going to contact my place of business, and tell them what kind of person I am."

At first, she said she resisted. Then the calls became more frequent, and started to ring on her cell phone, and at the grocery distribution company where she had worked for 27 years.

"I was more or less was in panic mode because he told me there would be someone before noon at my place of business to arrest me and take me to jail," she said tearfully. "So I agreed to pay him."

After receiving scores of complaints, investigators with the FTC said they began tracking the calls, and following the payments. They alleged the payments led them to a California company run by an Indian-American named Kirit Patel, and that such scams would not be possible without American front men.

"I would say that all roads of this scam, or many of the roads of this scam, lead back to Mr. Patel," said the FTC's Leibowitz.

ABC News tracked Patel for weeks, from the suburbs of San Francisco to Austin, Texas.

Patel refused to talk. But his lawyer, Mark Ellis, said he believes it is far too early to pass judgment on his client. Ellis, a Sacramento-based attorney, told ABC News that Patel was hired for a nominal fee to set up an American shell company, and had no idea what the call centers in India were doing.

"I can tell you, he was as snookered by the people in India as anybody," Ellis said. "He's a 69-year-old man who is nearing his retirement who thought all he had to do was set up some corporations and everything was on the up and up. He's completely dismayed that he has become the lightning rod of this entire problem."

A close friend of Patel's also defended him in a brief interview at his home, saying Patel was not trying to defraud anyone -- he was just an unwitting, bit player in a larger scheme.

"If Mr. Patel was just a cog in the wheel he seems to have been a pretty big cog," Leibowitz said. "It is clear that Patel was integrally involved with this scam."

Leibowitz points to thousands of pages of financial and phone records gathered by the FTC and filed as part of a civil case brought against him in the U.S. District Court in Sacramento last month. When FTC lawyers sought to freeze his assets and prevent his business from continuing to operate, Patel responded by invoking his rights against self-incrimination. His lawyer told ABC News he has had to be careful in how he responds to the allegations in civil court "because there is a potential criminal action," but that Patel maintains the allegations against him are false.

Federal investigators said the phantom debt collection operation that allegedly benefitted from Patel's assistance was one of several that all trace back to the same small town in Western India called Ahmedabad. Callers use technology to make it appear that the calls originate inside the U.S. Victims provided ABC News with recordings of dozens of the calls, and many of the thickly accented callers appear to be reading off a script.

"Subpoenas have been readied, and Monday morning you're going to be picked up from your home," one caller says on a victim's voicemail. "And you have children. Don't worry about your children. We have a childcare department to take care of the children."

"You will be behind bars for six months," said another caller. "And once you go behind bars, you will lose your job. Once you are behind the bars, you won't get a single drop of water."

William Peerce Howard, a Tampa attorney who represents victims of harassment from debt collectors, said it takes an especially twisted criminal to use threats and coercion to pry money from someone who is already struggling financially

"These guys really are the most visible villains in America today," he said. "They make a living scaring people."

Mark Merola, of Florida, said he just panicked when the caller told him he might be arrested at the deli where he works in a Florida retirement community.

"I was nervous. I didn't want to embarrass myself, my family," he said. He used his debit card to pay the collector $576.

Afterwards, he says he realized "how stupid I was."

"It just happened so fast," he said. "I got scared."

Leibowitz said he hopes with more attention, future potential targets of the scam will recognize red flags before they turn over any money.

If callers say they are from the police, consumers should know that law enforcement officers do not collect debt for private parties. If the caller is speaking with a thick Indian accent, but calls themselves by a names such as Officer Mike Johnson, that should be a tip off. And if they're calling 40 times in two hours, that's another red flag. "Legitimate debt collectors, legitimate pay day lenders don't do those sorts of things," he said.

Merola said he would like to see anyone involved in the scam prosecuted aggressively.

"There's no place in society for these people," he said.

http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/phantom-debt-co ... 16512428&page=2

These ignorant [***] are full of [***] trying to scam u out of money. If they were legit they by law cannot talk to people the way they do as that is enough for u to get the debt revoked. So any legit company would know that if they were real debt collectors. Maybe the forgein [***] should brush up on U.S. laws before placing calls. Cuz they r def. breaking a lot of U.S. laws minus the fact they r just scammers!!!!

The same peple called me and said I had a loan deposited into my suntrust account before june of 2012. First off my account wasnt opened berfore june and then when I asked how much was put in he couldnt give me a dollar amount. Then he said someone would be coming to my job tomorrow to serve me and pick me up. These folks aint got nothing better to do with their time. When I first started getting these calls last year I was nicked, scared as hell but after seeing that each time they stated that they were gonna pick me up and I never got picked up and then knowing that money was never put into my account then I caught on to the games and just had a smart comment for everyone that called me from then on. Dont feed into it and dont offer any information.