949-272-3902

A consumer who posted reports on 800Notes about being harassed by scammers calling from 856-831-0640 notes that he is now getting the same scam calls from 904-425-2857, and was directed to call 949-272-3902. (See https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-856-831-0640/5 )

If you receive a call from someone using 949-272-3902 who demands money from you, please know that it's a scam and that their threats are false and illegal.  This is a very active group of scammers, many of whom are calling from outside the United States. They attempt to extort money from consumers with a myriad of false and illegal threats, and alternately pose as debt collectors, federal and state law enforcement officers, lawyers and bankers. They use any number of phony names such as US National Bank, Federal Investigation Bureau, US Legal Investigation Bureau, Hopkins Law Office, United Legal Processing, Morgan Associates, United Pay Services, National Processing, White Collar Crime Unit and many more.  This group of crooks use many phone numbers from many area codes; they're probably using caller-id spoofing software and/or VoIP to disguise their real location.

There are some reports on 800Notes that have suggested that the crooks behind this offshore scam are also the crooks behind the notorious Bass Prelitigation/Ellis Crosby & Assoc./States Predisposition scams in Jacksonville, Florida and Georgia. The interesting thing is that the number of complaints on 800Notes about the US National Bank/US Legal Investigation/Federal Investigation scam skyrocketed *after* the state of Florida obtained a $1.3 million judgment against Ted Ellis Crosby, shutdown his operations and barred him from ever conducting debt collections in Florida. (Read http://myfloridalegal.com/newsrel.nsf/newsrel ... 5257424005858A6 )

The main thing to remember is that anytime someone calls you demanding money to prevent your arrest, it is ALWAYS a scam. No debt collector (let alone criminals posing as debt collectors) have the authority to have anyone arrested for anything. (And it's illegal to them to threaten such a thing; it's also illegal for them to falsely threaten you with lawsuits.) And since these dirtbags routinely impersonate law enforcement (which is also illegal), it's also important to remember that American law enforcement officers aren't in the business of debt collection.  (Debt is a civil, not a criminal, matter.)

The bottom line is, these are criminals trying to steal your money. If you've received such calls from 904-425-2857, I suggest you do all the following (most of which you can do online):

1) The U.S. Secret Service is responsible for protecting the country's financial infrastructure and payment systems from international and domestic threats. Call or write your local Secret Service field office to alert them to the details of this attempted extortion. The addresses and phone numbers for the local Secret Service field offices are listed at http://www.secretservice.gov/field_offices.shtml or in your phone book.

2) Alert the FBI at https://tips.fbi.gov  Be sure to tell the FBI that you are being targeted by extortionists over the phone who are posing as federal law enforcement. Be sure to give as many details as you can.

3) Since this is a California number, file a complaint with California Department of Consumer Affairs at http://www.dca.ca.gov/about_dca/contactus.shtml

4) File a complaint with your local police. Most police departments will take a report over the phone.  Be sure to tell them that you're being targeted by an extortionist and give them all the details.

5) File a complaint your state's attorney general, the contact information for whom is at www.naag.org

6) File a complaint online with The Federal Trade Commission at https://rn.ftc.gov/pls/dod/wsolcq$.startup?Z_ORG_CODE=PU01

If these crooks call back, promise them nothing, pay them nothing and tell them nothing other than that you know they're a scam and that you've reported them to law enforcement. (And be sure to report them to all the agencies above each time they call you.)

Finally, here's just a small sample of numbers used by this particular group of scammers. Read the reports and you'll see the same pattern time and again -- phony organization names, thick foreign accents, and oddly worded threats that are so melodramatic and ridiculous that it's laughable:

https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-925-262-1327
https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-678-954-6346
https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-888-341-4004
https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-856-831-0640
https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-949-743-1140
https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-410-505-8128
https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-917-464-2534
https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-210-858-6602
https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-888-775-2121
https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-949-743-1156
https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-214-245-1402
https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-214-245-0922
https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-214-723-5572

Hope this helps.

Update:

A consumer posting a complaint about these same scammers at https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-718-831-7157 notes that 718-831-7157 is associated with an India-based "outsourcing" telephone bank.  Though a reverse search on WhitePages.com shows that 718-831-7157 is an unlisted land line in New York City, information on Debtbuyers.Com shows that that number is used by India-based Intellisourze. (Source: http://www.debtbuyers.com/debtbuyers.asp ) My guess is that it's a VoIP phone number.

This is another piece of the puzzle that fits in perfectly with other information about this scam. There are some reports on 800Notes that have suggested that the crooks behind this offshore scam are also the crooks behind the notorious Bass/Ellis Crosby & Assoc./States Predisposition scams in Florida and Georgia. The interesting thing is that the number of complaints on here about the US National Bank/US Legal Investigation/Federal Investigation scam skyrocketed *after* April 7, 2008 when Florida obtained a $1.3 million judgment against Ted Ellis Crosby, shutdown his operations and barred him from ever conducting debt collections in Florida (Read http://myfloridalegal.com/newsrel.nsf/newsrel ... 5257424005858A6 ) There's certainly a good chance that the crooks placing these calls from India are doing so on behalf of the American crooks behind the Crosby/Bass/States Predisposition scams.

Here's the contact information for the phone bank in India:

IntellisOurzE BPO
701, Sapphier, Nr. Cargo Motors,
C.G. Road Navrangpura,
Ahmedabad - 9. (Guj.) INDIA.
E-Mail: info@intellisourze.com
Website: www.intellisourze.com

A check on the domain name "intellisourze.com" shows that the website and name registration was created on May 8, just one month *after* the Crosby scams were shut down in Florida:

Domain Name: INTELLISOURZE.COM
Registrant:  Pragra Infratech Pvt. Limited.
Email:  ankur.ranpariya@pragra.com    
908, Aksaht Tower, Nr. ICICI Bank
Opp. Rajpath Club, S.G. Highway
Ahmedabad, Gujarat, India 380054
Tel. +91.7926871353
Creation Date: 08-May-2008
Expiration Date: 08-May-2009
Domain servers in listed order: ns5.znetindia.com ns4.znetindia.com
(Source: http://whois.domaintools.com/intellisourze.com )

Though scam calls from these crooks have been going on long before May 8, the frequency of complaints about these calls increased considerably after Crosby was shut down in early April.

This is conjecture, but appearances suggest that Crosby and company were originally running a two-pronged payday loan scam operation -- with some calls being made from Jacksonville, Florida and other calls being made from a phone bank in India (and possibly other countries); then, after the Florida Attorney General shut down the Crosby scams in Florida, the Crosby crooks transferred most of their scam efforts to the India phone bank.

If you are targeted by these criminals, be sure to report them to all the following federal and state law enforcement agencies (most of which you can do online or over the phone):

1) The U.S. Secret Service is responsible for protecting the country's financial infrastructure and payment systems from international and domestic threats. Call or write your local Secret Service field office to alert them to the details of this attempted extortion. The addresses and phone numbers for the local Secret Service field offices are listed at http://www.secretservice.gov/field_offices.shtml or in your phone book.

2) Alert the FBI at https://tips.fbi.gov  Be sure to tell the FBI that you are being targeted by extortionists over the phone who are posing as federal law enforcement. Be sure to give as many details as you can.

3) File a complaint with your local police. Most police departments will take a report over the phone.  Be sure to tell them that you're being targeted by an extortionist and give them all the details.

4) File a complaint your state's attorney general, the contact information for whom is at www.naag.org

5) File a complaint online with The Federal Trade Commission at https://rn.ftc.gov/pls/dod/wsolcq$.startup?Z_ORG_CODE=PU01

If these crooks call back, promise them nothing, pay them nothing and tell them nothing other than that you know they're a scam and that you've reported them to law enforcement. (And be sure to report them to all the agencies above each time they call you.)

By the way, here's just a small sample of numbers used by this particular group of scammers. Read the reports and you'll see the same pattern time and again -- phony organization names, thick foreign accents, and oddly worded threats that are so melodramatic and ridiculous that it's laughable:

https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-925-262-1327
https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-678-954-6346
https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-888-341-4004
https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-856-831-0640
https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-949-743-1140
https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-410-505-8128
https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-917-464-2534
https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-210-858-6602
https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-888-775-2121
https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-949-743-1156
https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-214-245-1402
https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-214-245-0922
https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-214-723-5572
https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-904-425-2863
https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-718-831-7157

To whom it may concern;
I am being harassed by a company claiming that I owe them money for a payday loan. He was an Hindu man name John, then he said his name was Jason.  Claiming to work for the legal affidavit department of US National bank on behalf of Cash Advance.  He was very difficult to understand. He had my personal details such as last 4 numbers of my social security number and my bank name and last 4 numbers of my account.

He said that I took a $300.00 payday loan in 2007.  He said that I owed $5000.00 but he would talk to his Lawyer, Jack Robert, to reduce the amount if it was true that I did not intentionally default on the loan.  Then he did the lower it to $1285.00 and he said that he needed it today with a letter of apology and within an hour of hour phone call and that matter would be resolved.  He said if I didn't that I would need to get an attorney because I would be arrested if I did not comply with his demand for money.

Instead of being back into a corner I decided to see if I could find any information about US National Bank on the internet and found instead websites discussing this being a scam.  
The phone number calling me  949-272-3908, his fax number is 949-272-5831.

ABC News just did an investigative piece on this particular scam operation. Here's the report:  http://abcnews.go.com/Business/story?id=5621205&page=1

Called posing as Peoples Bank rep asking to do a refinance. Gladly hung up on them