In the Kirov region a taxi driver helped prevent fraud against an 82-year-old pensioner. An elderly woman believed telephone scammers who called her on behalf of her daughter and asked for a large sum of money that she supposedly needed. But the scam courier, who took almost 600 thousand rubles from a gullible victim, was unlucky.

NO 1 NEWS AND VIEWS PLATFORM FOR SANE PEOPLE

As 31-year-old driver Maxim Petrov (name and surname have been changed) said, on December 8 he went on shift as usual. ‘I’ve been taxiing for two years now; I work every day. There are different passengers but this one seemed very suspicious to me. He himself didn’t know where the taxi was ordered,’ Petrov recalls.

According to the driver, the passenger, sitting in the back seat, began to ask: ‘Where are we going? How much time is left?’

‘It was clear that another person had ordered a taxi for him. He mentioned that he worked as a courier and asked to wait for him for 10-15 minutes until he picked up the bag,’ says Petrov.

‘When we arrived at the place, I saw a frightened old woman who, with shaking hands, gave two bags to my passenger. Then the puzzle finally formed in my head that my client was actually a fraudster.’

SHARE OUR STORIES ON SOCIAL MEDIA TO INCREASE AWARENESS

‘As soon as he got into the car, I asked him what was in the bags. And he responded: ‘Bro, don’t worry, there are no drugs there. Possibly money and things.’ I say that I’m not worried that the end point of our trip is the police department, and the doors are blocked,’ Petrov continues.

According to the taxi driver, after these words the passenger began to offer tens of thousands of rubles, just to avoid going to the police. ‘But I told him:

‘Money doesn’t buy happiness, buddy,’ I threatened him not to think about running away during the trip, and dialed 112,’ says the driver. Later I realized that it was a rather reckless act. He could have attacked me. And all the way I was watching in the rearview mirror to see if he was trying to do something.’

At the police department, the car was met by operatives and the courier was detained. As the press service of the regional Ministry of Internal Affairs said they found a package containing 574 thousand rubles.

WE WELCOME READERS’ COMMENTS ON OUR STORIES

During interrogation, the 54-year-old man explained that he worked as a courier for telephone scammers. They called the victims and defrauded them of large sums, and he took the money and transferred it to the accounts that the scammers sent him through the messenger. 

According to the detainee, he got this job based on an advertisement he found on the Internet. For one trip, the courier received 5 thousand rubles. ($60) As the police found out, this was his fourth order.

‘The swindlers extorted money under the guise of providing assistance to relatives who allegedly caused traffic accidents and are now detained.’ According to a representative of the department, on December 8, 2023, a call was received at the home phone of a resident of the Bogorodsky district.

‘The pensioner, it seemed to her, recognized her daughter by the voice on the phone. What followed was a repeatedly described scheme of deception: the unknown person introduced himself as a police officer, began talking about the fictitious accident, and about the possibility for her daughter to avoid criminal prosecution.

THANK YOU STEPHEN (UK) FOR YOUR DONATION

Then the courier arrived to her he was supposed to take the money and then transfer it through an ATM to as yet unidentified persons. The man had previously been convicted of violent acts. The money has been returned to my grandmother.

According to him, the leadership of the regional Ministry of Internal Affairs is now deciding the issue of rewarding a caring taxi driver who helped detain an accomplice of the swindlers. Petrov himself says that he did not do anything unusual, but acted like an ordinary law-abiding citizen who learned about the crime. ‘If he had remained silent, he would have continued to calmly deceive grandparents,’ notes the taxi driver.

THE NUMBER OF STORIES RELATE TO RECEIVED DONATIONS. IF YOU WISH TO HELP CONTACT keyboardcosmetics@gmail.com