BILLINGS - Montana's attorney general warns about elder abuse scams on World Elder Abuse Awareness Day.
A Billings woman avoided some potential elder abuse fraud when she thought she had received a text from her pastor at Shiloh United Methodist Church.
The person had asked her to purchase some gift cards.
She stopped that and along the way learned some lessons that can help others avoid fraud.
It's a plea that could capture anyone.
Judy Frank received a text several years ago from a man she believed was her Pastor asking for gift cards to help a couple that he was supposedly counseling.
So she went to Albertsons and purchased three cards at $100 each.
It was only after she called her Pastor that she realized she had been scammed.
"I say I have your gift certificates for you," Frank said when she called her Pastor. "And he said, gift certificates. I didn't ask for any gift certificates."
Fortunately, Frank was able to return to Albertsons, which helped her cancel the cards.
"I thought I was pretty astute with that sort of thing, but this one really nailed me," Frank said.
That was five years ago.
Her pastor, Tyler Amundson,. is now the executive director of Big Sky Senior Services.
"Elder Abuse takes away people's livelihoods and their lives and causes mental health issues for folks and causes emotional and other kinds of neglect to happen in their lives," Amundson said. "And they receive abuse that they do not deserve."
Amundson spoke at Stockman Bank on Thursday where Montana's Attorney General Austin Knudsen talked about a law passed by the legislature this past session.
It provides liability shielding to banks, credit unions, and financial institutions as they put suspicious transactions on hold.
"They are master manipulators and they're very fast talkers," Knudsen said about the criminals.
Knudsen says criminals are getting even more clever, using artificial intelligence to clone the voices of grandkids and loved ones to make scams targeting the elderly even more believable.
"If you've put a clip of your voice out there on social media or on the internet that can be grabbed now and then replicated within an artificial intelligence," Knudsen said. "And you can make that AI sound like your voice."
As for Judy Frank, she now has her own way of handling those suspicious calls.
"You just say well, I'll call you back," Frank said. "And that takes care of the problem."
And she hopes her story will help others avoid what she experienced.
"These are our most vulnerable," Knudsen said about elderly people. "But these should be our most respected or dignified citizens in the state they've earned that we want to make sure they're protected.
