Heather Robinson of Deerfield Beach took the call Monday morning because she recognized the lawyer’s name and knew her jailed son needed help.
“The person made like he talked to my son,” she said. Her son had been arrested on a robbery charge and had spent the last four months in jail. Bond is $5,000, but money is tight and she couldn’t scrape it together. The lawyer’s phone call could have been a godsend. Until.
“He told me, ‘For me to represent your son, you need to Zelle me $1,000 right now,’” Robinson recalled. “Right away, I knew it was a scam.”
She was right. It was a scam that has lawyers, the Broward Sheriff’s Office and court administration trying to warn the public to do their homework before sending money to strangers.
“They’re pretending to be cops. They’re pretending to be bondsmen. They’re pretending to be anybody to prey on these vulnerable people and steal their money,” said Bill Gelin, the defense lawyer impersonated in the call to Robinson. “It’s insidious.”
The target is told time is of the essence and they must pay through a banking app or gift cards to speed up the legal process, get a court hearing or bail reduction, and pay for an ankle monitor. After the payment is made, the victim learns their hard-earned money is gone, no court dates have been scheduled and the defendant still doesn’t have a lawyer.
Gelin had previously represented a member of Robinson’s family, coincidentally, so she had already sent him a text message asking for his help. When she heard he was calling, the trust was built in. But something was wrong, Robinson recalled. The voice she heard sounded deeper than she remembered and less formal than what she expected from a lawyer. He didn’t mention the text message.
The request for an immediate payment through Zelle was the last straw. “I’m glad I didn’t send the money,” she said. “I’ll be honest; I almost did.”
The Sun Sentinel called the number Robinson was given. The person who answered it claimed to be Gelin but hung up when asked to provide Gelin’s Florida Bar ID number.
The Broward Sheriff’s Office issued its first public warning about the scam in December, though at the time it was limited to people impersonating law enforcement.
“BSO will never request money over the phone, through Zelle, Cash App, Venmo, gift cards or any other electric transfer service for bail, pretrial programs or the release of an individual from custody,” spokeswoman Miranda Grossman wrote in a letter that has since been posted outside the elevators in the courthouse.
Broward Chief Judge Carol-Lisa Phillips said Wednesday that the scammers are targeting people during desperate times, and those people need to exercise caution.
“You need to do your due diligence,” she said. Hiring a lawyer and arranging for bail is complicated, she said. “It certainly wouldn’t be some attorney calling you out of the blue demanding money.”
The Sheriff’s Office urged victims to contact law enforcement if they believe they have been approached by a scammer. Arrests can be verified at the Broward Sheriff’s Office website, www.sheriff.org, and the contact information for every lawyer in the state is listed on the Florida Bar website, www.flabar.org.
Rafael Olmeda can be reached at rolmeda@sunsentinel.com or 954-356-4457.