According to Salem Walmart Human Resources Director Brad Gilbert, a scam is circulating around Salem.
“We’ve had two people who have come in to purchase a Green Dot gift card to send to an attorney in order to get their grandchildren out of jail,” said Gilbert.
Apparently, someone is calling residents in Washington County and preying on the elderly, telling them a grandchild is in jail and needs bail money.
The person pretends to be an attorney and asks the grandparents to go to Walmart and purchase a Green Dot gift card and either call back with the account information or asking them to wire the money to an account.
“They ask to either load the card or a Walmart gift card with funds or to wire the money to another Walmart store,” said Gilbert.
Gilbert said two people tried to purchase funds from the local store yesterday to send to the fictitious attorney.
“We have an assistant manager who is a former police officer and he talked to the people and said, hey, let’s call where they say your grandson is in jail and see what’s going on. You don’t wire money to an attorney who’s waiting for it. Thankfully they caught it in time,” said Gilbert.
Gilbert said similar scams have been tried in other communities, but felt it was being tried in Washington County since there is a Walmart located here now.
If anyone gets a suspicious call, please call the Washington County Sheriff’s Department at 812.883.2834.
“At this time of year (or anytime) we don’t want anybody in our community to be taken advantage of,” said Gilbert. “These people are preying on peoples’ concerns for their grandchildren.”
