Nashville Standard

NASHVILLE – United States Attorney Henry C. Leventis for the Middle District of Tennessee joined national, state, local, and Tribal leaders today in recognizing World Elder Abuse Awareness Day (WEAAD). Since 2006, WEAAD has been commemorated to promote awareness and increase understanding of the many forms of elder abuse as well as the resources available to those at risk.

Highlighting the partnership between law enforcement and the public, U.S. Attorney Leventis emphasized the importance of awareness and education.

Elder abuse is an act that knowingly, intentionally, or negligently causes or creates a serious risk of harm to an older person by a family member, caregiver, or other person in a trust relationship. Such harm may be financial, physical, sexual, or psychological. The Justice Department maintains various programs and initiatives to combat elder abuse.

The Transnational Elder Fraud Task Force marshals federal and state agencies working collaboratively to investigate and prosecute foreign-based schemes that target older Americans. In addition to aggressively investigating the individuals, organizations, and networks responsible for these crimes, this initiative provides the public with information to guard against both traditional scams like tech support fraud as well as trending schemes such as romance scams.

Using one scam to perpetrate or conceal another, some fraudsters rely on money mules to move the proceeds of their illegal activity. Preying on the goodwill or financial vulnerability of their targets, scammers recruit people—many times older victims—to participate in schemes to move money in ways that avoid notice. The Money Mule Initiative identifies and addresses money mule activity to disrupt these fraud schemes and helps people recognize and avoid participation in perpetuating fraud.

To help older individuals and their families identify and avoid fraudulent activity, the Justice Department provides Senior Scam Alerts with information about tactics used in specific schemes. For example, in Social Security Administration Impostor schemes, scammers impersonate government administrators and falsely report suspicious activity to request that victims provide their Social Security number for confirmation. In Tech Support scams, fraudsters contact victims through internet pop-up messages warning about non-existent computer problems; they then ask for remote access to identify a non-existent problem before demanding large sums of money for unnecessary services. In Lottery scams, telemarketers falsely notify victims that they have won a sweepstakes but must first pay fees for shipping, insurance customs duties or taxes before claiming their prizes.

The United States Attorney’s Office continues working with its federal state and local law enforcement partners to investigate and prosecute elder abuse crimes. In April 2023 a federal jury convicted a defendant on twelve felony counts related to defrauding an elderly widow of over one million dollars. The defendant tricked the victim into believing he would care for her personally and financially holding himself out as her “personal representative,” “son,” or “godson” while pretending he was acting on her behalf. He defrauded her of approximately $1.2 million using her money for luxury items including purchasing a Lexus GX460 a 4.3-karat diamond ring and a $170000 interest in a pest control business.

Fraud related to nursing homes and worthless services remains a priority for the office which leads the District’s Elder Justice Task Force ensuring coordination across law enforcement agencies on recent scams targeting seniors including AI-generated scams.

To learn more about the department’s elder justice efforts visit the Elder Justice Initiative page.

To report elder fraud contact the dedicated National Elder Fraud Hotline at 1-833-FRAUD-11 (1-833-372-8311) or visit FBI’s IC3 Elder Fraud Complaint Center at IC3.gov.

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