Staff Report
ROCKINGHAM — The Richmond County Sheriff’s Office is warning residents of another wave of jury duty scams.
The RCSO posted the warning to its Facebook page on Oct. 19 — this time involving scammers alleging that the intended victim missed federal jury duty and “must pay immediately to avoid arrest."
The scammers, according to the sheriff’s office, may impersonate deputies, U.S. Marshals or court officials, as well as use real officers’ names, send fake warrants, or use caller ID to make it appear the number comes from a legitimate agency.
“Law enforcement will NEVER contact you by phone about this,” reads the post. “Please remain vigilant!”
RCSO said it had received several complaints on Monday.
The N.C. Attorney General’s Office says that elderly residents are usually the target, “but anyone can be duped by the clever perpetrators” — noting that people have reported being scammed out of “thousands of dollars.”
The penalty for disobeying a jury summons, according to the AG’s office, is $50 each time a juror fails to appear.
The AG’s office offers to following tips to keep from becoming victimized by a jury duty scam:
- In North Carolina, official jury summonses, as well as failure to appear notices, are always delivered to your home or post office box by first class mail.
- Court officials and law enforcement officers never make phone calls to threaten arrest or warn you of an impending arrest for failing to appear for jury service or any other infraction.
- These scam phone calls often occur in the evening, after courthouses have closed and employees have gone home for the night, which should be a red flag.
- Scammers obtain targets’ names, phone numbers, or addresses from phone directories or other public records and often call after working hours because they know they have a better chance of reaching their intended victims.
- Caller ID can be manipulated to appear as a local number or display the name and phone number of any agency or business, so don’t be fooled.
- Scammers often ask for payments of hundreds or thousands of dollars. The actual penalty for disobeying a jury summons is currently $50.00 for each time a juror fails to appear.
- If you have concerns, hang up and look up the courthouse phone number yourself (do not rely on any phone numbers provided by the caller) to verify with the jury coordinator or clerk of superior court’s office if you have, in fact, been summonsed for jury service or failed to appear.
