I have multiple calls on a daily basis from a man with a thick middle eastern accent claiming to be LAPD..(don't know anyone in Callifornia) Michael Spencer, Michael Brown, James Arnett..it's ridiculous. One time they called me twelve times in succession. My father died 3 months ago and my mother has copd and congestive heart failure. She injured her hip answering one of these phone calls. Each time they tell me to get my attorney of record, (don't have one and never needed one) and each time they tell me there are charges pressed against me in another state. (Never broke the law anywhere) So of course, I know it's a scam, the only problem is, I can't get them to stop calling me. YEs, I made the mistake of inquiring about payday loans online. Who knew? What I did do was close my account so these jokers can't get anything from me. Now I need to know what to do to stop them and why no one else has

I got a call. When I stood up to him, he began cursing at me. I want these guys stopped.

someone is selling the information provided to payday loan companies to these guys. They are horrible and keep threatening us with the fbi and a whole bumnch of cahrges. contact local law inforcement if they continue! They are a huge scam!!

these people are frauds they say that it is about a pay day loan that I never recieved or wanted for that matter. they have the last four of your social and the last four of your bank account. wrong last four of account for me and threaten you with jail and loss of job and all other kinds of charges. they are not for real! Please do not give them your money! Best part is the account info they say they have I only opened in march and they are trying to say that the payday loan was deposited into my account in January! lol the bank is aware of this and so are the police now! I had an attorney friend of mine contact them and I lkistened in the guy who says he is brian oliver almost died right there on the phone! This was on fox news last night! (6-20-2012) My husband has been getting calls like this too. Yesterday they said the FBI would be at his work to arrest him today. I told him to make sure the FBI drove my car home lol.

I got a call from this number it was an man with an accent stating that he wanted my attorneys info and that I would have bad luck if he didn't get the number! He also said there was an legal case under my name. I explained that I have no idea what he was speaking of and asked for details. He said "oh you don't know that someone is suing you?!" I told him that I was going to report him to the police ASAP and he hung up.

This evening a man named Jason Brown with a heavy arabian accent left a message at my job saying that he was calling from a attorneys office and that I needed to call him ASAP!!! I *67 the number first and it stayed busy...but when i unblocked my number it would ring. That's what  made me know that this is a scam. I called one last time and man picked and tried to disguise his voice as a woman named Jennifer.

I to recieved these calls.  Immediately after gettin off the phone i call courts houses to confirm and ofcourse it was all nonsense.  I then contacted the attorny generals office and filed a complaint. I do not like how he knew my name social security number email address and even bank account number. It seems like we may be victims of identity theft.

I got a call sayin I owed a company money and was goin 2 b but in jail

Received this call today with threats of being arrested, I didn't take out a payday loan that they are insisting that I took out! I yelled back at the man on the phone and told him that he was harrassing and I would be contacting the BBB about them.

they keep calling me and then told me I am getting picked up by the cops cuz i took out a loan and didnt pay them

they keep calling me and then told me I am getting picked up by the cops cuz i took out a loan and didnt pay them.

Yes, yes, yes.  I have received several phone calls from these very annoying people, posing as a law firm and claiming that I have 48 hours to get an attorney before they sue me.  Oh, and I'm supposed to be appearing before a judge.  The caller accent was so thick that you couldn't understand the name of the so called firm he was calling from.  When I told him he was a liar , he screamed at me and hung up the phone.

Officer tony Abraham who barely spoke good English  630-780-5105 #505

Instructed to go to Walmart get a green dot money pack . To send money and they would put case on hold . I could only record part of the conversation . I encourage everyone to do the same.  By noon tomorrow okie dokie .......

total BS, play along though cause its a good laugh

at 2:57 pm got a voicemail saying I needed to call this number 630-780-5105 back and that I was facing criminal charges I called them back and the guy told me I had criminal charges pending when I asked why he said you don't know I said no so he said hold a minute then a supposed paralegal came on and told me I was going to be arrested tomorrow for fraud I said why she told me I took out payday loans and didn't pay them  back  I said no I didn't give me the acct numbers and dates she even gave me a bank none of this was my info I hung up what a horrible thing to do

Im in PR and I have paid $200 first time but when I searched to vreify the phone number it seems I found all this comments. The second phone call was today, 14-June-12, and I ask more to the person who called me:  name, company and phone number. When I told I received same call 2 weeks ago he hangedup! How and Why this people have our presonal informatio???

This is A sCAm......!!!

i got two calls from this number, very thick accent telling me that i would lose my job and asking if i had an attorney. I told him that i knew it was fraud and a scam and that i was reporting them. he immediately hung up!!!

Yea I just got this call today... and i just went with him and told him that i never took one out because I never have...!!! how do they even get your number? and he said something about they have my social....

Just got a call from this number today. Was a man with a very heavy Indian accent who left a message saying not to disregard the message and to call right away. When I called he said I have three judgements against me for criminal charges to do with banking frauds. Said I took a payday loan from us cash net and never paid it back, which is a bunch of bull. Said that I owe $986 and if I don't pay then I will be arrested and taken to court which then I would owe $8489. Told him they are crazy never took any loan with them and that I won't be giving them any money. The man's name was Mark S. Said he works for a law firm but won't give me a company name.

I have recieved these phone call for over 2 years now, on and off.....It is really annoying.  Do NOT give them money they are not real debt collectors.  I have asked them several times to verify the debt and each time they say NO because they don't have to until I pay, lol.  So I say "Who is the debt from" and they tell me something different very often and a different amount.  I think they really need to be arressted and pay us for harrassment, suffering, etc.  I really feel sorry for the people who believe them and pay them.  I hope someone does something about this soon.

A person by the name of Jeff Murphy called my work number. I want this harassment stopped. I don't know how he got my work number

Just got about 20 calls in a row from this number, same thing as described above, a man with a thick accent.  I already knew it was scam call, played along for a minute with him, and then told him I already knew it was a scam call and he hung up immediately.  Wow, I would love to meet these people in person...

number keeps harrasing me

He was:

Phantom Debt Collectors From India Harass Americans, Demand Money

By BRIAN ROSS (@brianross) , CINDY GALLI and MATTHEW MOSK (@mattmosk)
June 7, 2012

Hundreds of thousands of cash-strapped Americans have been targeted by abusive debt collectors operating out of overseas call centers suspected of links to organized crime in India, law enforcement officials told ABC News.

The calls are part of a massive scam, one that appears to target struggling Americans -- especially those who have gone online to apply for payday loans. Armed with personal information from those pilfered applications, the threatening callers, who claim to be debt collectors poised to initiate legal action, have managed to pry loose millions of dollars from their victims -- even when the victims never owed money in the first place.

"This is what we call a phantom debt collection scam," said Jon Leibowitz, the chairman of the Federal Trade Commission. "It's a very pernicious and innovative new fraud."

Working through call centers in India, the commission estimates that the criminals have dialed at least 2.5 million calls, persuading already cash-strapped victims to send them more than $5 million. Some have reported receiving dozens of calls per hour. They are victims like Cindy Gervais, of New Orleans, who went online for a quick loan when her husband's car was hit by a driver who didn't have insurance.

Even though she paid the loan off, the so-called "phantom" debt collectors with Indian accents began calling to say she still owed money.

He more or less told me that if I didn't pay, they were going to have someone on my doorstep to arrest me," she told ABC News. "And that they were going to contact my place of business, and tell them what kind of person I am."

At first, she said she resisted. Then the calls became more frequent, and started to ring on her cell phone, and at the grocery distribution company where she had worked for 27 years.

"I was more or less was in panic mode because he told me there would be someone before noon at my place of business to arrest me and take me to jail," she said tearfully. "So I agreed to pay him."

After receiving scores of complaints, investigators with the FTC said they began tracking the calls, and following the payments. They alleged the payments led them to a California company run by an Indian-American named Kirit Patel, and that such scams would not be possible without American front men.

"I would say that all roads of this scam, or many of the roads of this scam, lead back to Mr. Patel," said the FTC's Leibowitz.

ABC News tracked Patel for weeks, from the suburbs of San Francisco to Austin, Texas.

Patel refused to talk. But his lawyer, Mark Ellis, said he believes it is far too early to pass judgment on his client. Ellis, a Sacramento-based attorney, told ABC News that Patel was hired for a nominal fee to set up an American shell company, and had no idea what the call centers in India were doing.

"I can tell you, he was as snookered by the people in India as anybody," Ellis said. "He's a 69-year-old man who is nearing his retirement who thought all he had to do was set up some corporations and everything was on the up and up. He's completely dismayed that he has become the lightning rod of this entire problem."

A close friend of Patel's also defended him in a brief interview at his home, saying Patel was not trying to defraud anyone -- he was just an unwitting, bit player in a larger scheme.

"If Mr. Patel was just a cog in the wheel he seems to have been a pretty big cog," Leibowitz said. "It is clear that Patel was integrally involved with this scam."

Leibowitz points to thousands of pages of financial and phone records gathered by the FTC and filed as part of a civil case brought against him in the U.S. District Court in Sacramento last month. When FTC lawyers sought to freeze his assets and prevent his business from continuing to operate, Patel responded by invoking his rights against self-incrimination. His lawyer told ABC News he has had to be careful in how he responds to the allegations in civil court "because there is a potential criminal action," but that Patel maintains the allegations against him are false.

Federal investigators said the phantom debt collection operation that allegedly benefitted from Patel's assistance was one of several that all trace back to the same small town in Western India called Ahmedabad. Callers use technology to make it appear that the calls originate inside the U.S. Victims provided ABC News with recordings of dozens of the calls, and many of the thickly accented callers appear to be reading off a script.

"Subpoenas have been readied, and Monday morning you're going to be picked up from your home," one caller says on a victim's voicemail. "And you have children. Don't worry about your children. We have a childcare department to take care of the children."

"You will be behind bars for six months," said another caller. "And once you go behind bars, you will lose your job. Once you are behind the bars, you won't get a single drop of water."

William Peerce Howard, a Tampa attorney who represents victims of harassment from debt collectors, said it takes an especially twisted criminal to use threats and coercion to pry money from someone who is already struggling financially

"These guys really are the most visible villains in America today," he said. "They make a living scaring people."

Mark Merola, of Florida, said he just panicked when the caller told him he might be arrested at the deli where he works in a Florida retirement community.

"I was nervous. I didn't want to embarrass myself, my family," he said. He used his debit card to pay the collector $576.

Afterwards, he says he realized "how stupid I was."

"It just happened so fast," he said. "I got scared."

Leibowitz said he hopes with more attention, future potential targets of the scam will recognize red flags before they turn over any money.

If callers say they are from the police, consumers should know that law enforcement officers do not collect debt for private parties. If the caller is speaking with a thick Indian accent, but calls themselves by a names such as Officer Mike Johnson, that should be a tip off. And if they're calling 40 times in two hours, that's another red flag. "Legitimate debt collectors, legitimate pay day lenders don't do those sorts of things," he said.

Merola said he would like to see anyone involved in the scam prosecuted aggressively.

"There's no place in society for these people," he said.

http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/phantom-debt-co ... 16512428&page=2

I got a call from an Iraqi sounding man stating that my husband has criminal charges pending in regards to online loans? A few weeks back, we received similar calls from different numbers. I do not know the company name since he had a strong accent. It sounded as if he was reading from a script. They wanted us to set up a payment plan and they wanted our debit card number.