Keeping calling my about a pay day loan and thearting to have me arrested if I don't pay it off

I got a call today from an Officer Danny Johnson who stated he was with Prime Investigations and that he was alerting me to a problem involving my name and social security number.  He had the last 4 digits of my social security number and my first name only.  He said if I didn't call him back there would be very serious problems for me.  I have no idea what this is all about.  But he has called twice within an hour of each other.

Got 2 calls on my cell and 1 at work. Identified himself as Jay Williams an investigator from Pennsylvania police trying to get me to settle my payday loan. Heavy thick Indian accent.

Calls here often I tell him off each time who does this creep think he is

Officer Johnson has been calling me on my cell for the last couple of days.  He told me since I wasn't taking his phone calls seriously I would have legal issues against me and that he is only trying to help.  Yeah right!

This person has been calling my job and i don't know who he is.

It's from a man he said he's name was John Foster was going to have me put in jail very soon! Stop this man from calling me! I don't owe for nothing to these people!

I have ofc John Foster calling my job and cell phone. You have the right one. I know this is a SCAM. He is calling from India as he has a very thick accent. I have NEVER had a loan with any company and u wont get a dime from me.

i receive a call from this number saying they where officer with the state police n that i needed to pay for a payday loan i had not even applied for said if i didnt pay up i was going to be charged with # counts of internet fraud when i begin to ask what was the name of the company they told me i was going to be arrested and hung up. be aware there actsence was from india

So this man with a thick Indian accent call me around 11am this morning asking to speak to someone with a different name. I told him he had the wrong number and he then asks for my name. I told him he had the wrong number again and hung up. He call back and says his name is Officer Mike Harris and he is calling about a debt and how this is a legal issue. Again I said you have the wrong number and since he was an "officer" I would like to speak to his supperior. He then said I "am my supperior I then laughed and said no "officer" is superior to anything and hung up. That was the last call until 7:35 this evening I sent it to voicemail but after reading these comments I am now armed with proper info on how to handle these peopl

i recieved a call at 5:55 pm at my place of employment threaten that he federal investigator michael johnson was trying toreslove a payday loan of 495 sating that some one from the investigator of south carolina will pick me up an take legal action to collect but instead of stating my social he stated my fathers during the second call i could hear someone else in the back giggling the gentleman proceed to transfer me to his superviser

"officer Johnson" called me today at my wrkplace with the same s*** they said the was gonna call my job and talk to my manager i was gonna get fired for not paying a payday loan...really officer johnson

Who is using this number?

I waa trying to get a loan and when I talked to them on the phone they told me to send them a money gram for $150.that's when the red flag went off in my head.I had my son look them up on line and found out that theses people were scamming people.so we did not  send  them any money and told  them we know  that  it was a scam.well 2 Weeks after that they started  calling me saying that they  were a officer named T.j. William well we called our local police office and the real officer T.I. William came out and called them back well it's been a week and they have started call me again now my next thing for me is to get  in touch with the  fbi

don't let these b*****ds push you!!!!!! they are full of s***!!!!!!

So it looks like they are using a different number now. Before they were using a 951 number and they have called me from that number as well.

A man purporting to be Officer James Jordan (his accent was so think I could not understand what department he claimed to be with) left a voice mail and said Stephen Kaufman (a name I do not know) used my name for a debt and that obligates me to return the call and repay the debt lest I be implicated in the crime.  He used my first name only, which is the name on my voice mail's outgoing message and left a return number of 718.690.3264.  Ridiculous.

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

An individule using the name Jay Williams called my business looking for one of my employees. He was attempting to collect a bogus debt but claimed to be an employee of the Pennsylvania State Office Of Investigation. It was a total fraud.

i had the same thing happen, he said that he would be there to arrest me in 1 hour. its 2 days later, where are you officer johnson? lol. said would arrest me on 2 accounts, check fraud, and social security fraud.

its a scam dont give out any info......they sit in a building and buy info from creditors to scam us.......

so this guy calls me and tell me that i owe on a payday loan,,,,,im looking really stupid until i remember that i took out a title loan....i also paid it back to them...how do i know....u dont recieve ur title back until u paid them off....so this fake a** officer gonna tell me that he's gonna come and arrest me at 6p either at my home or my job...lmao...i live 30 miles away from my job so how are u gonna be at 2place at 1time....oh...did i tell u i was a process server to...lol...this is hilarious ....im waiting officer harris....while still lmao......