The Greatest Scam Ever

Joey Rosati answered a phone call while shopping at Costco and quickly got wrapped up in one of the most involved phone scams of all time. The best way to avoid being scammed for 10's of thousands of dollars is to learn from other people's mistakes. Joey is tech savvy and skeptical yet he was moments away from sending $10,000 to a man who claimed to the the Sheriff.

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
All right, let's go over tosomebody who I was talking about chatting with.
This is a guy named Joey Rossotti. First of all, Joey,
you're there. You hear us,I'm here, Yeah, there you are,
Okay, I can hear. Joeygot a bunch of attention over the
weekend for something that probably was notsuper fun for him, and on Twitter

(00:20):
his thread started to go viral,and I wanted to bring this to everybody
because sometimes we sit and think we'relike, I'm super smart, like I
would not get caught up in ascam. It could not happen to me,
and it can like it got reallyclose for you. So let's walk
people through this. Joey to goback, you were just walking through Costco.

(00:42):
Right, you were shopping at Costcoand you got a phone call.
Now walk us through what happened walkingthrough Cosco. Man, just like everybody
else. Again, I have acareer where I get calls from random numbers
in the lending space, and you'realways getting phone calls from viduals. Have
to pick it up. Starts withjust Hey, I'm deputy x y Z,

(01:04):
badge number x y Z. Youknow, is this my name?
Located at my address. Again startsoff that the voice is perfect. Man,
it's American, uh Stern. Ilike to call it the you know,
the typical sheriff's voice sounds confident rightout. I mean everybody everybody always
thinks you know a scammers. Nowyou know this overseas call centers and you

(01:26):
can hear them typing in the background. It wasn't like that. Yeah,
So they say we're from the HillsboroughCounty Sheriff's Office. They they got your
name, they got your address.They even read off to you the last
four of your social and they tellyou you're in your trouble right what did
they say you were in trouble for? It was more nuanced than that,
which is why I was really creative. You know. They started soft,

(01:49):
which was, hey, this isa curtsy phone call. We just want
to let you know that, youknow, you missed your Jerry summons.
We have a signature here which yousay that you would be here. Just
wanted to let you know that.You know, the judge is being pretty
particular on this case and really goingafter people who are ditching this and so
you know, we wanted to figureout why you missed it and let you

(02:12):
know that there is a civil penaltyfor doing so and hopefully we can kind
of rectify this. Yeah, andso it's not like, hey, I
want your money. Hey, sureingto jail? And are you responding like
and is it conversational with you?Is an AI or is it actual?
Like you can determine it's a humanthat's scamming you. Definitely a human,

(02:35):
you know, because I immediately wereoff the bat said, you know,
because I'm in Costco. Right,it's a little loud, and I'm like,
all right, can you just youknow, restate your name because you
know, I flip it the speakerphone, I'm googling the name of the
share you know, the name ofthe deputy, because you know, I'm
sitting here like, you know,all right, come on. Was it
not a red flag that the persontold you that they had your signature versus

(03:00):
something like I've been to jury dutyonce or twice and I've never signed something
ahead of time saying that I wouldshow up. So it's been like,
gosh, it's been probably a decadesince I've had dury duty and I don't
And that's probably the big dumb educationhere, which is I don't even remember
what the exact process was. Iremember I got something I didn't remember if

(03:22):
I just sign it or not.I trually did so. They even told
you, they're like, hey,here's the address, come on down and
sort this out with us. Andyou look the address up the addresses the
right address, the sheriff's office inHillsboro County. What's why the hell would
a scammer be telling me go tothe sheriff's office in county? Of course,
you know, it's like, allright, well they're you know,

(03:43):
what's what's the worst that can happen? I walked in and clear it up.
Right at that point, you're startingto believe this is actually an officer.
I might be in some trouble here. But to answer the question,
they had two really good hooks thatwere different than normal. Number one,
they said, hey, we mailedthe letter on April twenty nine, and
they had a specific date, andthat date perfectly matched the week in which

(04:08):
I just moved to a new home. Okay. And then they asked a
question that said, did you happento move recently? Is it possible that
Yeah, it's okay, that's okay. We're on a bunch of radio stations.
So yeah, we'll have to dropthe FS and the SS. But
you're good. So you you thoughtyou thought you sle word? Yeah,

(04:31):
oh crap. And then what man? I just moved. So they clearly
cross reference the database either with mortgagesor with you guys know how this If
you move, you get up abunch of coupons in the mail. Yeah,
there's a public database that shows thatthis is a complex scam. Then
they've got a lot of info.This call center knew what they were doing,

(04:54):
they had the specific data points,they knew exactly when to say it,
how to say it. They slowlybut surely built trust and every single
thing matched. What about the phonenumber that they're calling from? Did you
look up the phone number that theywere dialing you in from? So here's
another very creative thing that they did. So I basically I said exactly that.

(05:14):
I said, Look, I gotto get off the phone. I
had to call my lawyer, youknow, call you back. I said,
just you know who am I callingback to make sure I can get
a hold of you to make theput us up? And they go,
sir, no problem, And theygave me a phone number and said when
you call back, asked for badgenumber X y Z. I asked for

(05:35):
this guy, you know, thesheriff's name. I googled it and that
was the sheriff's number. That wasthe police office number. So what they
did is they were bluffing that Iwasn't going to go off the phone,
and they've bluffed me because of course, I'm thinking, why would they give
me the number of the seriff's department. That's crazy good because if at any
of these points you were just like, fine, I am going to go

(05:56):
to the Sheriff's department, or fine, I am going to hang up and
call back, you would have raninto a wall there. But them being
so confident in that moment, you'relike, well, maybe this is real.
Maybe they'd really have me on thisjury duty thing. Again, this
isn't what look. I got roastedonline. It's been a tough couple of
days here, but I did itfor a greater good. Uh huh.

(06:17):
You know I was with my momand I'm picturing my mom on the phone
instead of me, and she wouldhave one hundred percent paid the money,
right, So did you get toa point in which they well, they
tried to get you to wire moneytransfer money VENMO something like that. Did
that part actually come up? Yes, So about twenty minutes into it,

(06:38):
I was driving to the sheriff's department. I figured why not. I've got
the time, I'm going there.Look, I've got an OCD personality.
I don't let things linger. I'mjust going to go solve it like I'm
innocent. So five minutes until I'mgetting there, the Sheriff's on the phone
basically says, hey, look,I know you're getting close. I'm going
to transfer you to my front deskwho is going to process your payments that

(07:00):
when you walk in, all yourcivil penalty is is cleared. I was
like, oh, I didn't realizethat had a civil penalty already. Look
at this to sign it. Andthey said, oh no, sir,
you know you have to pay afine. And then they transferred me.
And then the person on the phonewas like, we're actually going to divert
you to a federal processing center forpayment. And that's why they lost me
right as soon as they said thepayment. You know, it was never

(07:24):
about payment. It was only aboutdata validation and matching everything for the first
twenty minutes, so they get youlike ninety percent down the field, not
even mentioning money, and then atthe last second they're like, you know
what, you don't even have tobe bothered with coming down to the location
here. We could just take careof this with our payment process. Had
you've fallen for it, do youknow how much you would have paid?

(07:45):
It was forty five hundred dollars forcontempt of court failure to appear. And
in my DMS on Twitter, there'sprobably thirty different people who reached out to
me who are too embarrassed too.And I get it, like, I'm
not criticizing them, they're too embarrassedto publicly state it. People got swindled
for nine hundred dollars all the wayup to twenty thousand dollars. Wow.

(08:09):
I've well known people in my DMSwho are like, hey, you know,
it's really just how embarrassment my wifefell for this, my daughter did.
I had a young girl reach outto me, you know, she
was like, hey, I wasin college and you know, I just
I just wanted to go away.And so the stories are they'll send you
like a Venmo link, they'll sendThey'll send you to multiple different places.

(08:33):
I've seen people like giving me theirstory and super heartbreaking, which is again
why with every story I've read,I'm willing to, you know, talk
this out with you guys and embarrassmyself even more because you know what,
I'm super glad you're doing that,because because people get embarrassed, they don't
share this with other folks, andthen when other people get that same phone

(08:56):
call, they're not prepared, youknow, and that the information is super
important. What were we going tosay? See that? I was curious
if the the people that reached outto you in your dms that have fallen
for this scam, did they indicatethat the scammer was telling a similar story
or were there different ruses that peopleshould be aware of combinations. Majority of

(09:20):
them have the same storyline, butevery one of them had a unique hook.
So my hook was that I hadjust moved. A couple of the
other hooks were that like they hadjust been in a lawsuit, or they're
in the hospital. Well that's postinformation, all this public information. Some
of them what they do again,I give them all the credit world like,

(09:43):
it's brilliant stuff. It's just superunfortunate. They some they'll call your
sibling, leave a voicemail, becausewhat that hooks them for is that when
they get off the when you callthe sibling or something, they say,
yeah, I got a voicemail aboutit. It must be true, right,

(10:03):
So they they're setting these like seedsin so clever. I've had a
couple of deep fake guys reach outto me who stated that, you know,
more than likely the you know,it could have been an overseas call
center, but with deep fake voices. So in other word, I keep
saying this, you have the sheriff'svoice. But it was earnest, it
was stern. It was not youknow, if you guys never you know,

(10:31):
it's it's uh, it's it's verymatter of fact. The crazy thing
is, look like, you're aguy, you know, you get tech,
you're in you're a businessman, you'reyou're young. Imagine how many older
people would just be swabbed this.Yeah, it's going to get them every
time. To be clear, that'sthe exact reason I'm getting made fun of

(10:52):
on a on a minutely basis.But but yes, that's that's the whole
point. That's why I went viralsbecause I'm some old person who doesn't understand
how to turn on an iPhone.Yeah, if I can fall for this,
I have my head on my shoulders. I I'm always looking out for
scams. Hell, I've sorry,No, no, You're okay with that

(11:13):
one. That. Yeah, I'vemade money in in the bitcoin realm.
Who can't take? But I guesswhat I'm saying is I've been like raised
in this world of being on onguard. If it's because my heart rate

(11:37):
was up. Best described that ifthey can get that close to taking like
ten g's from you, they couldthey could get a lot of people.
And I'm glad you came forward toput this out there because that does help
out a lot. And uh,we appreciate you taking the time to hang
out with us. Man, ofcourse, all right, Joey Rissotti over
on Twitter, It's at Risotti Corp. At R O S A T I

(11:58):
C O R P. Just anote for you to tell that story to
your family members, right, otherpeople. The more people that hear this
story, the more they're gonna bea little on edge and more skeptical when
they get that phone call coming in. And I'm glad they didn't get the
money from you, man, samenice. I'm hoping that if this saves

(12:18):
one person. It's all worth itgood. Absolutely all right, Joey,
take it easy. We'll talk toyou. We'll talk to some other time.
There goa goodbye. All right,be careful, folks, they get
clever. Man. I'm gonna actuallycall my parents in a secret number and
try to try to get like tengrand out of them. Uh just wait
till the AI. Did you educateyour parents? And she's like, no,

(12:39):
I got the money. Yeah,I made the most out of this.
R O s at I. Sohe's r O s A t I
co r P. There's a wholeviral. It's got ten million views.
The tweet thread where he explained everythingthat was going on here and what was
happening. Also, iward they toldhim we'll talk to him later. Probably

(13:01):
won't. Yeah, it's probably notgoing to have it going to be what's
part two? Hey, Joey stilldidn't pay the guy money. Joey's in
jail. Actually was it was true? Is that what made you sign up
for jury duty show? That's theultimate twist. I didn't sign up.
They just hit me up. AndI don't want to be like fake Joey

(13:22):
because uh, like I don't wantto get caught up in whatever that would
be if I missed real jury duty. So there you go. There is
his story when we come back,the final dispatches, stories that didn't make
the cut, And today I wantto wrap everything up for a Tuesday that's
coming up next, something the newschunk key