I need some help with ideas on how to give this lowlife what he/she deserves.
On Wednesday I got a call from the Discover Fraud unit, who informed me that someone had purchased airline tickets using my credit card. After conversations with both Discover and the merchant (CheapTickets.com), it appears as if someone purchased two tickets DC to LA, one in my name and one in theirs. They had my correct credit card info and address. They provided working phone numbers (not mine, and probably not theirs either). The outbound flight departed Wednesday night and mystery traveler checked in but I did not (obviously).
This person has a return flight on Sunday August 3rd. That means that there is a good chance that we know the exact time and place this person will show up. Neither Discover nor the Chicago police seem to have much interest in catching this person. They seem content to let them fly back to DC where they can go on about their business of defrauding other folks.
Now, I know that this whole thing is not really inconveniencing me. It’s not like I was mugged or robbed and the worst part is having to wait 4 days for a replacement card to be delivered. But I can’t shake my immense feelings of pissed offedness- both at the thief as well as at the ‘Authorities’ for not giving a damn. I understand that they may think it’s not economically worth it to remove a teaspoon of wrongdoing from the flood of fraud they must see everyday. But how many times do they get the opportunity to have someone essentially present him or herself for arrest?
So while other may be apathetic about the situation, I do not wish to be. What can I do to give this person the justice they deserve? I’m open to suggestions on both societally condoned action (police, judicial system, etc) as well as pseudo-vigilantism (nothing physical like a beating, but I’m certainly not against causing them some emotional or financial distress).
While I would never actually do it, I’ve been having ‘thought fantasies’ about flying to LA to confront this person or to follow him back to DC and find out who he is.
I find it amazing that the authorities don’t plan to pursue action against this person.
I don’t know if you can do this in Chicago, but here in KC one of our news channels has a segment wherein, basically, one of their reporters will publicly confront people/businesses that have in some way defrauded someone. This often leads to restitution for the victim; I imagine, if nothing else, it would certainly provide a deep sense of satisfaction.
Failing that I would alert the police at the airport, ahead of time, and perhaps he can be detained after the flight lands. I can’t imagine then refusing to act if you called them and said, theres a known criminal on flight 436 landing at 5:36.
I’d call the airline and tell them the whole story. Their agent at the airport will probably be the first one to know when scumbag presents himself, and there’s any number of police personnel on hand. Seems to me they could easily orchestrate an arrest.
That’s very strange that people would use a stolen credit card for airline tickets. WIth all the security now, the person has either use their real name, or have a fake id handy, so it’s very odd…
I’d say you need to talk to the airport authorities and airline, tell them what happened, and it would be very odd if they didn’t do anything about it. I’d think this is a more serious crime now due to heightened security at airports. No money trail to catch the guy, and possibly using a fake id? I’d think someone would be interested in him, but then again, sometimes people just don’t really care.
Before my initial post I called United and talked to a couple of folks there. They both said that they cooperate with police, but don’t have any unit that deals with this on their own. So barring ‘official’ interest United is content to let the person fly on a ticket for which they will probably not get paid.
mrmuddylee - The card wasn’t stolen, they just had the info somehow. And they purchased a ticket for themselves and me but only used the one for themselves (they obviously have either a fake ID that matches the name on the ticket or they were dumb enough to use their real name - although an anywho.com search on the name ’ Ashling Hyles’ did not turn up any people).
I tried calling the FBI as World Eater suggested, but was told that they do not handle this and the Secret Service deals in credit card fraud. After calling the Secret Service, I finally talked with someone that at least seemed to give a damn… she said she’s not certain what sort of resources they can devote to something like this (small$$, they usually only deal with fraud in excess of $50k), but she would see if they could work something out where they’d pick up the person in DC if they actually got on the plane in LA.
It’s not much, but at least its something other than complete inactivity.
The agent promised to give me a call if they were able to catch up with the person. I hope they do.
I’m really suprised by this. With all the recent warnings about possible hijackings I would think that the authorities would be very interested in anyone who is flying under any kind of false pretenses. Maybe you should try to contact the Homeland Security Dept.
God, I feel your pain, and I hope someone comes up with some good ideas for you.
My coworker had her wallet stollen. The crooks were dumb enough to make themselves somewhat trackable. But the police had no interest in doing the legwork, and my coworker could formally issue a complaint because she cancelled her card & checking account. The losses were incurred by the banks, so they were the ones who were supposed to follow up, but they didn’t seem that interested.
Her bank cooperated a little by forwarding the electronic checks they’d arranged. That gave us some information about which address in town they were using when they signed up for cellphones on her bank account. I did a special lookup to find the phone number, and I called.
My plan was to say I was from Nextel and the salesperson had neglected to tell them they were eligible for $50 rebates, but that I would need to confirm their name, address, etc. I figured the lure of the $$ would get them to divulge more. But the person at that address denied that anyone with those names lived there, so it ended up being a dead end. I couldn’t even leave a message.
All I could think was, here are a couple of buttwipes with no respect for property and they were going to just waltz away because nobody with any authority gave a damn. It really really rankled. I was willing to do some legwork, but I didn’t want to get, say, shot or stabbed. Or sued. But I thought, I’ll bet one of the reasons identity fraud is so popular is that it’s low-risk. The crook learns they’re onto him when he gets a purchase denied but all he does is flee the store and that’s the end of it.
People are never careful enough with their credit card receipts. A week or so ago, my wife and I found a receipt with the card number, name and expiration date. We have relatives overseas who could easily have used it for awhile.
There are also people who go dumpster diving outside large department stores. Some of the stores simply dump the old credit card receipts instead of shredding them.
Seems our priorities are a bit out of whack. Now, if you could convince the police that they guy had been smoking a joint, you could probably get the perp thrown in jail for the rest of their natural lives. But theft and fraud? Nah, they’ve got bigger fish to fry. Just ask the happy ex-employees of Enron.
Which is maybe why the only person that seemed to care was from the Secret service (which falls under Homeland Security now). To be honest, I didn’t even think about anything more nefarious than simple fraud before it was mentioned here, but it is certainly a possibility.
Was kinda weird talking to them though (In that, hey do you guys all look like Clint Eastwood and wow you protect the president and can I try your earpiece and what? keep my hands off your sunglasses? OK… kinda way).
…and now you know why we pay insane interest fees on our friggin’ credit cards.
It’s cheaper, easier, and more convenient – FOR THE CREDIT CARD COMPANY – to simply screw the honest people, than it is to spend time, money, and energy CATCHING THE CROOKS!
Look into the requirements for making a citizens arrest in your area. If worse comes to worst and none of the authorities will assist you and you can catch the person, go for it.
I’ve no suggestions on how to identify the person short of standing outside the gate with a sign with their likely ficticious name on it, but at least you’ll know that having just been on a plane he or she will not be armed.
Even assuming you could locate this person, physically confronting him or her could be extremely dangerous. Furthermore, you could very easily wind up getting arrested yourself for causing a disturbance, kidnapping, etc.
On the other hand, I agree with previous posters who see this as a serious issue no just because of the credit card fraud (which is infuriating) but also because it like means that someone is flying under a false name for who knows what reason.
I would contact homeland security and tell them that you have good reason to believe that the person travelling under the name _____________ is using false identification. You can explain to them that you know the tickets were purchased fraudulently because someone unknown to you used your card to buy the tickets without your permission.
Umm, they’re probably not flying back. The return ticket was probably a ruse. I think a lot of flights are booked round trip.
I’m not certain what it’s like getting a flight on-line, but if you use a travel agent they always ask when you will be returning.
Call back the FBI. This time tell them you’re calling to report suspicious activity potentially relating to terrorism. Tell them that you know of someone who is about to board a plane under a forged identity with stolen tickets.