Scammer caught!

Marl Carey form TDI sent this in from the Sun Herald.Com, which serves the  Biloxi-Gulfport and South Mississippi area. Robin Fitzgerald reported:

“A homeless man used a pay phone in Biloxi to contact truck-driving schools in California in a scam to solicit money, police said. Richard Roarke Perkins, 57, posed as a representative of a truck-driving association or trucking company that sought graduates for jobs, said Michael Shaw, Biloxi police investigator. Perkins needed to pay for only one call at a time — he would stand by and wait for return calls, said Shaw. Detectives believe Perkins asked job-seekers to wire him money to pay for someone to pick them up and drive them to South Mississippi. ‘He did receive a couple of hundred dollars from one subject in California,’ Shaw said. Police arrested Perkins on Friday. Detectives said he had several names and phone numbers of students at a California truck-driving school. He is charged with fraud. Justice Court Judge Albert Fountain ordered Perkins held under a $10,000 bond.”

We take full credit for having helped to nab this scammer. OK, we don’t. But we think that everyone’s efforts to get the word out has raised the level of awareness about this scam and has helped make it harder to get away with it.