By Bill Morem
Regena Johnston knows second-hand what it feels like to be skinned in an international lottery scam. It feels like her ailing 79-year-old mother owing $235,000 to Bank of America.
“We first became aware of the fact that my stepfather and mom were in trouble when he made a call to his granddaughter asking for $40,000,” says the rural Paso Robles resident.
Johnston’s stepfather was 73-year-old Howard Crank, a Paso Robles resident with diabetes so bad that both legs had been amputated above the knees. He was also a veteran who served three tours of duty in Vietnam and was an aircraft mechanic and instructor in the United States Air Force for 25 years.
Regena, husband Jess and daughter Cheryl Blank were surprised at Howard’s request for $40,000, especially when he was vague as to why he wanted it, just saying he had an investment opportunity. They thought he had a comfortable retirement and his call just seemed odd.
Then, three weeks after the request, while Howard was negotiating his motorized wheelchair from his parked car to a renal dialysis center in Templeton, something went terribly wrong: He may have caught his shirt in the wheels and was bucked from the chair, breaking the femur in his left stump. To complicate matters, his wife, 79-year-old Betty, was in Twin Cities Community Hospital at the same time with her own health issues.
Curious as to what he wanted the $40,000 for, and knowing no one was home, Regena, Jess and Cheryl went to Howard and Betty’s home and discovered why he wanted the money: He’d been notified that he’d won $715,555 as his share of a $113.8 million lottery in Madrid, Spain.
Over time, knowing they had a fish on the line, the $715,555 grew to $115 million. And, as his meticulous records would later reveal, Howard needed to pay ever-increasing transfer taxes upfront before the fictitious winnings could be released.
No one in the family knows why Howard fell for such a scam; his heart gave out April 1, 2008, a day after he underwent surgery for his broken femur, and they weren’t able to question his reasoning.
They believe, however, he was hustled over the Internet, and being a neophyte with a new computer, he may not have been aware that such come-ons are common crooked cons.
What they do know for sure is that from Feb. 22, 2007, to March 13, 2008, he made multiple wire transfers totaling $313,004.30 to a bank in Madrid, wiping out his life savings and leaving his widow with two equity lines of credit — secured by Howard’s modest house — to Bank of America for $235,000.
In addition to the mystery behind Howard’s motives in falling for such a scam, the family wonders why the Paso Robles branch of Bank of America would give him a $100,000 line of credit on Dec. 5, 2007, and another loan less than a month later on Jan. 3, 2008, for another $135,000.
They also wonder why no alarm bells went off when he sent 15 wire transfers totaling $274,799.05 to Spain, behavior he’d never exhibited in the 35 years he’d been a patron.
Banking and elder abuse
Under California Welfare and Institutions Code Sections 15630 and 15658(a)(1), banks are required to report suspected financial abuse of elders to Adult Protective Services or local law enforcement.
By all accounts, Howard Crank was a man with a big heart, someone who annually contributed $10 to $15 to each of 37 various charities. Perhaps he believed he could increase those charitable contributions and suspended his skepticism at being a European lottery winner.
The more likely reason is that he was simply unaware of computer scams; that any notification that you’ve won a lottery, or are the recipient of a fat bank account just waiting for you to collect, is nothing more than a heartbreaking, expensive fraud in the offering.
Abridged
SOURCE: San Luis Obispo Tribune
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