Chinese-American business owners and professionals are being targeted by a Mandarin-speaking caller seeking money and often threatening them and their families, authorities and business leaders said.
The calls, apparently originating in China from someone with a Hoklo, also known as Taiwanese, or Fujianese accent, have targeted people in at least seven states, from California to Massachusetts. Cities where the threats have been made include New York, Boston and Philadelphia.
“They were saying: ‘We know where you live, we know your family members,’” said Steven Zhu, liaison officer of Chinatown Town Watch in Philadelphia.
At least 20 people in the city or its suburbs have been targeted in the past two weeks by someone seeking US$10,000 to US$30,000, and a Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, resident ended up wiring a large amount, police said.
Several calls have not involved threats but have been appeals based on ethnic origin to get cash, for example, to help someone get out of jail, Lieutenant Dennis Cullen of the police Criminal Intelligence Unit said.
FBI officials on Friday acknowledged “a nationwide attempt to extort business owners ... through phone calls threatening violence.”
Officials said the callers, apparently based in China, try to provide enough personal data about Asian-American victims to convince them that they are in danger, but use only information available on the Internet.
“There have been no reported incidents of violence actually perpetrated,” Matthew Heron, section chief of the FBI’s Organized Crime Section in Washington, said in a statement.
An FBI spokesman said such calls had been reported in California, New York, Massachusetts, Illinois, Florida and Texas.
Since mid-March, “scores” of calls have been made to doctors, attorneys and accountants in the San Gabriel Valley area east of downtown Los Angeles by callers demanding US$30,000 to US$50,000, said Steve Whitmore, spokesman for the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department.
“He’s also leaving phone messages, which ... indicates that he’s somewhat brazen,” Whitmore said.
About three dozen cases have been reported in Boston and the surrounding cities of Brookline, Cambridge and Quincy, said Gilbert Ho, president of Boston’s Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association and a member of the city’s Chinatown Crime Watch.
“If a person answers using English or another language, they will hang up; they only speak Mandarin,” he said.
He said authorities have told him the perpetrators appear to be using Internet phones and the money was to be wired to an address in China.
The callers may also be using an Internet mapping program to describe the area of a victim’s store, Ho said.
“They describe nearby landmarks, so the businessman thinks maybe they are nearby, so they become more scared,” he said.
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