It is mid-day when the phone rings to retired Lill Coombes in September 2022. It is not until 9 pm that she hangs up – the day after, 60,000 kronor has been withdrawn from her savings account. The kind man who called the day before turns out to be a scammer.
The strange thing is that I never usually answer these anonymous numbers, but I did, says 75-year-old Lill Coombes.
It was 14 people who were sentenced to prison on Monday, after they cheated Lill Coombes and 138 other people. In total, they cheated people out of over 17 million kronor. In today's verdict, it appears that Lill will get back 60,000 kronor in damages, the amount she was cheated out of three years ago.
Are you kidding me? It's as if he up there and Santa Claus are collaborating. I am extremely surprised and deeply impressed by the police's work, says a surprised Lill Coombes after the verdict.
Many affected
She has not been severely affected by the scam, but knows that others have.
It has hurt me that some private individuals, who have been dependent on their savings, have been affected.
The person who called the 75-year-old claimed to be her bank and that her Bank-ID had been hijacked, which meant that she had lost thousands of kronor. The caller would help her get the money back.
I should have stopped the call and called the bank myself, but they can talk their way out of it pretty well, says Lill Coombes.
”Was shady”
Less than a year after Lill Coombes was cheated, Stefan Arff received a similar call. It was from a man who said he was from a debt collection company.
They said that a guy in Malmö had bought an Iphone 14 in my name and that he would connect me to my bank's security department. If you're going to be wise after the fact, it was already shady there, says Stefan Arff.
He lost 149,000 kronor from his company account, but his bank managed to stop most of the transaction. After Monday's verdict, it is clear that his company will get back the nearly 30,000 kronor that was missing.
It's fantastically positive, says Stefan Arff.
