UPPER TYRONE TOWNSHIP, Pa. — State Police arrested two men accused of trying to scam a man out of tens of thousands of dollars in Fayette County.
Harsh Parekh and Harshil Patel, who live in New Jersey, were arrested on Oct. 25 at a home in Upper Tyrone Township. Troopers say the men are from India but are in the state on a student visa.
Troopers announced the arrests during a press conference on Friday.
The 75-year-old victim was contacted and told he was under investigation for a fraudulent purchase at Walmart. Over several text messages, the scammers told him he needed to clear out his bank account and claimed the money was “illegal.”
The bank sent an alert to police when the victim took out $28,000 and they found it strange.
Pennsylvania State Police say the advanced notice helped them solve the crime.
“We have to give a lot of credit to the Mid Penn Bank employees who alerted us,” said Pennsylvania State Trooper Public Information Officer Kalee Barnhart, “Their productive work helped solve this scam.”
People are reminded to look for red flags if they suspect a potential scam.
Scammers often create a false sense of urgency to cause victims to act without clearly thinking things through. Contact is also usually unsolicited and comes from an unknown source.
A good rule of thumb for the future is to consider if it seems too good to be true, it probably is, police said.
Criminals will also often ask for odd means of payment including cryptocurrency. They also ask for extremely large amounts of money frequently.
State troopers encourage anyone who suspects a scam to report it to law enforcement.
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