Washington County sees uptick in scam calls

WASHINGTON COUNTY, Okla. — There are warnings about telephone scammers after a Bartlesville business received phone calls from people trying to get money.

Ashlynn Wolf said she’s nervous to answer the phone at work now

“I don’t want to answer the phone anymore at all, I’m like the phone ringing someone else get it I ain’t doing it,” Wolf said.

Wolf works at scooters coffee in Bartlesville and last Friday someone called saying they were from their corporate office.

The caller there was an investigation underway and they needed her to count the stores money up and take it to a bitcoin ATM.

When Wolf questioned it, they threatened her job.

“I’m actually putting all this money in an envelope I have my jacket on I haven’t left yet I’m still on the phone with them and I’m like I’m not really comfortable doing that … he was like whenever you go back inside grab your things and go home if you’re not going to do this then you’re not needed here.”

She didn’t fall for the scam – but the scammers didn’t give up – they called back a few hours later and tried the same scam again on a different team member.

They even knew the managers name and details about the store.

“He sounded completely legit the whole time he sounded normal sounded professional… It was like being watched, he knew where I was, he had my phone number, he knew my manager wasn’t there, he knew how many people were in the building,” Wolf said.

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Miranda Smith is the manager at Scooters Coffee, and Smith said it’s worrying

“I cannot believe that they had the nerve to call more than once …. A bunch of our girls here are younger … they’re younger girls so maybe they haven’t had that knowledge of scanners of anything like that I mean it terrified them,” Smith said.

Washington County Sheriff Office said they’ve seen an uptick in scam calls recently.

Jon Copeland is the Washington County Undersheriff and he is trying to warn people.

“Somebody sounds official, somebody sound the part and yet they’re not. ….Ask questions you know they’re calling you ask questions …. you want to verify who I said I am, well how about you verify who you said you are.. “ Copeland said.

In a separate scam, someone pretended to be a Washington County Sheriffs Deputy and demanded money for an alleged warrant. The woman targeted by the scam was told if she did not pay, she would go to jail.

“I can tell you in Washington county and almost any other county in this state are not going to call people and tell them that a they have a warrant and they need to pay money over the phone,” Copeland said.

Copeland said the scams are aggravating.

“For us it’s aggravating because all of our deputies have a high level of integrity…”

For parting advice, Copeland advised to stay on your toes and don’t give away personal information.

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