Springs police say IRS scam attempt led to swatting case
A Colorado Springs man said he is grateful he didn’t get hurt or arrested after criminals took an IRS scam too far.
Monday morning, Jim Davis said a man called and told him he owed back taxes to the IRS. He would have to pay up or the man would issue a warrant for his arrest.
“He gave me a badge number, he gave me a case number. They were going to lien my house, seize my car, confiscate my bank accounts,” said Davis. “It sounded really legit so I drove to the bank and talked to a friend of mine.”
After verifying that it was a hoax, Davis hung up the phone and things went south. Davis said the criminal called his home phone 20 to 30 times and told his daughter that police would be coming to arrest Davis.
Then, a phone call was transferred to the Colorado Springs Emergency Communications Center at 12:26 p.m. Monday (2/8/16) from a man who said three armed men were outside of his home and threatening him. Further into the call, the scammer, posing as Davis, told the dispatcher he planned to hurt officers who came to his home.
When officers arrived at the north side home on Windy Oak Drive, they found out it was a hoax. The nearby Discovery Canyon Campus was locked down as a precaution.
“If I was home, they would have accomplished their mission. They either get your money or we are going to make your life miserable by having you arrested in front of your community,” said Davis.
Before police arrived, Davis’ daughter returned a phone call to one of the numbers and found that it actually belonged to the El Paso County Sheriff’s Office. Police say the scammers changed the telephone number that was displayed on the caller ID using a technique known as spoofing.
The practice of using deception to send first responders to an address is known as swatting.
“The fact that they (scammers) would push it to this extent, it’s not something we have seen here in Colorado Springs before and that’s why we wanted to get the information out there,” said Lt. Catherine Buckley with the Colorado Springs Police Department.
IRS scams are common during tax season, but they are rarely associated with swatting.
Police think the call came from overseas.
“It kind of sounds like this could be a call center. A place where they do nothing but process these type of scams,” said Buckley.
If you receive a call claiming that you owe the IRS money and you suspect it is a scam, you should collect as much information as possible and contact law enforcement.
