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Prince George’s County State’s Attorney Tara Jackson announced indictments Thursday of two men charged with defrauding a 59-year-old county resident out of $86,000.
Jackson and county police said Zheng Hui Xie, 30, of Flushing, New York, and Jianwei Wang, 27, of Monterey Park, California, impersonated Federal Trade Commission officials in order to convince the resident, who was not named, that there had been fraudulent activity on her Apple ID and that several accounts were compromised.
The resident received a text message on April 28 about a large purchase made on her account, and called a number provided. The person who answered claimed to be with a fraud department, and transferred the woman to an individual who claimed to be an FTC agent.
On two separate occasions, the resident was asked to withdraw money from her bank in order to secure her money. She handed the money over to the fake agents who came to her home.
When the resident received another phone call May 15 from an unknown number, and was told to withdraw $24,000, she contacted police. On May 23, investigators with the Prince George’s County Police Department’s Financial Crimes Unit arrested Xie and Wang.
Although senior citizens are mostly preyed upon in similar schemes, Jackson said scammers also target those who are “very responsible.”
“If somebody texts you and says, ‘If you don’t pay this money immediately, then your license is going to be suspended,’ most of us that are responsible don’t want our license suspended,” she said. “Our message to our residents and others is to make sure that you just don’t respond.”
If others believe they may be been defrauded, they are asked to call police at 301-352-1200.
Last month, AARP Maryland kicked off a campaign to stop financial exploitation on older Americans.
Federal Trade Commission data showed that there were 44,195 fraud reports from Maryland residents in 2024, for a total loss of nearly $202 million, up from the 44,168 fraud reports and $168 million in the state in 2023.
