Jalisco authorities have dismantled a well-organized telephone scam being run out of the Puente Grande state penitentiary, Attorney General Eduardo Almaguer has revealed.
A massive, unannounced search carried out in the middle of the night uncovered a stash of cellphones, SIM cards and texts used for telephone extortions. At least ten inmates were involved in the scam, Almaguer said.
The racket mostly consisted of “virtual kidnappings” and targeted residents of U.S. cities such as Los Angeles, Miami and Chicago, Almaguer said.
Inmates at the prison located on the outskirts of Guadalajara made thousands of random calls, passing themselves off as lawyers acting on behalf of relatives they claimed had been kidnapped, Almaguer said.
A few panicked families, unaware that the calls were hoaxes, were persuaded to wire money to Mexican bank accounts, he revealed.
The exact amount of how much the gang earned through the scam is unclear.
The gang identified their targets from the pages of U.S. telephone directories, Almaguer said.
Virtual kidnappings have been around for a long time in Mexico but are becoming more frequent in the United States, according to the FBI. Scammers use different variations of the scheme, sometimes posing as the kidnappers, victims or intermediaries.
In last week’s raid at Puente Grande, officers collected 23 notebooks with details pertaining to the scam, seven cellphones, 18 SIM cards, 13 phone chargers, 17 knives, 13 cutter blades, 30 pairs of scissors, 14 screwdrivers, two hammers, a saw and small quantities of marijuana.