81-year-old Troy man has nearly $500,000 stolen in online scam

TROY, Mich. (FOX 2) - An elderly man, swindled out of close to half a million dollars - he may not see a dime back of that money returned.

"Unfortunately we had an 81-year-old resident of ours who fell victim to a gold exchange scam," said Sgt. Ben Hancock, Troy police.

Troy PD is investigating a cyber crime trying to help an elderly man get back some of the $460,000 he was scammed out of.

Hancock says the scam began in October of 2023 and lasted until last month.

"When he inquired about pulling out some of his earnings in April of 2024, he was sent a letter saying he needed to pay some taxes on his earnings," Hancock said. "And then a family member that this was a scam."

Hancock says he thought he was investing wisely -online - but that wasn't the case.

"Anyone can be fooled. a lot of things look legitimate online but unfortunately most of the time they’re not especially of something if that magnitude," he said.

Hancock says there are ways people can protect themselves, especially when things are done online.

First, look at the email address.

"Things are misspelled or it looks like it’s from a legitimate company's email address," he said. "But the company’s name is misspelled."

Then do some research on the business or organization to make sure it's solid.

"I would say do your homework," Hancock said. "You know, make sure you really do your research before you invest any kind of money especially a sum of that amount."

Also have family look it into it or multiple people. He stresses do what you can to protect yourself so you don't fall victim.

"Cybercrime, very difficult to investigate," Hancock said. "It is assigned to one of our investigators right now. but pretty unlikely that this individual will get their money back."