Audrey Grisham, Utah Woman, Reports Credit Card Fraud, Then Is Accused By Police

Imagine calling the police to report a crime, only to have them turnaround and accuse you.

That's what happened to Audrey Grisham of Bountiful, Utah. Her financial nightmare began when she discovered $1,524.74 worth of charges she didn’t make on her credit card, KUTV reports (h/t The Consumerist). When Grisham reported the charges to her credit card provider, Discover, company officials told her that before she was eligible for reimbursement, she had to report the fraud to police departments in each of the Utah towns where fraudulent charges were made.

Sounds easy enough. That is until police in the town of Centerville didn’t believe her and accused her of fraud herself. By federal law, banks must return, refund or remove all but $50 of any unauthorized or fraudulent activity on a lost or stolen card.

Globally, credit card fraud like that which Grisham says she experienced is falling, thanks in part to increased security measures. Yet the U.S. remains conspicuously behind. In 2010, 47 percent of global fraud losses last year occurred in the U.S., up from about 46.5 percent the year before. One year before that, customers lost $443 million to various forms of financial consumer crimes.

It wasn’t long before Grisham’s name was cleared, thanks to another police department filing charges against a suspect. Discover still refused to pay up until local network KUTV contacted the company, noting its failure to pay was unlawful.

Grisham's case is small compared to that of Adekunle Adetiloye, who was recently sentenced to 18 years in prison for organizing a scheme to open 600 fraudulent bank accounts in 22 banks across the U.S., bilking card firms out of up to $5 million. Unlike Grisham’s card thief, though, Adetiloye’s fraud was based on identity theft.

Likewise, police in Quebec, Canada recently busted a crime ring that is estimated to have committed fraud worth up to $100 million, MSNBC reports.

But as in Grisham’s case, things can sometimes turn out alright for victims of fraud. John McDevitt, a U.S. army veteran who was cheated out of some $25,000 while on vacation, was ultimately reimbursed by Bank of America after the bank initially denied his request. Yet again, it wasn’t until increased media scrutiny that BofA decided to finally pay up.

Comments

[pfz]

04:46 PM on 05/11/2012

Discover makes the card holder file a report in each town? Guess what gets shredded today.

[Steelsil]

01:05 AM on 05/11/2012

Thanks for the warning.  I'll never get a 'Discover' card now.

[kbella]

11:24 PM on 05/10/2012

Getting your credit card number stolen is a real pain. It happened to me earlier this year, and since I only use the one credit card, I couldn't make any online purchases since you really aren't supposed to use a debit card to do that. I will say that whatever service my local credit union uses to track this stuff spotted the error shortly after it occurred and was able to block additional fraudulent transactions. I was pretty impressed.

[rnl52]

04:23 AM on 05/11/2012

PayPal.

[kbella]

10:44 AM on 05/11/2012

Yeah, it was mostly stuff like Amazon books, though, which doesn't really use paypal. It's over though, and I got my new credit card within about 10 days.

[parabq]

11:14 PM on 05/10/2012

So much for "protect and serve" !

[Robert SF]

07:08 PM on 05/10/2012

The story sounds strange. The woman should have read the law and her agreement. She was not required to make reports to various police departments in the first place.

[Turukano]

06:50 PM on 05/10/2012

Of course she was going to be accused. There needed to be an investigation. Do you folks have any idea how many claims of fraud are just made up?

[pfz]

04:47 PM on 05/11/2012

who are you talking to?

[onionboy]

05:08 PM on 05/11/2012

That sounded like a rhetorical question, so what is the number?

[Veri]

04:50 PM on 05/10/2012

It wasn't until increased media scrutiny forced BofA and Discover to lawfully pay. Welcome to American Capitalism where corporations consider it an option to follow the law.

[rvhobo]

09:52 AM on 05/10/2012

Not surprising, I went to a off brand ATM one day at a chevron station, made a attempt to make a cash withdrawl, the machine issued no money, a reciept where it stated no money was issued and it took the credit card company 45 days to fix the issue, they billed me, let it sit on my account for that entire 45 days imagine if I had no reciept, the representative admitted it would have taken longer to clear up the matter, the ATM company was no more help, when I called the number on the machine they said they did not own it merely represented the owner, took my transaction number from the reciept, noted it down and nothing more heard from them! I wonder if this is not a form of corporate fraud, imagine the internest they make on these type cases billing customers credit card companies who in the end make it right but someone somewhere got the money credit and imagine millions of these gltiches multiplied by the interest involved someone somewhere is making out like highway robbery!

[fabuloush2s]

10:30 AM on 05/10/2012

Same has happened to me at the service stations's Chase ATM machine. I submitted my card, posted transaction for withdrawal ... no money came through the slot, a receipt popped out reflecting the withdrawal time date etc...no money! What I did not do was report the issue, so I lost out. After that, I rarely use ATM at gas service stations because my peronal feeling is that they are set to take not to give. Banks are crooks no doubt about it anymore!

[rvhobo]

10:40 AM on 05/10/2012

Ironically I was assured at the time by the Chevron manager the charge would not show up on my credit card, but I called that day and the lady stated it was attempting to be posted, she advised me to make a xerox copy of my reciept gave me a fax number to fax it too, it was a very unpleasant experience now I use it only at my personal banks ATM, I refuse to use off brand ATM's since they have many layers of ownership, my bank has a reason to keep me happy or I will leave!:-)