'That was my granddaughter's voice': Senior suspects scammers used AI in Regina, Saskatoon

Jill Finn is ease preoccupied by the sound.

"I testament depose to my dying death that it was her voice, her mannerisms, her little ups and downs," Finn said in an interview.

"Her voice was identical."

The 79-year-old lives in Regina with her 78-year-old husband Ian. She recounted how her phone rang on a Tuesday afternoon earlier this month.

Finn believed that she was speaking with her granddaughter. The young woman was crying and said she needed help. She said she'd just been in a car accident and had been arrested.

"I was about to turn a corner and I've rear-ended a woman and she's a senior," she told Finn. "She was rushed to the hospital."

The "granddaughter" told Finn she'd been arrested for distracted driving and needed cash for bail — $6,875, to be precise.

Finn said that, at that point, nothing had happened to make her overly suspicious. Her "granddaughter" handed her off to a police officer, who in turn handed her off to a lawyer — "Mr. Williams" — who would be handling the details of getting the bail money.

"Mr. Williams" gave Finn the instructions.

"He told me that I'd have to go to the bank and withdraw the money, cash. And he said, don't tell them it's for a bail bond … people may talk in the bank," she said.

He added that, should anyone ask, she should say that she was paying a contractor cash for a home renovation. Once she had the cash, she was to call another number and a courier would come to their house and pick up the money. The lawyer said the courthouse was too busy on Tuesdays and Thursdays for her to deliver the cash in person.

She was to leave the money in a small box on her front step.

Finn said that she went to the bank and withdrew $7,000, in 50s and 100s. Once she got home, though, she and her husband became suspicious, because there had been no mention of the courier leaving a receipt for the cash.

Finn decided to track down the lawyer, "Mr. Williams." She went to the Regina phone book and located a listing for defence lawyer John Williams.

Finn called the office. The veteran lawyer suspected something was awry with the call from the start.

"Basically, she said 'Are you the Mr. Williams that called me?' I told her that I didn't know anything about what she was talking about," he said in an interview.

"I think I told her almost immediately that I believed she was being scammed."

Despite the curious chain of events, Finn still believed that she had spoken to her granddaughter on the phone. The young woman on the phone had her mannerisms and tone "to perfection."

Williams, however, said the scenario just didn't make sense, especially the instructions about transferring the money.

"What did they ask you to do with that? And she said, 'To put it in a cardboard box,' then put it on their step for a courier to pick it up with nothing else on it," Williams said.

"And I just said to her, 'ma'am, no lawyer would ask you to do that. You are being scammed. You do not put that box on your step and call the police.' And I told her that she should tell the police that someone was coming to pick up the money."

Finn called the police and officers came to their house. She told them about the phone call, the accident, the bail request and a courier supposedly coming.

Regina police were already in contact with their counterparts in Saskatoon, who had just seen a spate of grandparent scam calls a week previous. Five seniors in Saskatoon lost a total of $45,000 in November, and four other couples in Regina had been contacted the same day as the Finns.

Police were waiting to intercept the courier when one of the officers got a phone call.

Two men from Quebec had just been arrested.

"We were able to locate a vehicle that matched a description from Saskatoon, conducted some surveillance on it and were able to confirm that the people inside the vehicle were the same ones that were responsible for the frauds in Saskatoon," Regina police Sgt. Dave Krieger said.

"We actually observed them going up to a victim's house here and obtaining some money from them. So we were able to arrest them right afterwards."

Krieger said investigators are not certain whether the suspects used AI to clone the voices of the victims' family members, or had just harvested key details off social media. He said the frauds are sophisticated and that the victims ought not be ashamed of what happened.

"People in all walks of life fall for it. Doctors, lawyers, police officers. These groups are really, really good at what they do, and they create that urgency and prey on peoples' love for their family," he said.

"It's easy to beat yourself up about becoming victimized. Try not to do that."

He also urged victims to come forward with their stories, so that police and others may be aware of how the scammers prey on victims.

Finn still can't get over how much the voice on the phone sounded like her granddaughter.

"That was my granddaughter's voice," she said.

"I'm sure that the AI was used, and they've got it to perfection."

Reporter

Dan Zakreski is a reporter in Saskatoon.

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