Sweepstakes Fraud

Targeting Seniors

Many sweepstakes are legitimate, but an increasing number are simply scams designed to entice gullible people into sending money, buying unwanted and often inferior merchandise, or giving away personal information that allows scam operators to steal identities.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) reports that in almost 80 percent of the sweepstakes fraud cases investigated, victims are elderly. Publishing Clearing House (PCH), the best known of the large sweepstakes companies, estimates that at least 30 percent of its entrants are over 65 years old.

The elderly may be more vulnerable to sweepstake scams because they may be lonely, suffering from cognitive impairment, or simply more trusting. Marketing to the elderly may be as subtle as adding a familiar touch to the sweepstakes offer by addressing the recipient by name, or it may be as blatant as advertising in cemeteries. In August 2003, Alder Woods Group, Inc., installed 8-foot by 10-foot signs at the entrances of its 200 cemeteries, inviting visitors to enter a sweepstakes in which they might win from $2,000 to $25,000.

An elderly person may send money to fraudulent sweepstakes companies for months or years before authorities are notified. An elderly woman in Colorado, for example, wrote more than 2,000 checks totaling $107,000 over a 14-month period before it was reported. A Colorado man in his 70s became so obsessed with entering sweepstakes that he rented a post office box to receive the entries and locked himself in his room each day where he wrote checks from $5 to $50 totaling hundreds of thousands of dollars before his family discovered his secret and reported it.

After being asked to send a map to her home, one 78-year old Florida woman had friends waiting to watch her receive her prize from representatives of Publishers Clearing House. The company, who had no association with PCH, never came. Another elderly woman spent one-half of her social security check each month buying products from companies because she thought that purchasing improved her chances of winning. In an effort to educate the elderly about sweepstake scams, in 1999 Congress passed the Protecting Seniors from Fraud Act (Public Law 106–534), requiring the assistant secretary of Health and Human Services for Aging to work with state attorneys general to educate seniors about sweepstakes fraud.

One of the most common sweepstakes scams involves notifying an individual that she has won millions of dollars that will be transmitted only after the recipient sends a cashier's check, money order, or Western Union transfer to prepay taxes, cover shipping and handling, or make an nonrefundable deposit. Gloria Vettor, a Canadian bookkeeper in her 50s, was so anxious to win the $850,000 that she was told she had won in a sweepstakes that she embezzled the $82,140 “cover fee” from her employer. After responding to the first offer, Vettor was put on a “sucker list” and was contacted by scores of other fraudulent sweepstake companies to which she also sent money. After embezzling $8,768,000 from her employer over ten months, Vettor was arrested and sent to jail. Out of the $2.7 million that Vettor was told she had won, she never received a penny.

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