Suffolk DA Ray Tierney says his office recovered hundreds of thousands of dollars from internet scam

The Suffolk County District Attorney’s office recovered more than $330,000 that was stolen from a Suffolk couple who were the victims of an alleged internet phishing scam, the DA’s office said Wednesday.

“Foreign national scammers often prey upon our residents under the belief that even if their crimes are discovered, they will be beyond the reach of American law enforcement,” Suffolk County District Attorney Ray Tierney said in a statement. “Here, our Financial Crimes Bureau swiftly teamed up with the Suffolk County Police Department, and we were able to recover the victims’ funds within in a matter of days. I remind everyone to be cautious about this kind of predatory behavior by opportunistic swindlers.”

An alleged scammer in Kolkata, India stole hundreds of thousands of dollars from the husband and wife couple’s bank account on about Sept. 20, according to a news release from the DA’s office.

The stolen funds amounted to the couple’s life savings. The scammer then convinced the couple that they needed to refund hundreds of thousands of dollars that had been erroneously deposited into their bank account, according to the district attorney’s office.

The scammer “made false claims and manipulated electronic banking information” to trick the couple, the DA’s office said. Once the couple deposited the funds into a crypto wallet, the scammer locked them out of the account and used the stolen funds to buy Bitcoins, the DA’s office said.

The couple reported the scam to authorities and the DA’s office and police department “worked to freeze the account,” the DA’s office said, and recovered the funds within two days.

Tierney's office did not identify the alleged scammer or the victims.

By Nicole Fuller

nicole.fuller@newsday.com@NicoleFuller

Nicole Fuller is Newsday's senior criminal justice reporter. She began working at Newsday in 2012 and previously covered local government.