Log In

Sooo..

Mom got a letter in the mail from what claims to be the FBI. They say that during their investigation they found information that my mom was a victim in a crime and that we need to fill out a questionnaire and send it back before april 15th.

They included a pamphlet about the FBI's "Help for Victims of Crime" and stuff... the websites on the letter and pamphlet are .gov addresses

Everything looks legit..

The crime is apparently about a magazine company or something "Your Magazine Service" asking if we subscribed to them, and other questions pertaining to that.

A few years ago.. 4..5. maybe 6? Mom got a call in the middle of the night from some Magazine service.. they convinced mom to subscribe to some magazines.. I remember she subscribed to a few animal based ones for me for art refs...

Neither of us are into sports, so she never ordered sports magazines and yet a few months after she started the subscription we started getting ESPN and other sport mags..

What happened back then and this letter now really makes me think this is a legit FBI thing... o-o, They aren't asking for personal info, bank info, anything like that.. they just want to know what we remember about this Magazine service..

She doesn't remember much, and I just remember getting pissed at getting Magazines for shit we weren't even into.

What to do?! Dx

Just answer the letter. They're probably investigating some sort of ongoing scam and they determined you were affected by it

I think the magazine thing is a scam, so anwer the letters and see what happens.

If they succeed in their investigation, you might get some compensation for the money they tricked you out of.

The problem is, we can't remember what the company was called or anything. Mom has memory problems and she was half asleep when they conned her into the magazines...

It was so long ago I don't think we can get anything from the bank to give to them.

The questions are basically A, B, C like answers.. so there is no way to tell our story.. =(

Well, still, you should help them out if you can.

I think banks are required by law to keep most records of checking and savings accounts for a minimum of five years. You can call the associated bank and ask them how long they retain transaction histories to be sure.

We'll be going to the bank on the first, so that is the best time for us to ask. If I left it to mom, she'd just screw up asking =o=

I'll do my best to fill this out.

You can also call the local FBI office (you can find it on their website) and blatantly ask them if it is legit or not.

Firstly, if you're unsure it's legit, either:

1. Call the FBI office and report it.

or

2. Do what I did when I got a fraud email from the bank I was with at the time.
Take a print out of the email to your local police department (in my case I took it to a local location of the bank itself) and have them look into it.

The email I'd received said that my online banking account was locked due to suspicious activity/login attempts.
No one at the bank recognized the email and an account assistant (or whatever they're called, those who open new accounts for new customers) had me log in on the computer at her desk to confirm that my account was NOT locked.

The email had looked very authentic though, it had their logo and copyright.

As for how to tell your story, can you not tell it the way you did here, in the OP? That sounded pretty decent. There are at least two suspicious factors in that telling:

1. That the call came in the middle of the night
2. That you're receiving mags you didn't subscribe to.

Are you still getting any mags? If so you can give the FBI the return address on the last ones you received.
Or give them the mags themselves and they can take fingerprints.

If the FBI needed names and/or addresses to track someone, they wouldn't be very efficient.