{"id":102266,"date":"2026-01-01T14:10:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-01T14:10:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/102266\/"},"modified":"2026-01-01T14:10:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-01T14:10:09","slug":"key-biscayne-woman-scammed-out-of-950k-police-turn-to-fbi-for-help-with-rise-in-fraud-cases","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/102266\/","title":{"rendered":"Key Biscayne woman scammed out of $950K, police turn to FBI for help with rise in fraud cases"},"content":{"rendered":"

Key Biscayne police have turned to the FBI for help as residents continue to fall victim to scammers. The latest local victim: a 74-year-old woman was swindled out of nearly $1 million, according to police.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But as investigations rarely recover funds, police have also begun to hold seminars to educate residents on how to protect themselves.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think the underlying message is to always verify. Never do anything over the phone. Big transactions should be handled at a legitimate place of business like banks or money management firms,\u201d Police Chief Frank Sousa said Tuesday.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Village\u2019s latest victim also called the FBI on Dec. 19 before reporting to police that same day of being defrauded out of $950,000.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Back in October, the victim received messages through WhatsApp and Telegram from someone pretending to be \u201can innovative investment organization that utilized artificial intelligence for the allure of gaining large profit,\u201d the officer stated in his report.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Once the thieves convinced her of their validity, she transferred about $950,000 from Merrill Lynch Charles Schwab account into the alleged \u201cSpeedDiva\u201d account.\u00a0<\/p>\n

It was not until the victim recently began to prepare her income tax return and reached out to the scammers who told her that \u201ctaxes weren\u2019t necessary because her money was safe,\u201d according to the incident report. But they offered to return her $950,000 investment if she deposited another $4 million.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Police found some of the contacts used in the scam to be linked to Indonesia and a very basic website for the masquerading \u201cSpeedDiva\u201d company.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The officer spoke to the victim about how she could safeguard her identity in the future, given how she had given all her personal and financial information to the suspects.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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According to the Better Business Bureau, which tracks scams nationwide<\/a>, investment scams continue to be the riskiest scam type , according to a 2024 report<\/a>. More than 80%\u00a0 of people who have reported being targeted by investment or cryptocurrency scams have lost money to scammers.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is happening everywhere \u2014 this is pervasive throughout the country. You can make a correlation to drop in violent crime. People realize they can do I.D. theft and fraud (instead),\u201d Sousa said.<\/p>\n

The rise in fraud cases, however, has created a difficult workload for Village police. In response, they have begun hosting prevention seminars, especially aimed at seniors.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Protect yourself: Upcoming Seminars for Residents<\/p>\n

The next seminar is Jan 14th at 6:30 at the Ocean Club condo. On Jan. 27th, KBPD is planning two sessions, 12 to 1:30 and again 6-8 p.m. at the\u00a0 Community Center.\u00a0<\/p>\n

So far reaction has been good and representatives from the Florida Department of Law Enforcement have been guest speakers. But the chief said the department has also received feedback from residents saying they want more individualized help so the department is looking into that.<\/p>\n

\u201cSeniors often don\u2019t have people to talk to, to assure their finances,\u201d Sousa said.<\/p>\n

Tony Winton contributed to this reporting.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Jessica De Leon is a general assignment reporter at the Key Biscayne Independent.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Key Biscayne police have turned to the FBI for help as residents continue to fall victim to scammers.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":102267,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[2362,589,21523,1724,46221,123,125,124,11176,21762],"class_list":{"0":"post-102266","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-miami","8":"tag-fbi","9":"tag-featured","10":"tag-frank-sousa","11":"tag-investment","12":"tag-kbpd","13":"tag-miami","14":"tag-miami-headlines","15":"tag-miami-news","16":"tag-scam","17":"tag-senior"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102266","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=102266"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102266\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/102267"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=102266"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=102266"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=102266"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}