rSlash - r/Scams Mom Sent $375,000 to Her "Boyfriend"

Episode Date: July 9, 2026

0:00 Intro 0:08 Romance scam 2:54 Account access 4:46 Fake warrant 7:25 Laundry app 9:19 House fund 10:48 Taxi Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Here we go. Someone's already claiming this is our year. Someone else said that last year too. A round of Jameson, Ginger, and Lime arrives at a table. Smooth enough for kickoff, smooth enough for extra time. New friends pulling up a stool. Debates about whether that was a handball. Cheers rising like a roar around the room.

Because match days are about the shared moments. How did Jameson to your match day lineup? Jameson, it's what you bring. Please enjoy our products responsibly. It's me. Jesse Tyler Ferguson. In case you haven't heard, and I don't know how that's possible, you're obviously not seeing my Instagram stories, but I have a podcast. I know, I know. I know. I didn't think there was enough podcasts, especially podcasts hosted by actors. So here I am. It's called Dinner's On Me, and it's actually pretty special to me. It combines two things that I absolutely love, eating and connecting with people. So in each episode, I take an old friend or a new friend out to a fabulous meal and as we break bread,

we dive into everything from imposter syndrome and mental health to being a new parent, navigating new relationships. It's fun because you truly get to be a fly on the wall for some really intimate conversations. So please pull up a chair, join us. You can listen to dinners on me wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to R slash scams, where someone gets scammed out of three. Our next Reddit post is from 07. I'm an 18-year-old college student living in a different state from my mom, with no idea how the legal system works, so bear with me here.

I never lived with her. I've always lived with my paternal grandparents. My mom recently told me that she's planning to invest $30 million in a research project where I would lead professors at my university, which I obviously declined, because it sounded so unrealistic. considering she's poor. So where the hell did she get this money from? And also, I'm literally a freshman with no degree. How am I going to lead professors? When I asked her where she got $30 million, she said that it's coming from her secret partner that she met in 2021, whom she's now calling my

new stepfather. She says that her partner's father recently died and she'll inherit a hundred million dollars from him soon. She said that he's the love of her life. When I asked for pictures, she only showed me photos of him from a website because apparently he's a Chinese celebrity who moved to L.A. in 2014. She kept the relationship secret from everyone, even my aunts, except for my maternal grandmother. Who has no real world experience, so she probably got scammed too. She claimed that people would try to steal the money or kill him or kidnap him over it. She said that his family is after him and that she has to keep everything confidential. She also says that she can't contact him normally because he's protected by the FBI.

Apparently, she and my maternal grandmother had met him in real life and had dinner with him. But both of them are people likely to be scammed, so it's not reliable evidence to me. Plus, my aunts asked to see him, and they never got to. She's about to sign trust documents with an unknown lawyer to access the inheritance. She doesn't know the lawyer's name. My aunt just revealed that my mom already sent this man $375,000 a few years ago to invest in a business. Even after she told her it was extremely sketchy. She never got the money back. I told my aunt today about this new inheritance information and she said that she didn't know my mom was still in contact with the scammer. She won't listen to family. I told her so many

times that it sounds like a classic scam and gave evidence online, sent her resources, everything. And she just keeps telling me to trust her. I asked my aunt who this man was, as in his name and location, and she said she didn't know. Down in the comments, people are asking O.P., where she got $375K from if she's poor, and she sold her house for it. Our next Reddit post is from personal AIDS. I put my dad on my bank account years ago when I was deployed to Afghanistan so that he could manage my finances while I was gone. Two days ago, I was talking to him and he was saying that he had to take care of some things due to an error. I come to find out that he was being actively scammed. The scam involved them saying they accidentally sent him too much money and he needed to immediately

send them money back. Without consulting me, he withdrew $10,000 from my bank account and sent part of it through Bitcoin. And the, man, that's so dumb. And the rest in mailed cash through UPS. He doesn't tell me anything about this until last night. He has a separate checking account. A police report was made and a report with the FTC was made. I called my bank and they said that since he was authorized to withdraw the money, they can't do anything about it. The police advised that historically, this money does not get recovered. I was told that the $2.4,000 sent through Bitcoin did get recovered, but it'll be eight weeks till I get it back. I'm devastated. This was years of work saved up, just gone in an instant. It would be different if I got scammed. At least it

would be my fault. But my dad doing this and not saying a word to me has me in complete shock. I even just talked to him about scams last week, unironically. I just needed to put this out somewhere. I'm beyond mad at my situation. And what has happened, and I'm terrified. for my future. Down in the comments, everyone is saying that Bitcoin cannot be recovered, so the 2.4,000 recovery is more than likely another scam that they're using to extract even more money out of OP and his dad. Oh yeah, for just 500 bucks, we'll refund you $2.4,000 with a Bitcoin refund? Sure, we'll do that. Our next Reddit post is from Appropriate Air. My wife got a phone call from a number that claimed that they are government officials from Livingston Police Department

in New Brunswick, saying that she failed to appear for a grand jury duty, so there's a warrant out for that, and for holding contempt of courts. They claim to have a signed, certified mail, saying that she'll show up. They told her that she can just go to the station and verify the signatures to clear her name, but before she does that, she has to satisfy federal and state fees for failure to appear in a grand jury court, and a fee for being held in contempt of courts. They told her that she has a gag order, so she wasn't allowed. to say anything, not even to me as her husband. And when she went through money from the bank, they told her to just tell the teller that it's for home improvement. They told her to keep the

phone on her all night so they can monitor her because she has that gag order, so she was scared to even say anything to me. And the next morning they got disconnected, and then she called the Livingston Police Department, and they told her it was a scam, and that's when she realized. The scammers texted her fake warrants for her and fake gag order. letters. They really got into her head. They convinced her that once she pays the court fees and she goes there to exonerate her name, the government will give you your money back. She went to the bank a few times and did three Bitcoin ATM deposits after the scammers sent her a QR code for their wallet. She was about to deposit $28,000, but the phone was disconnected and that's when she's

somehow had an inkling. I'm trying my best to be grateful because she feels terrible. and stupid already, but I myself am still absorbing this. Like, she was ready to just take out all of our money. She took out our kids' savings too. Crying in front of the bank, she wants to take out a $40,000 loan and give the money back and just move out and disappear. I let her calm down, go home and eat, and we would deal with our kids normally. Later, I told her that this one incident doesn't define who she is, and that the scammer robbed us from our money and our children's money. But, I refuse to let the scammer rob our dignity as well. There's not much that we can do, to be honest,

except to just live with our mistakes and learn from them. It sucks. I'll tell you guys the safest workaround. If you ever get a call from like your bank or the government saying you have to do this or that, just hang up and then dial directly the number of whatever the agency is. Because anyone can call you saying, oh, we're Bank of America. But if you just look up Bank of America's phone number and call them,

you will definitely only get Bank of America. Our next Reddit Post is from Sersepol. I woke up this morning to alerts from my bank about a fraudulent charge on my debit card issued by my bank. I checked my bank account using their website and found seven fraudulent charges all in the range of $100 to $199 that were pending from less than 24 hours ago. I already canceled my debit card

and filled out forms to have the charges denied, but I thought that I would post here about how this scam happened. I was visiting my sister's apartment, in Washington, D.C. for a few weeks, feeding and caring for her pets while she was out of town until June. Her apartment has laundry machines in the basement level that use QR codes and an app to pay for and start the washers and dryers. Users are expected to scan the QR codes using signs attached to the machines, both to install the app on their smartphone and start whatever machine they pick to use. At some point, the app maker required users to load money onto the app using their credit or debit cards,

which can be used to pay for washing or drying. Here's where this stupid scam goes awry. The app makers, in their infinite wisdom, put a space on the screen where you sign up for an account and pay with your credit card that allows for third-party advertisements. Of course, someone paid them for a targeted ad that looks like the rest of the app, and the ad says something to the effect of

activate your laundry account and add credits. You can see where this is going. Users need to add the app. account and add credits to use the laundry. And they allow their user interface to be hijacked by a third party by placing ads right there in the same area where users must activate their accounts and add credits. I suspect that when I was trying to get their app set up, I was directed via a pop-up window that was using a web page to enter my payment details. And that somehow, after filling out what at the time I thought was the credit form, I was asked a second time for the same information.

Our next Reddit post is from Crown B. My dad used my parents' entire housing retirement fund, $300,000 in a scam without telling my mom. I literally don't know where else to go. I'm so devastated. He knows better. Both my parents have worked and broke their back working their entire lives. They had saved up to buy a really nice house when they retired. My dad, who's 66, got pulled into a singular guff scam with some lady named Denny.

niece, claiming to make him $7 million if he sent them $300K. My dad has done this once before and lost them $120,000 when I was 18. I'm now 35. He talked to them over WhatsApp, and without asking any questions or consulting my mom, because he knew that she would say no, wire transfer them $200,000. He was transferring more when his bank froze the transfer and police came knocking on the door. That's when he fessed up saying he was making them $7 million. Not one internet search or question. He just blew their entire housing fund. It's not dementia.

It's his pure greed. And in the process, he screwed over my mother and himself for life. I don't even know how to help them. Well, I can tell you step one is to not give this guy access to money because he's done this twice, which means he'll definitely do it at their time. Our next Reddit post is from Fruit of the Vine Fruit. I'm embarrassed that I fell for this. I'm an experienced traveler.

I've seen a lot of scams, both travel-related and otherwise, but this one was very good. I arrived at the Paris airport with my wife. I decided a cab was best for us. I looked it up, and it's a fixed fare of about 55 euros to our hotel. On the way to the taxi line, someone with a badge asks us where we're going and points us to the ride share area, even though there's a sign pointing the other way to taxis. I walk towards the ride share, then get suspicious and turn around towards the taxis. Someone else with a badge points us to a ride share area. I decide that with two people pointing to ride share, I should go there

and see what they say. Someone who seems like a taxi dispatcher matches us with a nice looking Mercedes. I ask how much the fare will be. They say it'll be on the meter. I tell them I know it's a fixed fare. They say there's some sort of strike going on and that the normal fixed fares are suspended. I'm suspicious, but it'll be the taxi meter price, so I decide to do it. The taxi driver starts driving. In the cab, I ask chat GPT if there's some sort of suspension going on and it says no. Within a minute of getting in the cab, I realize that I've been scammed. I arrive at the destination and they want to charge 102 euros. They show me what is almost certainly. a fake meter app on their phone. I tell them I know I'm being scammed, but I'll give them

a hundred euros. They accept a hundred. Anyways, it was the best taxi scam that I've seen in years of travel. Three different people involved in the dispatch, plus the driver, for total. A fake meter app, and high but not crazy prices. I suspect most people falling for this don't even know they're being scammed. O.P., you suspected you were being scammed, and you got in the car anyways, and then a On discovery that you're being scammed, you just give them all the money? I hate to say this, O.P., but I think you might not be as worldly as you seem to think you are. You know, actually, I just sold something on Facebook Marketplace, and the price was $300, and the guy comes and says, oh, here's the 200.

Nah, man, 300. Where's the other hundred? Oh, I could have sworn it was 200. My mistake, but now that I see in the text message is 300, my bad, can I zell you the rest? No, you can't zeal me the rest? go to the bank, get another $100 and come back. I mean, I wasn't rude about it. I just said, no, I can't accept 200. It's 300 cash only. People out there just have to get more comfortable with saying no. Yeah, if you say no, that's not going to work for me. It's a little awkward, a little socially uncomfortable, but it's better than getting scammed. That was R-slash scams. And if you like this content, be sure to follow my podcast because I put out new reddit podcast episodes every single day.