Fake Doctor Runs Phony Medical Spa Scheme, Part 1

[00:00:01] Bob: This week on The Perfect Scam.

[00:00:03] Holly Saunders: They said, "Do you have a picture of this guy?" And so I pulled up this picture of Dr. Dan on my phone, and he's sitting there in a white coat, but he's got Dr. Dan embroidered on his coat. But it's like the embroidery you would use on a towel or something. And Joe, being a surgeon, he looked at it and he said, "Uh, nope, nobody does that. That is absolutely a no. Don't do anything with him.”

(MUSIC SEGUE)

[00:00:39] Bob: Welcome back to The Perfect Scam. I'm your host Bob Sullivan. Jill Alper and Holly Saunders had a great friendship. They were neighbors in South Carolina who bonded because they were both raising twins. So when the kids got older and opportunity presented itself, it seemed only natural for them to go into business together. But when they did, they never imagined they'd end up on the phone with a reporter from Western Massachusetts who'd been tracking the exploits of a serial con artist for more than two decades. And together, these three women decided it was high time to freeze this con man out of the crime business. Today, we begin a two-part series on a medical spa franchise opportunity that went south. But our story actually begins up north.

[00:01:33] Stephanie Barry: My name is Stephanie Barry, and I am an investigative reporter in Springfield, Massachusetts. I work for The Republican and MassLive.com.

[00:01:43] Bob: Is it fair to call you Western Massachusetts largest newspaper?

[00:01:45] Stephanie Barry: Yes.

[00:01:46] Bob: Okay.

[00:01:47] Stephanie Barry: Yep.

[00:01:47] Bob: So how, how long have you been there?

[00:01:49] Stephanie Barry: So I have been at The Republican since 2003, and that's when I first encountered Dana Dray McCann.

[00:01:58] Bob: Dana Dray McCann. Stephanie was doing what all new reporters do when they first start out. She was shadowing a more experienced journalist, watching what was going on, trying to figure out when she'd get a byline and mostly, staying out of the way while watching Dana Dray McCann.

[00:02:16] Stephanie Barry: I was a brand-new reporter. I was covering federal court, and he was being sentenced for many, many counts of fraud in Federal Court in Springfield. And so I was so new that I didn't cover his trial. But I was sitting in as like a trainee listening to the sentencing uh, with an older, more experienced reporter.

[00:02:40] Bob: There wasn't supposed to be much drama that day. McCann was there just to be sentenced which normally would only take a few minutes. But he was given the chance to make a statement to the court and boy did he.

[00:02:53] Stephanie Barry: So Dana McCann got up and spoke at length in front of a federal judge, who had, he was a Rhodes Scholar, this judge, and had a reputation of being very easy, you know, being very liberal in terms of his sentencings. So Dana McCann went off on this diatribe for probably nearly an hour, which is very long by these standards, talking about all of his talents and everything from being a writer, to a musician, to writing jingles for advertising agencies, to being a poet.

[00:03:33] Bob: And, and this is your first, second, third, whatever day on the job?

[00:03:38] Stephanie Barry: Just about. Just about, yeah.

[00:03:40] Bob: (chuckling) What did you make of this?

[00:03:42] Stephanie Barry: I, I, I thought, do all sentencings go this way? And I just remember listening to him with interest and kind of cringing inside because there was so much like braggadocio and backslapping and I, I found it almost embarrassing to watch, and I thought, who would ever buy this guy's whatever he's selling? But the fact of the matter was a lot of people have.

[00:04:11] Bob: There was something special about McCann, Stephanie remembers.

[00:04:15] Stephanie Barry: He was an average looking man. He was in orange prison garb, which is flattering to no one. I suppose that he was handsome enough, and I guess he was eloquent enough. His voice was kind of musical. I don't mean he was singing the opera, but you know, he had a nice presentation. He just has a fair amount of charisma, and I think charisma gets you a long way.

[00:04:42] Bob: It didn't get him a long way with the judge, Michael Ponsor, however. He might have been known for being lenient from the bench, but not this time.

[00:04:52] Stephanie Barry: And the just indulged him for a very long time and finally said, "I'm going to stop you right here. And I never, ever do this. But I am sentencing you to the maximum penalty that the law allows." And that was 7 years in prison. So that was in 2003.

[00:05:14] Bob: So McCann goes away for a long time. Seven years pass; Stephanie goes on to become an award-winning investigative reporter. McCann serves his time and ends up back in Judge Ponsor's courtroom almost immediately.

[00:05:30] Stephanie Barry: In 2010, I was sitting in federal court on another matter, I can't recall what it was, but one of the US Marshalls scooched over to me on the court bench and whispered in my ear, "Do you remember Dana McCann?" And I said, "Vaguely. Vaguely I do, why?" He said, "Well, he's on the lam and we have been tasked with finding him." I said, "Really? Tell me about that." So he had gotten out of prison, made his way to the Greater Boston area, hitched his wagon to a wealthy divorcee, so she had a lot of money, and they stayed in one of the swankiest hotels in Boston for a couple of months, stiffed the hotel for I think it was 30 something thousand dollars. And he stole $125,000 in her jewelry and took off. So she called the police, and then somehow the police in New York City, I believe he kinda tried to pull the same thing at a very fancy hotel in New York City that he was staying there, somehow convinced them that he could stay there. He had a line of credit, and then he stiffed them on the bill. So that hotel called New York City detectives and they started pursuing him. And so because he was still on probation, the, the US Marshalls got involved and they tracked him to Long Island.

[00:07:07] Bob: So McCann is arrested and eventually lands back in that same Massachusetts court again, back before Judge Ponsor. And the judge put him away as long as he could, again, but his hands were a bit tied.

[00:07:22] Stephanie Barry: The judge could only give him two years because his violations were actually probation violations, which only allows you to sentence, you know, kind of a minimal prison term. And then he acted like he was repentant, and the judge said, and I believe I quoted him in at least one or not more stories, "You are the most unrepentant, dangerous fraudster I have ever encountered." So then he went away for another couple of years.

[00:07:50] Bob: And in her story about that sentencing, Stephanie also used another quote from the judge who made quite an alarming prediction that day.

[00:08:00] Bob: I have this, I'm dying to ask you about where this judge who seemed to have a very colorful career as well, “what on earth is going to happen to him, and what's to become of the rest of us once he's on the loose again?”

[00:08:12] Stephanie Barry: Right. So that was prophetic, um, obviously. And I think Judge Ponsor, the judge, was really being sincere about that, because I think he felt, “I don't know what's going to stop this man. And God help us all if you bump into this guy in business or in romance.” And he was right.

(MUSIC SEGUE)

[00:08:43] Bob: Jill Alper is an art dealer who has traveled the world. She's lived in Africa and New Zealand, but when it was time to start a family she landed in South Carolina, her happy place, she told me. But when she started that family, well it kind of happened all at once. She was pregnant with twins, and that's how she meets Holly Saunders.

[00:09:05] Jill Alper: Holly's a little bit older than I, and every year we, we travel somewhere. We are really great friends. I used to live in Laurens, South Carolina, and she lived down the street from me. And I'll never forget, I was pregnant with the twins and, and then she came into the driveway, and she said, "Hey, I'm your neighbor. I'm Holly Saunders. I have twins, and I'm going to be here for you." I remember her saying like, it's going to be okay. I know it, it seems like a big deal, you know, you're pregnant, and she's like, "I'm going to help you." Her twins are, they're in their probably 30s or 40s now. So anyways, we became friends 16 years ago.

[00:09:44] Bob: Holly remembers the dawn of their friendship the same way.

[00:09:48] Holly Saunders: I'm 69, and I don't even know how old Jill is. But she's, she's younger, but we were neighbors, and so when she was pregnant with her twins, mine were, oh gosh, I guess 10 or something already. And so that kind of was our original bond together. I just remember telling her, you can do this. And it will get easier, but we've had a wonderful, wonderful friendship since those early days as being neighbors in Laurens.

[00:10:24] Bob: As her kids start to get older, Jill begins to look around for business ideas in and out of the art dealer industry.

[00:10:32] Jill Alper: So the, the art business has only been for like five years. Before that I was in banking. I had a durable medical equipment company, so I've, you know, I've done lots of different things, but then I got to a point where I wanted to do something creative, so I decided to start a company with a friend of mine, and we would take local art outside of South Carolina, and, and sell it in these beautiful homes in Atlanta, Charleston, and we'd have these big events and it was a lot of fun until COVID hit. I had just started the business. We were just starting to have these shows, maybe every, you know, six months; it wasn't a, you know, something I was doing every day, but it was kind of a part-time and as a single mom it worked great for my schedule. So that's kind of where I was at when I met him in 2019.

[00:11:22] Bob: That's where she meets him -- Dr. Dan. Not at an art show, but at a theater performance.

[00:11:31] Jill Alper: In Greenville, we have an amazing downtown, and lots of arts, culture, and we have a, a place that we have off Broadway shows, and I usually get tickets for the year, and I went to one of the, the shows, and I was really bored. For some reason, it just, I was just kind of falling asleep and I went with some friends. I'm like, "I gotta go. I was planning on..." well I was going to take my daughter to camp the next day, and then fly out to Spain two days later. So I, I walked out of the Broadway... off Broadway play, and I was going to call an Uber, and he, I was dressed, you know, when you go to a Broadway play or off Broadway you, you dress nice, and I was definitely dressed up and I'm, waiting. Beautiful night, just kind of waiting on my ride, and he walks up to me. He had, he had like a, a golf shirt with a horse emblem on the front of it, like something breeder, you know, something where he owned a horse farm or, you know, we just, we just started talking. Just very, "How are you doing?" "You look so," you know, just, you know, complimentary and he, he said, we just started talking about life and um, and he's just super interesting. And he said, "Would you like to go get a drink?" It was across the street, and I said, "No, you know, I'm not interested." But we kept talking and you know, he, he said he was in town 'cause he had, he sells horses. We have a huge horse area in Tryon, North Carolina. He's down here, you know, getting some dinner while he just dropped off all these horses, and showed me his card where he's a plastic surgeon from Beverly Hills, and, and I mean he just started to just telling me about his life. I said, "I'm going to Spain." He knew how to speak Spanish. I mean I was just very intrigued by this man.

[00:13:22] Bob: As she waits for her Uber, it seems to take forever getting there. This man just keeps chatting away. Then he pulls out his phone to share pictures of his life in Beverly Hills. And he gives her the nugget of an idea, an opportunity.

[00:13:39] Jill Alper: He showed me pictures of like him and Kate Moss. I mean he had, it was something to back everything he said. Because I, I usually have my guard up a little bit with men. I'm like, okay, what, you know, this is really interesting, but he just, he is smooth. No doubt about it. So that was our conversation and he said he's going to open up some spas in Greenville and he, he had this whole, you know, there's something called CoolSculpting that a lot of us know about and it's, it's pretty expensive, and they're all over every city. I mean I feel like every doctor's office, dermatologist, they're all, they're all doing it. And so when he was telling me about his fat freezing, you know, it's a, a lot cheaper and the, you know, it just intrigued me, because what a great thing to, to be a part of with my schedule, with, you know, I could do my art, I could have, in my mind I'm thinking, ooh, I could have the spa here and have my own hours. It just, it made sense. I'm helping women. You know, just, it just all made sense.

[00:14:38] Bob: The Uber finally arrives and Jill speeds away headed for her Spanish vacation with friend, Holly. But even in Europe, she can't stop thinking about this business opportunity, and how it might really be the perfect fit for her. In fact, she texts with this man a little bit more while she's away. Finally, she opens up to Holly about this chance meeting with Dr. Dan. Holly is very supportive right away.

[00:15:06] Holly Saunders: She told me about this machine, this business possibility, this, or opportunity, and I said, "Jill, I think this is an answer to a prayer. I honestly think this is a great thing for you, particularly. Because you can pick up your children from carpool, you can do, you know, you can be a volunteer mom in their school. You can be a, a housewife, a mom, everything and have this business, and it'll be yours." And at some point I said to her, "And I'll tell you, I like it, and I'm interested. And I would be very interested in having a partnership business with you.

[00:15:51] Bob: So when the vacation is over, and the friends are back in South Carolina, Jill starts to do her due diligence. She learns more about how Dr. Dan got into the fat freezing business. He tells her to call a spa in New York to talk with one of his colleagues. She confirms a lot of what Dr. Dan had said.

[00:16:12] Jill Alper: He was a, a baseball, a professional baseball player, or not professional, but you know, the way the leagues before, but he had a, he had pictures of him being a baseball player. He also said he had like a brain, he got hit by the ball or something, and that's why he had a little bit of a shake. So his hands would shake a little bit and that's why he could not be a plastic surgeon anymore. So he decided to go into the, the fat freezing business. I'm like, wow, I mean this guy is, this guy's real.

[00:16:44] Bob: So Jill decides it's time for Dr. Dan to meet Holly and what better time than one of her art shows. But that night, it's Dr. Dan who really steals the show.

[00:16:57] Jill Alper: My company, we set up art, I think we, we were on the lake in Gainesville at this beautiful home. We usually connect with a nonprofit, so we give money, whatever we sell, we give a portion of it back, and we had a huge group of women come to the show. And he shows up in a suit, which I had never seen him in a suit, and he walks in, and he's like, I want that piece, I want that piece, and I'm like, this is great. He's going to buy art. And he sits down at the piano at this lady's house, and he starts playing like he is on, he's in New York on Broadway. I mean the whole, all the people are around him stunned. He is singing and I mean it was like a performance I had never seen in someone's house. And I don't, it's just, out of nowhere. And I look at Holly, I'm like, oh my, I mean who is this guy? He, he just, he can dab in anything and, and he, I mean everyone was just blown away by this performance.

[00:17:58] Bob: This accomplished piano player, doctor, entrepreneur who speaks multiple languages and wants to buy art? He seems heaven sent. Still, heaven is one thing, payment for art is another.

[00:18:13] Jill Alper: So he's done, but he picks out at least 5 or 6, 7 paintings, and I said, "You can't take them until you pay me." He was like, you know, "I need to get my CPA to send a check," and, "Can I take some?" I'm like, "No, you cannot. With this business, you have to pay before you take."

[00:18:30] Bob: Still, Holly spends a lot of that night talking with Dr. Dan about his practice, his horses, his baseball career, and comes away impressed by everything except his car.

[00:18:43] Holly Saunders: Now, I do remember one of the girls that's one of Jill's partners, we were standing outside, and we watched him leave, and he left in this ratty car. And he flies, I mean he just zooms. He takes off like a banshee. And so, anyway, I remember Courtney said, "Well, not liking his car" or something like that. And I said, "I know. It's just not, not sharp at all."

[00:19:15] Bob: Soon after the art show, and that piano performance, Dr. Dan starts to get some paperwork to Jill which she shares with Holly and things start to seem very real.

[00:19:27] Jill Alper: He had given me this huge manual, like 100 pages. It is every detail of this business. The grids of how to make money. What to say. How, the training of how using it, and with these places he told us, as long as there's a doctor, you could open up these little spas. He would, he could have, you know, 10 of them and as long as there's a, a medical person involved, then we're good. And you know, I just, he, you know, everything just, was just this sounds good, wow, this is great.

[00:20:01] Bob: Still the pair of new partners want confirmation about just what they're getting into. So, they take a road trip to see the business in action.

[00:20:11] Holly Saunders: So one hot, Sunday afternoon, we drove to right outside of Atlanta and go to like an office plaza park, and it was a nice looking one, not bad at all, like professional doctor's plaza. And he wasn't there, so we sat on the steps and waited a while, and I noticed all sorts of people were coming in the building next to us, and so anyway, he comes, zooms in in that ratty car, parks, tells us to stay seated, goes to the door, couldn't get in the door. And he was like, "Ah, I don't have the key" or "They've changed the locks," or something like that. "Sit tight, I'll be right back." And he said, "I live real close to here." So zooms out of there, he's back in no time, and I thought, he didn't go home. He hasn't had time to go home. He literally gets out of the car with cat burglar tools. So anyway, he gets in the door...

[00:21:17] Bob: Wait, he breaks in basically?

[00:21:20] Holly Saunders: I'm not sure how he got in. 'Cause I, he told us to stay seated which we did, we didn't really stand behind him and look. But he got in there.

[00:21:30] Bob: A bit confused, but nothing else seems wrong. So Holly and Jill proceed to see for themselves how fat freezing technology works.

[00:21:40] Holly Saunders: It's like going into a doctor's office, or a spa office, like if you get a facial or something. It was nice -- sort of. It didn't look real super-duper, just somehow it just didn't look that clean to me. It wasn't filthy at all. But he had this business on Groupon. The girl that ran it, she walks in. She was very nice and very gentle type of a person. You know, she kind of took a back seat to him. I said, "So, is this working well? I mean are you getting a lot of customers?" She went, "Oh yes, yes, yeah." And he's doing the procedure on Jill. I think she was first, and then me, and telling us how to do the machine and telling us how to put this there and that there. And, and I thought, you know, that's easy. I mean I; I can handle this. I know I can handle this. There's just nothing complicated about it.

[00:22:47] Bob: Nothing complicated about it. Perhaps the perfect side business. So they have lunch and talk about their good fortune.

[00:22:57] Holly Saunders: And so Jill and I proceeded to go to eat pizza. And so talked about how much money we were going to make and laughed, and just had a good time.

[00:23:09] Bob: Back in South Carolina, they start running the numbers. Dr. Dan can sell them a machine for $15,000, but there are plenty of other start-up costs too. They start looking for a storefront, start talking to landlords about leases. Dr. Dan wants to come and see how the setup might work.

[00:23:28] Holly Saunders: Okay, so he says he's coming to Greenville to talk to us about where to set up and just the real details of putting together a business. And so he comes to Jill's home, and I was there. We go downtown, we knew a friend of ours had an office space available, and so we looked at the building and he said, "Let me just run around and look at the neighborhood and just see what I think about this neighborhood and blah, blah, blah, blah." He took off, so we, we were looking in the building ourselves and talking about well this room could be for the lobby, and this could be where we put the machine, and this needs to be painted, and this, that, and the other. And so the rent was maybe, I don't remember, 1200, 900, 1200? I don't remember. Then you'd have to have pull in telephone, networking, all sorts of stuff. So I'm thinking to myself, whoa, here I am trying to set something up in downtown Greenville. This is a pretty expensive endeavor, monthly payment, that I really am not real sure I want to get into. So I'm having my doubts there.

[00:24:42] Bob: While Holly is starting to get just a bit of cold feet when the numbers start turning into reality, Jill is full speed ahead.

[00:24:52] Jill Alper: Anyway, he goes back to Greenville, and I start really going over the paperwork. I'm all in. So Holly and I were going to do this together, and then he really starts in my ear like, you need to do this on your own. And now I understand, 'cause he wanted to sell two or three machines. If Holly and I went in together for the spa, then it would have been one sale for him. You know, so he's trying to get more money. So I told Holly, I'm like why don't you do it in Laurens where she lived, and I'll do it here, and she was kind of stunned, like what are you talking about? But he was so in my ear, I made that decision like, I need to do this on my own.

[00:25:35] Bob: Just then, the opportunity starts to sound even sweeter to Jill. Dr. Dan has come by a discounted machine.

[00:25:43] Jill Alper: He came to Greenville, and he said, "Listen, my, I have a friend who's a chiropractor, and she, I literally talked to her on the phone, and she has a machine, and she says that her mom or someone's sick and she needs to get rid of it. Do you want it? I'll do it for $10,000 instead of $15,000." And I was like, okay, okay, you know. So anyway, he came to Greenville, and he goes, "I need cash." I said, "Okay." At this point we are, you know, I've talked to him a ton, we've already gone through the training. I know the business. I mean he has shown me so many pictures of like the spas, people using it. I mean it's just, it just was like, okay.

[00:26:31] Bob: Dr. Dan wants payment right away, however.

[00:26:34] Jill Alper: I gave him $4,000 in cash, and then once we got all the contract signed, I mean there was a full contract to even get this machine. And once I got all that information, and I talked to the chiropractor, I saw pictures of it, I saw serial numbers of it; it was already crated. I got pictures of that. You know, he sent pictures of the whole process.

[00:26:56] Bob: You wired him the, the remaining $6,000, right?

[00:26:58] Jill Alper: Right.

[00:26:59] Bob: So all told, it's less than two months from the day she had met Dr. Dan, to the day she sends him $10,000. She's ready to sign a lease on that office space, but she hasn't pulled the trigger yet. She decides to wait for the machine to get there. That turns out to be a good choice because she's going to have to wait a long time.

[00:27:21] Jill Alper: I said, "Alright, what's the update?" And then he would text me back. "You know, there's a storm in blah, blah, blah... and it's on..." I mean, it was like, this is when I'm like, this is just so weird. And, you know, there was always something going but, you know, I would get updates. It's kind of like here comes your puppy from across the country and here's your updates of it. You know you're, it's an investment, and, and I was super excited. I'm, I'm studying, I'm learning all I can. But the, you know it, it just, there was one excuse after another and I'm just, it's just not feeling good.

[00:27:59] Bob: Meanwhile, Holly is keeping an eye out for the machine's arrival. Despite her cold feet, she's still thinking about investing in her own place. And during this time, she goes to visit one of her kids and tells the little party about this exciting opportunity.

[00:28:16] Holly Saunders: My oldest and her husband, they also live in Greenville, and they said, "Come over for a drink tonight, Mom. Joe's going to be here." Joe is my daughter's best friend from growing up. He is a Mohs surgeon in Charleston, and he was in town to fill in for someone's practice for the week because the other doctor was on a trip or something. And I said, "Oh, okay. Great." And so it's a Thursday night, and I was telling them about this venture, and they all just laughed at me and said, "Look, you cra--, what is this? What in the world are you getting yourself into?" And I said, "No, I think it's legit. I do. I mean wow, it's a great opportunity." They said, "Do you have a picture of this guy?" And I said, "Well, yeah, let me, here." And so I pulled up this picture of Dr. Dan on my phone, and he's sitting there in a white coat, but he's got Dr. Dan embroidered on his coat. But it's like the embroidery you would use on a towel or something. And Joe, being a surgeon, he looked at it and he said, "Uh, nope, nobody does that. I mean nobody does that. That is absolutely a no." They said, "Don't do anything with him. Don't do anything with him, just hold off." And I said, "All right, well I'm going to do a little more research on him." And so I come home, house is quiet, everybody's in bed. I go upstairs to my room. I googled, I put one more "n" on the "n" end of McCan, in other words, I looked up Dan, M-c-C-a-n-n. Boom. Up comes scammer, blah, blah, blah. His pictures. The history, the lawsuits or the whatevers, and I mean I just couldn't believe it. I, I absolutely was stunned, and I thought that, there he is. That's him.

[00:30:34] Bob: Dan McCann, that's him! What Holly finds that night is story after story, most of them written by Stephanie Barry up in Massachusetts chronicling the wild crimes of Dan McCann.

[00:30:48] Holly Saunders: And so, I immediately texted, called Jill, I mean just called, texted, just sent her or forwarded her the thing about him online, I didn't hear a thing. I was babysitting for a granddaughter, didn't have a car, and I was texting and calling Jill; just stalking her on Friday. Nothing. She didn't answer, she didn't respond whatsoever. And so I was just furious to tell you the truth. And Lee, my Lilly's twin, is in Laurens and she said, "Mom, do you want me to call the cops? Should I send them over there?" And I said, "No, the minute Lilly gets home I'm getting in that car and going to Jill's." And so I did.

[00:31:45] Bob: And when she sees Jill, it's not good.

[00:31:49] Holly Saunders: I parked, I walked up to the front, her daughter Ellison comes to the door shaking her head like, "Uh-uh, no, no." And I said, "Is your mother here?" And she went, "Yeah, but I don't think she's doing real well." And I said, "Where is she?" And I mean I just burst into her room. And Jill's in bed, just like a zombie, and I said, "What are you doing? What in the world? Why haven't you answered my calls, my texts? I have been worried to death about you." And she said, "I've been at the FBI all morning." And I said, "Oh my gosh." And then ding-dong, I'm not very intuitive sometimes, she said, "Holly, I sent him $10,000 two weeks ago or a week ago or whatever ago." And I went, "Oh my gosh, okay." So it all made sense then ... sort of.

[00:32:55] Bob: Yeah, yeah.

[00:32:56] Holly Saunders: And um, I thought, okay. Well, you've saved me 15,000. I mean it's really kind of tragic. Anyway, she was just a mess. She was embarrassed, she was physically sick, she just felt so stupid that she had allowed this to happen to her. And I said, "Jill, stop. Just don't even go there."

[00:33:21] Bob: Instead, Holly has another place she wants to go; she wants to get revenge.

[00:33:28] Holly Saunders: I said, "Jill, the only person who can take this man out of business is me. And I'm going to do that. I'm going to sign up for a machine."

[00:33:46] Bob: I'm going to sign up for a machine? Holly wants to buy another fat freezing device from a man she now believes is a scammer? What happens next? That's next week on The Perfect Scam.

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[00:34:13] Bob: If you have been targeted by a scam or fraud, you are not alone. Call the AARP Fraud Watch Network Helpline at 877-908-3360. Their trained fraud specialists can provide you with free support and guidance on what to do next. Thank you to our team of scambusters; Associate Producer, Annalea Embree; Researcher, Sarah Binney; Executive Producer, Julie Getz; and our Audio Engineer and Sound Designer, Julio Gonzalez. Be sure to find us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. For AARP's The Perfect Scam, I'm Bob Sullivan.

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