Page 20 THE VILLADOM TIMES I • April 24, 2013 ing on the driveway at a staggering discount. The “asphalt” is probably black paint from a deep-discount paint store. The secondary targets are the baby boomers, those born just after World War II through about 1960. Baby boomers tend not to be good at saving money, but they tend to want to be -- or act -- younger than they are, and this targets them in several ways. Baby boomers enjoy working outdoors to show they are still spry, or because they simply love nature. Police in Wyckoff have discovered a new menace: While the husband and wife are outside in the garden, the perpetrator, sometimes posing as a contractor, slips into the house though a door that was left open and makes off with whatever cash, jewelry, or high-grade electronics he can gather up in a minute or less. This scam has overtones of burglary, but the impersonation of a contractor verges it over into a sort of confidence game. Amazon wonder drugs are also big with some baby boomers. The new exotic fruit found only in the Amazon will take 40 years off your life, restore your energy, and make your hair grow back. The Indians in the Amazon - like Indians everywhere -- do not experience male pattern baldness. Sadly enough, people who know them say Amazon Indians generally live to be about 40, so if the Amazon berries really work, they do not work on the people who discovered them. Bullying also turns up. A few years ago, a woman whose first language was not English, was ordering legal therapeutic drugs by mail. She received a call from the “FDA” telling her there was a federal warrant out on her for violating the narcotics laws and if she did not want to go to prison, she should send multiple thousands of dollars. The woman may very well have come from a country where genuine public officials are not averse to bribes, but in this case the public official was anything but genuine. The money vanished, but she did not go to jail. Selling items on the Internet also has its perils. One favorite scam begins when the seller receives a check for $2,000 when he was asking for $200. The seller follows up and the buyer says the best way to deal with it is to send a refund of $1,800 and cash the check. A few days later, the seller, who has already sent out the merchandise, learns that the $2,000 check bounced. Sales of non-existent property also generate excellent returns -- until the perpetrator gets caught. A Bergen County man recently came under indictment when he obtained some five-figure checks from a number of people promising quick returns on the purchase of real estate at low prices and the resale of real estate at fair market value. Many fortunes have been made in this manner. The trouble is that the real estate the man was selling never existed. A different man met a woman at a hotel, convinced the hotel manager to give her a better room at the same price, and won her confidence that he was a true gentleman and a brilliant businessman. He then offered her a chance to finance a real estate deal that was too good to refuse, he said. Oddly enough, that money also disappeared. The sad fact of life it that it is easier for some people at the lower edge of the wage scale to get rich by stealing than it is by working -- until they get caught. When they do get caught, their savings evaporate into extended plea bargains instead of tropical vacations or weekends in Paris. Honest people are vulnerable simply because they are honest. If an honest man finds an envelope full of cash lying on the street, he can take his chances that it is not counterfeit or marked ransom money and pocket it. If the wad of cash is in a wallet with an address, he will feel compelled to hand it over to the police or find the owner. Someone I know left a bag of quarters on a New York bus, but there was an ID card with an address in the bag. A couple of days later, a woman drove up in front of the house, rang the doorbell, and gave back the plastic bag full of change. My son dropped a $50 bill in his freshman year of college and another freshman saw it fall, picked it up, tapped my son’s shoulder, and handed it to him. There are people like that from all groups. There are also people from all groups who stay awake at night trying to figure out how to separate honest men and women from their hard-earned dollars. The best way to avoid their scams is to remember the old adage: If it seems too good to be true, it probably IS too good to be true. It is also wise to tell your grandchildren to drive safely in other countries -- or to see America first. Some historians believe the central theme of American history is the unending battle between the creditors and the debtors. Now that spring is here, a sub-theme plays out as people who may have debts, but probably do not pay them, assault the bank accounts of those who do save money. The assailants are known as scam artists. The target of most scam artists is the “Depression baby” group: people born during times when money was scarce and saving was encouraged because many people lost the farm or the house and many missed meals. Those people learned the value of a dollar before the value of a dollar dropped to twelve-and-a-half cents in gold-backed currency. The Depression babies saved hard. Scammers pursue them like wolves chasing down caribou. One of the favorite scams is the grandson in trouble scheme. Grandma and Grandpa get a phone call, supposedly from a foreign country. The caller tells them their grandson, usually a college student or a recent graduate, has had a serious accident somewhere outside the United States -- Canada seems to be a favorite -- and that the Mounties have him in custody. Unless the caller gets $20,000 to hire a lawyer, the grandson will be thrown in prison. The grandparents come up with the money and send it to the lawyer by some sort of transfer method that does not facilitate delayed payment. If the grandparents are really unlucky, they may get another phone call to pay, let us say, for medical bills for the other person who was injured in the accident so that he or she does not press charges. Eventually, the grandparents get suspicious or run out of accessible savings. Then the grandson turns up and reports that he was never in Canada and absolutely not in an automobile accident. The good news is that the grandson is not locked away with imaginary surly trappers and prospectors and their sled dogs or insurgent Eskimos. The bad news is the grandparents wiped out a bank account when the grandson was never at risk. The scam is predicated on a human foible: Mothers-inlaw seldom trust daughters-in-law to do a good job of raising kids, and grandmothers expect the “spoiled” grandson to get into trouble. Freud could explain this sort of thing, but I can’t. The love of grandparents for their grandchildren is ruthlessly exploited by scammers who love money more than honor. A lot of them do. People who do not know a lot about exterior home maintenance are also targets. The scam here is for a contractor to pull up in a truck, ring the doorbell, and politely but breathlessly warn that he was driving around and noticed that the homeowner’s chimney was about to collapse. For a rather substantial amount of money, he can make sure that it does not collapse. People who have been there know the “contractor” will probably ask to be paid in cash or by personal check if at all possible, and will then clamber up on the roof, do some useless work, and report that the chimney was about to collapse, but he saved the day at the last minute. Alternatively, the contractor may pull up and tell the homeowner he was just doing a job on the next block and has some leftover asphalt that could be used for a new coat- Springtime is scam season Letters to the Editor Dear Editor: The Community Alliance of Midland Park would like to thank all of the Midland Park residents who displayed signs, carried umbrellas, spread the word, and most importantly, voted “yes” at the polls on Tuesday, April 16. It was so encouraging to see the enthusiasm in this town. CAMP views this as a first of many steps to improve our schools, foster cooperation within the town, and restore pride in Appreciative of support Midland Park. As Patricia Fantulin stated in previous articles, “Community pride begins in our schools, but it is not where it ends.” We are so proud of our residents and what we have accomplished with this vote. Together, we can do this! Elaine Seals on behalf of: Community Alliance of Midland Park FLOW Notes (continued from page 6) Franklin Lakes. The overnight event celebrates those who have battled cancer, remembering loved ones lost, and provides an opportunity to fight back against the disease. Relay for Life supports the society’s mission to save lives by helping people get well and stay well, finding cures, and fighting back. The program will begin at 5 p.m. on May 17. The opening ceremony will be held at 7 p.m. The event will continue through the night, ending at 6 a.m. on May 18. Relay teams will camp out and take turns walking or running around a track. Relay events are up to 24 hours in length and, because cancer never sleeps, each team is asked to have at least one participant on the track at all times. To register, or for more information, contact Kaitlin Chieco at (201) 457-3418, extension 2218, kaitlin. chieco@cancer.org, or visit RelayForLife.org/flowNJ. Gold Masque presents musical comedy Ramapo High School and Gold Masque Productions will present “The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee” on April 25, 26, and 27 at 7 p.m. The production will be held at the Ramapo High School Auditorium located at 331 George Street in Franklin Lakes. This musical comedy centers on a fictional spelling bee set at a geographically ambiguous middle school. Six quirky adolescents compete in the contest, which is run by three equally-quirky adults. The Tony Award-winning show is unusual as four audience members are invited onstage at each performance to compete in the spelling bee alongside the children. The audience never knows what will happen at each performance. Tickets purchased in advance are $10 for adults and $5 for students and seniors. To order tickets, e-mail mlambrix@rih.org. The cost for tickets purchased at the door will be $12 for adults and $10 for students and seniors.