"I kidnapped your daughter": Mother warns of frightening phone scam that cost her thousands
MINNEAPOLIS – A Minneapolis woman is sounding the alarm on a frightening scam that cost her thousands of dollars.
When Linda Austad received a call from an unknown number Saturday, it set in motion a six-hour ordeal.
"There was a girl that was crying, and she said, 'Mom, I was in an accident,' and it sounded just like my daughter," Austad said.
Then Austad says a man took the phone. At first, he said he was a police officer, but then he changed his story.
"[He said] 'I kidnapped your daughter, and you need to follow my instructions and you need to stay on the phone with me or I'll cut off her finger or kill her,'" Austad said.
He also told her he was in a drug cartel. Keeping her talking nearly the whole time, the man had Austad drive to several Walmarts and complete money transfers to people in Mexico. She sent $2,800.
"I was under so much stress because I thought for sure he had her, because it sounded just like her," Austad said. "It was just the scariest day of my life."
When the last of the money went through, the scammer finally came clean and hung up. Austad confirmed her daughter was safe.
"I don't want anyone else to have to go through the torture that I went through," she said.
We dialed the Minnesota number that called Austad, but no one answered.
Unfortunately, this scam hasn't just happened to her. The Washington County Sheriff's Office tweeted Sunday that a scammer called someone in Hugo saying their daughter was in his trunk and a woman could be heard screaming.
The tweet says the man drove to his daughter's house and found her to be OK while keeping the suspect on the phone.
Austad says she wishes she thought to do something like that.
"He could hear every word I was saying, so I didn't want, you know, to compromise my daughter," she said.
Austad says a police dispatcher told her to call 311 on Monday and file a report.
