

LONGMEADOW — Police credit an astute Big Y World Class Market employee with preventing an elderly woman from wiring $900 to a scammer Friday afternoon.

Capt. John Stankiewicz said the woman was contacted by a man, claiming to be a law enforcement official in Mexico City, Mexico, who told her that her son was being detained and that a $900 Western Union wire transfer was needed for his release.

Stankiewicz said the employee called police, who determined it was scam, and the transaction was cancelled before it could go through.

Such scams have become quite common in Western Massachusetts in recent years and Stankiewicz said they are reported in Longmeadow some 4 or 5 times a year.

In a similar scam, reported several weeks ago, a Longmeadow woman lost $2,845 after a female scammer claimed to be a police sergeant and told the victim she had been flagged for a “tax liability”

The victim was told she would have a warrant issued for her arrest if she didn’t pay up immediately via reloadable debit cards known as Green Dot MoneyPak cards.

The woman obtained the cards and provided the scammer with the numeric codes needed to access the cash. After the transaction was completed, the woman realized that she had been scammed and called police. It was too late, however, to recover the money, Stankiewicz said.

Last month an elderly East Longmeadow man lost $1,400 to a scammer who told the victim that his grandson had been in a car accident in Las Vegas and was responsible for $1,400 worth of repairs.