A Tennessee man has been arrested for attempting to scam an Izard County woman out of nearly $20,000. Darren James Burton, 30, of Clarksville, Tennessee, was arrested in Searcy on Saturday and charged with four felonies. According to the Izard County Sheriff’s Office’s probable cause affidavit, the victim reported the fraud on November 19 after receiving a text stating that $19,400 had been taken from her bank account. Shortly after receiving the text, the victim began receiving phone calls from the fraudster, who said she had been hacked and offered to help her retrieve her money.
The man told the woman to put $19,400 in a box marked “Merry Christmas,” and he’d send a courier to pick it up. Once gathered, he would duplicate the funds and transfer them back into the victim’s account. The suspect repeatedly pressured the victim not to inform anyone about their chat, claiming that doing so would put her and her family at risk. The scammer called when the driver was ready to pick up the box, saying the driver had an accident and couldn’t come.
The following day, investigators from the sheriff’s office and the 16th Judicial Drug Task Force began surveillance on the victim’s residence and observed many phone contacts with at least two distinct suspects. The callers claimed to have captured five of the seven “hackers” and were pursuing the remaining two. They instructed the victim not to inform anyone about their chats or the hackers. The calls persisted for several days, revealing to investigators that the suspects were either having difficulty finding the victim’s address or that the “money mules” were unable to get to the region…