The Expert Podcast

If you've been a victim of some type of online scam or online fraud, you may be very, very upset, frustrated, and angry at the scammers for having taken your money. There are ways to investigate it, look at recovery, do an investigation, or prosecute, and we've talked about that before. The link below will tell you some of those methods. Here's one way not to try to get your money back. This was a guy in India. He was arrested because he was a victim who went and kidnapped employees of the platform where he lost his money to try to get his money back.

India's law enforcement has arrested a man suspected of kidnapping two people connected to a Ponzi scheme in an attempt to recover his investment. This person lost money investing in a digital currency, and it was likely a Ponzi scheme. In order to recover his investment, the person, along with accomplices, kidnapped two employees and tried to extort Bitcoin from them. So, if you're a victim of a scam or fraud or a crime, it's bad news.

You lost money, and you want to get your money back. It may be a life-altering event—maybe it's your retirement or your life savings—and it can be frustrating. However, don't let that anger or frustration make you do something stupid, like trying to kidnap someone. We've seen cases where victims have tried to shoot the scammers. You don't want to do that. Don't let it ruin your life. There are legal methods to recover funds from a scam or fraud.

There are legal ways to do this. If you try something sketchy, what's going to happen is, even in the best-case scenario, if you're not arrested, your actions might prevent you from ever getting your money back. In fact, we talked to a victim and the law enforcement working with them, who lost money in a Ponzi scheme. It wasn’t a Bitcoin Ponzi scheme—it was a real estate Ponzi scheme. Their local law enforcement, the district attorney, and the state police in their area were working on this case, trying to get the person their money back. We were doing investigations to get evidence for this government agency.

In the middle of the case, the victim started sending death threats and threatening messages to the scammers. Because of this, the government decided to drop his case. They weren’t going to work on it anymore, even though they knew he had lost money and these people were scammers. They said, “You know what? The fact that you’ve now made these death threats means you can no longer be a valid witness in the case.” If they ever prosecute this person and bring them to court, they would need to call the victim as a witness to testify. However, if the victim made death threats, the scammer can just say, “This person’s not credible because they threatened my life,” and they're probably going to lose the case.

So, don’t do anything stupid. Don’t make threats or do anything problematic because it could cause you to not only lose your money but also your freedom. This person got lucky they weren’t prosecuted, but the victim who made death threats could have been arrested for committing a crime. This is how not to do it. There are many ways you can pursue an investigation to get your money back, but making threats or trying to kidnap someone is definitely not the way to go.

There's a lot more information on our website, activeintel.com. You can also schedule a live consultation with a licensed private investigator at that link if you'd like to discuss your case further and get more details on what you can and maybe can't do.

Thank you for watching. Remember, you can access live, one-on-one personal consultations with a licensed private investigator, a licensed commercial insurance broker, a licensed certified real estate title examiner, and a certified civil court mediator. If you need to talk to an expert in any of these fields—or even a licensed building general contractor—you can click the link below at actualhuman.com and arrange a live, one-on-one session where you can ask any questions and get information about your situation. We'd be glad to help.