The first text message from my bank was short and seemed fairly routine, and it vibrated from my phone to get my attention:
Bank Security: Your debit card ending in XXXX was used at XXXX for $.90. Declined 9/26. Did you authorize this activity? Reply YES or NO.
It was a relief to know that my longtime bank was looking after me, and because I hadn’t authorized a purchase in such an odd amount, I texted, “NO,” thinking that would be the end of it. But less than two seconds later, I got a phone call. Now I was on edge.
By September 2023, I’d been producing my independent podcast for three years. While the show focused mostly on missing people and true crime in North and South Carolina, because cybercrime had become so prevalent, I decided to produce an episode on it — specifically on how to avoid being a victim.
I put out a call for experts to interview and found Patrick, who had created artificial intelligence software to block scams on a variety of platforms. On the morning of Sept. 27, just minutes before my world imploded, I’d been reviewing my notes and preparing to log on to a Zoom call with Patrick.
The timing for my own fraud alert could not have been more ironic, and even though Patrick lingered in the Zoom waiting room, I knew this was a phone call I needed to take. It wouldn’t take long, I told myself.
The man on the other end of the line claimed to be from my bank and spoke quickly, in a friendly and helpful tone. He sounded professional and erudite — like he could have been in my circle of friends. He stated they’d noticed two suspicious Zelle payments on my account, and when I told him I hadn’t scheduled any such transfers, he said he’d help me reverse the charges.
I followed his directions.
1. Open my bank’s app and Zelle.
2. Create a new contact named Renee RLR.
3. Enter number XXX-XXX-XXX, which would act as my “claim” number.
4. Do this twice, once in the amount of $1,922 and again for $1,263.
Before we hung up, I asked the man if this was related to the 90-cent debit charge I’d just been notified about.
“That’s how scammers start,” he replied, exuding sympathy. “They run a small charge and then go in for larger amounts.” Before the call ended, he advised me not to open my account on any browser for at least 24 hours to make sure that the reversal went through.
At these words, my blood ran cold. My phone dinged with two text messages notifying me I’d just sent $3,180 total to the contact I’d created. My mouth was instantly dry.
I logged on to the Zoom call with Patrick. I gave him a quick rundown of what had just happened while my heart pounded so loudly I swear my microphone must have picked it up. The concerned look on his face confirmed that I’d been scammed.
“You need to hang up right now and call your bank,” he said.
I paced the floor as I waited to get a representative on the phone. It was immediately evident that more than $3,000 had been siphoned from my account. Susan, the bank rep, dutifully filed my claim but warned that because I had authorized the “payments” myself, the bank might not be able to process a refund. She arranged to send me a new debit card, but by then, waves of nausea rolled over my body. What on earth had I done?
Courtesy of Renee Roberson
My husband Daniel and I both grew up with parents who worked blue-collar jobs, and we were first-generation college students who barely scraped by before entering the professional world. By 2023, we’d been diligently focused on our careers, working hard and raising two children, and we felt we could finally start saving, which was critical now with one child in college and another on the way there. By some standards, such a loss of money might have been considered minor, but the crisis brought back painful memories of my unstable childhood, an era I had tried so hard to put behind me.
My parents divorced when I was still a toddler, and my mother moved back home to live in a trailer on my grandparents’ property while they helped watch me during the day. I later learned my biological father, David, had been physically and verbally abusive to her. She eventually met the man who would become my stepfather, and although I never went hungry, they struggled continually to make ends meet.
Throughout my childhood, I’d had sporadic visits with David, but most of them were orchestrated by his mother, my paternal grandmother. Though he was court-ordered to pay child support, he never did. When I got old enough to ask my mom about it, she simply shrugged and said, “He doesn’t have it. What am I supposed to do?”
The last time I saw my father in person was 2002, when I traveled to Louisiana for a cousin’s wedding. David arrived at our hotel room, unannounced, with a frozen daiquiri in his hand that he kept encouraging me to drink, but I shortly left, horrified, especially since I was in my first trimester of pregnancy.
He later showed up at the wedding reception, drunk, and told me my mom had ruined his life when they married. That’s when I knew I had to put some distance between us for my own mental health. Occasionally, he would have friends message me on Facebook to let me know he “wanted to meet my kids,” and I promptly blocked each of them.
Courtesy of Renee Roberson
Living with financial insecurity for so many years indelibly shaped my view of money. My life was never about luxury or keeping up with the neighbors. Money represented stability, freedom from the cockroach-infested rental homes of my childhood, and the chance to set an example for my own children. This sudden loss due to my own naivety threatened my family’s future, which brought me enormous guilt.
However, the emotional toil didn’t stop there. I was also humiliated. There was no getting over the sad fact that I, a good citizen and savvy podcaster trying to help other people avoid this same crime, had become a victim myself.
These feelings fueled my quest for justice. It wasn’t just about the money anymore. Everything was on the line for me — my family, my self-worth and my peace of mind — and the glib-tongued swindler who sweet-talked his way into my bank account had no idea who he was up against. So for the next two months, I fought to the bone to get that $3,000 back using every available resource.
First, I filed fraud claims with the local police and the cybercrimes division of the FBI. I never heard back from either, but that didn’t deter me. You could argue that I had always had a premonition that this very thing would happen because, long ago, we signed our family up for programs meant to protect us, including identity theft insurance and prepaid legal services. Unfortunately, neither of these services panned out, either. In fact, an attorney I spoke with went so far as to tell me I should “let it go,” because if I pursued it, my bank could decide to drop me as a client!
With a heavy heart, I eventually received the news that my bank had officially rejected my claim for reimbursement. Through further research, I learned these Zelle “Me to Me” scams have been stealing money from people for at least 10 years, and banks with Zelle integrated on their apps weren’t obligated to refund customers’ lost money. I also discovered these Zelle scams fell into a regulatory gap not covered by standard consumer protections. Banks usually only reimburse customers who lose money at the hands of hackers, not scammers.
“There was no getting over the sad fact that I, a good citizen and savvy podcaster trying to help other people avoid this same crime, had become a victim myself.”
The more I learned about this sinister crime, the more my determination intensified. I remembered that a local consumer affairs reporter named Jason had reported on the Zelle payment scams before and mentioned that several customers filed a class action lawsuit against my bank, so I reached out to him. My history as a true crime podcaster piqued the interest of this journalistic watchdog (who also recently became an attorney). Within a few days, Jason and a cameraman were at my house reporting on my experience.
Jason’s attention paid off nearly immediately. Before the station ran my interview, he reached out to the bank to see if they had a comment on my claim. They told him they planned to contact me. This half-hearted promise wasn’t much, but it gave me a little glimmer of hope. And although I knew it might result in another dead end, I felt better knowing that I had done all that I could.
On Nov. 22, I sat in the backseat of our SUV, sandwiched in between my 20-year-old daughter and 17-year-old son. We were halfway through a seven-hour drive to Ohio to visit relatives for Thanksgiving. Daniel was at the wheel, and his mother sat in the front passenger seat. We were somewhere in West Virginia when a little voice in my head told me to open my banking app and check it, and when I did, I saw a deposit in the amount I’d lost in the Zelle scam ― $3,180. Seconds later, I received an email from my bank effectively closing my case with the words: “Your Claim Has Been Resolved.”
“It’s a GREAT day to be me!” I shouted, elated. After fighting to get the money back for two solid months, I felt a huge sense of relief. The humiliation and guilt I’d felt over losing the money in the first place slowly began to dissipate. After a quick celebratory lunch at Subway, we resumed our road trip.
Courtesy of Renee Roberson
It wasn’t long before my phone dinged again. This notification, however, was vastly different from the last.
A cousin I hadn’t spoken to in years messaged me through my podcast page on Facebook.
Your uncle is trying to get a hold of you. Your dad passed away this morning.
My deep gasp startled everyone in the car. “What is it? What is it?” they wanted to know. But I couldn’t speak. My brain was so busy trying to process the information that I couldn’t respond.
My daughter leaned over my shoulder to read the message, her eyes widening. As my shoulders racked with sobs, she wrapped both her arms around me.
Memories had overwhelmed me during our car ride. As a preteen, I visited my dad in the sweltering, muggy heat of Louisiana when I still lived in Texas, and later, after I’d moved with my mom and stepdad to North Carolina. Our visits were stilted. While I had fun hanging out with my cousins, aunts and grandmother, David and I never knew what to say to one another. He would often drive me around the small town of Leesville to visit his friends and show me off. It was awkward, but I remember feeling special. We shared a few laughs on those trips, and I saw myself in his eyes.
I’m ashamed to admit I was embarrassed when he showed up unannounced at my college graduation. I’d sent announcements to all my family members but didn’t expect anyone from my dad’s side of the family — let alone David— to make the 24-hour drive to the ceremony. But he surprised me by arranging for friends to drive him to North Carolina.
I felt conflicted. The two sides of the family couldn’t have been more different — David’s ancestors settled in Louisiana before it was even a state, and my mother’s Mexican side of the family is from South Texas. When he showed up at the restaurant where I worked, I politely told him I didn’t have enough tickets for him to attend the ceremony. He hung his head but bounced back quickly, telling me how proud he was.
After we hugged goodbye, he gave me $200 in cash. Knowing his financial struggles, this money — the only he’d ever given me — must have knocked him back a bit. But I appreciated it and told him so.
In the years before my dad’s death, I’d been struggling with mixed emotions about how I’d shut him out of my life. I hadn’t wanted my children to know a grandfather whom I had known as a deadbeat dad who disparaged their grandmother every chance he got. On the other hand, I knew he had tried, in his own way, to do right by me. I wish I’d had the courage to reach out to him once my kids were older and tried to explain to him how I felt. Suddenly, sitting in our car as we rolled through the hills of West Virginia and Ohio, I was out of time.
Courtesy of Renee Roberson
Once we arrived at our relative’s home later that evening, I called my cousin Ricky, whom I hadn’t spoken to in more than 20 years. He told me my dad had been living in a nursing home, across the hall from Ricky’s mother, for at least a year until she passed away. My dad died of stomach cancer after choosing not to pursue treatment. He never remarried and he died alone, without the comfort of close family nearby. No one had contacted me because I guess they thought I’d permanently washed my hands of him.
I went through the holiday weekend numb, detached and broken. How could I have been celebrating getting my money back when my father had died a frail and penniless man with a large tumor growing out of his stomach? I barely recognized the frail old man in his obituary photo. What kind of daughter was I?
I told very few people about my dad’s death, not wanting to show a crack in the professional and polished veneer I’d spent decades creating. The words to explain how I felt deep in my core eluded me. And, as an only child, the burden of my father’s death fell solely on me.
I called the funeral home in charge of David’s burial. That’s when I learned that one of my uncles had planned a funeral, but the director told me he’d confessed he didn’t have the funds to pay for it because of his own medical bills.
I believe in synchronicity. I believe the return of the $3,000 happened for a reason. While my family could have used that money to take an overdue vacation or make necessary repairs to our home, I told Daniel I wanted to use part of it to help pay for some of my father’s funeral. He supported my decision.
As I approach midlife, I’ve come to realize familial relationships are not always clear-cut. As parents, we make mistakes. As children, we learn to let some things go, and we hold on to some memories. The strands of our lives are intertwined, nevertheless, and the bonds of parents and children are difficult to sever, whether we wish to or not.
I called the funeral home the next day and gave them my credit card. I didn’t tell my dad’s side of the family what I was doing, and no one ever asked me about it. I chose not to make the trip four states away to attend in person. They buried David in the local cemetery next to his mother, Catherine.
While my father spared me the knowledge of the suffering he endured at the end of his life, the universe still found a way for us to connect in the end. That payment was my final goodbye to my father. I think it would have made him happy to know the same daughter he had once paraded around town paid for the dignified burial he deserved. And there was no scam in that.
Renee Roberson is an award-winning writer, aspiring novelist, and host/creator of the true crime podcast “Missing in the Carolinas.” Learn more at her website, FinishedPages.com.
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