Elder Fraud in Kansas

April Guadalupe Hernandez was indicted by a Bernalillo County grand jury for assuming the identities of licensed nurses and illegally providing hospice care, including mis-transcribing a medication order that nearly resulted in a fatal morphine overdose. Hernandez, a certified nurse assistant, allegedly stole the identities of three nurses from Texas, California, and Kansas to gain employment at three healthcare facilities over 18 months, defrauding them of approximately $40,000. She faces 19 charges including identity theft, nursing without a license, elder abuse, and violations of the Nursing Practice Act, with a potential sentence of up to 27.5 years in prison

A 27-year-old certified nurse assistant in New Mexico was indicted on 19 counts including identity theft, elder abuse, nursing without a license, and Medicaid fraud after assuming the identities of licensed nurses to provide unauthorized hospice care while receiving approximately $40,000 in fraudulent Medicaid payments. The fraud scheme lasted over 18 months across three hospice facilities and resulted in a near-fatal morphine overdose to a patient; Hernandez faces up to 27.5 years in prison if convicted.

A 26-year-old certified nurse assistant in New Mexico, April Guadalupe Hernandez, was charged with 19 counts of misconduct including nursing without a license, identity theft, abuse of a resident, and fraud for falsifying nursing credentials and stealing identities of nurses from Texas, California, and Kansas. Over one year, Hernandez worked at three hospice centers using different name variations, claiming to hold higher nursing credentials than she possessed, and made a potentially fatal medication error (an overdose of morphine) that was caught before administration; she has an arraignment scheduled for September 8th.

Andrea Estell Cochran, a 51-year-old from Houston, was arrested and charged with federal bank fraud after using forged passports to impersonate account holders and withdraw approximately $11,000 from multiple banks across Washington state and Maine in 2024. She faces up to 30 years in federal prison plus additional state charges, with a plea deal hearing scheduled for August 28, 2025. A separate study by VPNPro found that seniors aged 60 and older across all U.S. states lost significant sums to fraud in 2022, with losses ranging from approximately $3 million to $31 million per state, highlighting the widesprea

Andrea Estell Cochran, a 51-year-old from Houston, was arrested and charged with federal bank fraud after using fake passports to impersonate account holders and withdraw approximately $11,000 from multiple Washington state banks in 2024, with similar attempts in Maine; she faces up to 30 years in prison and state charges across multiple Washington counties. Additionally, a VPNPro study reveals that seniors aged 60 and over across all U.S. states lost substantial sums to fraud in 2022, with per-victim losses ranging from $13,118 to $30,150 depending on the state, highlighting seniors as prime targets for scammers

This is an obituary for David Raymond Brockish, an 80-year-old Air Force veteran from Kansas who passed away on August 9, 2025. While not itself a scam or fraud incident, the obituary notably directs memorial contributions to "End Elder Fraud," suggesting the family's commitment to combating elder fraud awareness and prevention.

Cyber criminals are increasingly using malicious links hidden in emails, PDFs, and other documents rather than attachments to steal passwords and install malware, with over 3 billion such attacks reported. Emerging threats include "ClickFix" scams (fake error messages), QR code phishing (4.2 million attempts in early 2025), and "pig butchering" romance scams where criminals build trust with victims before pressuring them into fraudulent investments—including a 2023 case where a Kansas banker lost £34.6 million and received a 24-year sentence. Security experts warn these attacks exploit human psychology by using trusted brands and familiar technology rather

Nebraska residents lost a reported $42.5 million to scams in 2024—tripling over four years—with experts attributing the increase to more accessible and affordable artificial intelligence technology that enables scammers to operate at scale and create increasingly sophisticated fraud schemes, including voice cloning and realistic chatbot-generated scams. Peter Hines, a 76-year-old Fremont insurance business owner, lost $936 to a Facebook ad lead scam and was unable to recover the money due to the company's out-of-state location and legal protections in his agreement, highlighting the difficulty of prosecution when scammers operate overseas or across state lines. Authorities recommend limiting online presence,

Match Group agreed to pay $14 million to settle FTC allegations of deceptive advertising practices, including tolerating romance scammers to attract paying users to its dating apps OkCupid and Match.com. The settlement requires the company to simplify subscription cancellation, stop retaliating against users filing billing disputes, and cease misrepresenting its money-back guarantee, with FTC compensation to injured consumers pending judge approval.

In 2024, payment scams cost Americans over $12.5 billion, with New York reporting nearly 280,000 fraud cases to the FTC—a 25% increase year-over-year. Seniors are particularly targeted through scams involving impersonation of grandchildren, family members, and government agencies (like fake DMV and toll road warnings), sometimes using AI to replicate voices, resulting in victims losing tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of dollars. A bipartisan group of senators is proposing the TRAPS Act to establish a federal task force coordinating the Treasury, Justice, FTC, and other agencies to investigate and combat these rapidly escalating payment scams.

The Kansas Department of Transportation warned of a text messaging scam falsely claiming to be from KDOT or the Kansas Department of Motor Vehicles demanding payment for unpaid traffic tickets. KDOT clarified that it does not collect payments via text message and urged recipients not to click links or share personal information, instead reporting suspicious messages to the FTC or Internet Crime Complaint Center.

Emmanuel Ugbaja, a 56-year-old Georgia man, was sentenced to 5 years probation with 2 years home confinement for money laundering in connection with internet scams that defrauded two victims of $60,000 in 2018—one through a romance scam and one through an inheritance scam. Ugbaja received the fraudulent funds into his bank account, kept a portion for himself, and sent the remainder to a maritime broker as a vessel down payment. In addition to probation, he was ordered to pay over $97,000 in restitution to the fraud victims and over $135,000 to the Small Business Administration

A Kansas City man discovered someone had attempted to fraudulently sell his undeveloped property after a realtor contacted him about a suspicious transaction. The scammer used convincing forged documentation including a fake driver's license, but the scheme was stopped before the property changed hands. Real estate professionals report this type of identity theft and property fraud is increasing, and recommend property owners watch for red flags such as sellers who only communicate virtually and use apps, and consider enrolling in county land sale alert programs.

This opinion piece advocates for the bipartisan TRAPS Act (Task Force for Recognizing and Averting Payment Scams) to combat the surge in digital fraud, which cost Americans $12.5 billion in losses across 2.6 million fraud reports last year—a 25% increase from the previous year. The author, a former law enforcement executive, argues that payment scams disproportionately target older adults through romance schemes, fake investments, and AI-generated impersonation calls, and that the current fragmented approach leaves victims bouncing between agencies without effective coordination. The proposed legislation would unite the Treasury Department, FTC, Justice Department, FCC, and financial industry leaders

In early 2025, Chinese actor Wang Xing was abducted after being lured to Thailand under false pretenses and taken to a scam operation in Myanmar, sparking widespread panic about fraud on Chinese social media; Thai police rescued him within three days after he reported being forced into training for "pig butchering" scams. Pig butchering scams, operated by organized crime groups primarily since 2019, involve criminals building trust with victims online before manipulating them into making large fraudulent investments, with victims losing billions globally—including a U.S. banker who embezzled $47 million to cover losses from such a scam, and a Connecticut woman who lost nearly $1