I-Team: Big changes in how Cleveland police investigate scams, con artists

CLEVELAND (WJW) – The FOX 8 I-Team has uncovered a big change in how Cleveland police are investigating fraud and hustlers getting into your bank accounts and ripping you off.

This comes after the financial crimes unit had shrunk to just one detective.

Records show, last August, the unit investigating scams and fraud had dwindled down to one sergeant and one detective.

Now, Cleveland police are moving to a new system to look into cases like the mystery surrounding plane tickets for John Prather and Andrea Teel.

They say their vacation turned into a nightmare. They believe someone hacked into their account and used their plane tickets.

“It was a mess and it cost me a lot of money,” said John Prather said. “This cyber fraud or whatever is going on, it’s crazy.”

“We were furious and upset at the same time because we didn’t know how we were going to get home,” Teel said.

Big money crimes can get complicated with bank records and email accounts. Yet, again, we found the Cleveland Police Department’s financial crimes unit had been staffed by just one detective. In two years, the number of cases sent off for charges had dropped by two-thirds.

The city says the financial crimes unit kept dwindling in size with retirements and transfers.

Now, cases with a con artist or fraud ring will be assigned to neighborhood detectives.

“We’re committed to constantly looking for better ways to serve our community,” Sgt. Freddy Diaz said. “Now, the neighborhood districts will have the ability to handle these investigations. They’ve gone through some training in regard to the financial crimes.”

Still, those detectives already handle many other crimes. So, we asked, “how realistic is it to have these neighborhood detectives handle these cases when they’re so busy already handling shootings, robberies and stolen cars?”

“The increases in technology, the increases in items detectives didn’t have, you know, 20, 30 years ago, we have found there are other ways to handle the investigation,” Sgt. Diaz said.

Andrea and John say, however it happens, something has to be done about the scammers. They say their case is still a mystery.

“How did it happen? Why did it happen? Did it happen at the airport?” Prather wondered.

Veteran investigators tell us many of these crimes can be nearly impossible to solve. In fact, last month, we showed you a hack into the Ohio Lottery system likely will not be solved.