Law and Order Lake County

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Updated: January 19, 2012 5:19PM

East Chicago

Purse thief gets 3 years in prison

Lake Superior Court Judge Diane Ross Boswell sentenced an East Chicago man to three years for robbery.

Terrell Cordell Williams, 20, admitted he stole a woman’s purse on May 3 in the area of 142nd and Elm Streets in East Chicago.

Williams was ordered to serve his sentence in the Lake county Community Corrections program.

A charge of robbery that is punishable by a sentence of six to 20 years was dismissed.

HOBART

Police warn residents about scammers impersonating officers

Hobart Police want to inform the public to a recent case involving scammers representing themselves as law enforcement officials.

An elderly Hobart woman received a call from a man identifying himself as her grandson, who said he was in a Florida jail because of a drug arrest. He passed the phone to another person, who identifed himself as a police officer with the Greenwood, Fla., Police Department (which does not exist). He told the woman that she needed to wire $2,800 to a person and address in Lima, Peru, to get her grandson out of jail.

She questioned why that she had to wire money outside the United States and the caller gave her a return phone number that was a cell phone number registered in Montreal, Canada.

The woman decided to call her grandson, who told her that he wasn’t arrested or in jail. After verifying that he was fine, she called the police. Hobart Police contacted the Jackson County, Fla., Sheriff’s Department — which has jurisdiction over Greenwood — and discovered that none of the information provided by the scammers was true.

Police praised the woman for taking time to verify the story before wiring any money. Police warn the public to always check a story before wiring funds to an unknown person or place. Residents should call the police if they sense a call is suspicious.