Beware of Barfly Banking Chaperones
The next time you're getting drunk in some bar — let's call it Boomer's — and a stranger suddenly offers to take you to the bank and help you open up a new account, maybe don't go with them. Yeah, just keep on drinking.
Sadly, a 64-year-old man in Ohio didn't follow this advice, and is now short $3,500. On May 4, he was hanging out at "THE BEST DAMN BAR IN ELYRIA" —coincidentally, it's also called Boomer's — and chatting with some woman he barely knew. They started talking about personal finance. When he told the woman that he needed to set up a bank account to deposit his brand-new $25,000 disability check, she offered to "help." That's when the trouble began:
[T]he pair went directly from the bar to Fifth Third Bank. The man said he was intoxicated while opening the account, according to a police report.
He said he placed $10,000 into a savings account and $15,000 into a checking account. From the checking account, he took out $5,000 cash and wrote a check for $500 to the bank to cover a previous overdraft, the report said.
On Wednesday of this week, however, he found the checking account balance was only $7,005. The bank told him numerous withdrawals ranging from $30 to $500 and totaling $3,504 had been made. The man told police the woman had helped him change his debit card pin number and he had never received it in the mail, the report said.
The bilked barfly describes his shady lady banking chaperone as "white with brown hair, in her 50s and 5-foot-4 to 5-foot-6 with a stocky build." If you've seen any woman who fits this description, call the police right now.
When we were growing up, our mom always told us, "never take candy from strangers, because it's full of razor blades and needles. And if you're going to hang out with strangers at a bar, do it at night, when the banks are closed." We understand the banking part now.
