An elderly woman who lost millions of dollars to scammers is hitting Bank of America (BofA) with a lawsuit over allegations of negligence, breach of contract and violation of federal law.
Lynne Bucklin, a 67 year-old Florida resident, says BofA failed to adequately protect her from a scheme that drained $2 million from her accounts, reports the cyber litigation firm Vernon.
Lynne says the scam started when she received emails and phone calls from people pretending to be Federal Trade Commission (FTC) investigators. The bad actors got Lynne’s attention by telling her that her social security number was exposed.
One of the scammers, who posed as an FTC official under the name of Bruce Williams, sent his purported credentials to Lynne, including his badge and badge number. He also sent her a copy of an FTC letter saying that her accounts were being investigated for fraudulent activity.
Believing that the threat was real, Lynne succumbed to the instructions of the thieves.
BofA’s employees are accused of green-lighting the transfers even though the transactions were out of the ordinary.
Now, Lynne is seeking the assistance of the justice system, accusing BofA of negligent hiring, breach of contract and violations of the law including the Electronic Funds Transfer Act and the Florida Uniform Commercial Code.
“Under the guise of protecting her assets, the scammer convinced Bucklin to transfer money into cryptocurrency accounts via wire transfers at a Bank of America branches in Naples, Florida.
Despite the irregularity of the transactions, Bucklin’s bank representatives failed to question their validity. Furthermore, the scammer gained remote access to her computer to manipulate accounts and steal her identity.”
Lynne initially reached out to BofA in an attempt to recoup her funds but the mega lender was only able to recover $500,00 before shutting down her case.
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