Man accused of traumatizing people as old as 91 in 'grandparent scheme'

A federal grand jury indicted a man from the Dominican Republic in connection with a grandparent fraud scheme, the latest case in a growing trend where scammers pose as desperate relatives and convince seniors to handing over their savings.

Luis Alfonso Bisono Rodriguez, a citizen of the Caribbean nation living in Cleveland, was charged in Pennsylvania with working with partners in the Dominican Republic to defraud at least five victims of some $50,000. They called people as old as age 91 and posed as a cast of characters ranging from the victim's children to attorneys to bail bondsmen.

“This fraud scheme not only targets elderly, vulnerable victims, but further traumatizes them by placing them in fear for their loved ones,” Troy Rivetti, acting U.S. attorney for the federal district in Pennsylvania, told USA TODAY on Thursday. “We encourage any additional victims to contact the FBI as soon as possible and urge our elderly population to stay informed and remain vigilant in protecting themselves from these scams.”

The case out of the Western District of Pennsylvania is the latest in the trend of financial fraud schemes targeting elderly people. Recent FBI reports show that elderly people lose as much as $3.4 billion annually to grandparent schemes. 

Bisono Rodriguez, 34, is charged with five counts of receipt of stolen money that crossed a state border, according to a federal indictment. The scam lasted from June 2024 to January 2025, court filings say.

Victims handed over up to $20,000 in envelopes labeled as "legal documents" to unsuspecting Uber and Lyft drivers, who drove the envelopes from Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, to locations in Ohio where Bisono Rodriguez picked it up and deposited it, according to the FBI. Financial records say Bisono Rodriguez wired at least $14,000 to a recipient in the Dominican Republic shortly after completing the handoffs, court filings say.

Chalon Pfeifer, Bisono Rodriguez’s attorney, told USA TODAY her client plans to plead not guilty. 

How grandparent fraud schemes work

Fraud schemes targeting the elderly have developed in recent years into elaborate dramas involving whole casts of characters.

For a set of victims in their 70s, it started with a call from someone posing as their son, David, according to the FBI. David reported he was in an accident; transferred the call to someone claiming to be David’s attorney who outlined supposed charges against their son; and finally transferred the call to a supposed bail bondsman who said the parents needed to send $9,000 in cash so David could post bond.

Scam artists use stolen data or public information from social media to learn about their victims in order to develop credible narratives, according to the Federal Communications Commission.

Characters they invent may have cameo roles in scamming multiple victims. For example, Matthew Arnold, a supposed public defender, called at least three of the victims, according to court records.

Scammers tell victims not to tell anyone about the money, sometimes saying that a judge’s order prevents anyone involved in the case from talking about it. 

One 74-year-old victim in the recent case told a curious bank teller that the $9,500 she withdrew was just a gift for her grandson.

Security footage taken from gas stations and rest stops show the same man identified as Bisono Rodriguez entering stores to buy a drink after taking the money, according to court records. Often, he wore the same all-maroon sweatsuit and olive-colored beanie.

Drivers showed police messages from the rideshare account holder saying that instead of picking up a passenger, they were retrieving “legal documents.” Tips of up to $100 were offered if they successfully delivered packages, court filings say.

An international crime ring

Financial records and data obtained from Uber via a legal request indicate Bisono Rodriguez was working in concert with partners in his native country, according to an FBI affidavit.

Bisono Rodriguez sent approximately $14,000 to someone in the Dominican Republic, according to bank records obtained by the FBI. 

Money transfers tended to happen shortly after someone received cash delivered to Ohio by rideshare drivers. Transfers amounted to roughly 20% of the cash received in a handoff, according to court filings.

Data provided to the FBI by Uber showed the rides were called not by Bisono Rodriguez but by a man named Jesus Cardona, according to an FBI statement. Cardona was not in Ohio or Pennsylvania but in the same city in the Dominican Republic where money was being sent.

Cardona ordered some 80 rides between December 2024 and March 2025, according to the FBI. Investigators have found other victims linked to the account, including an elderly couple in Connecticut defrauded out of $14,000 and an elderly person in Kentucky scammed out of $9,000. 

Bisono Rodriguez, a citizen of the Dominican Republic, originally entered the United States on a tourist visa, according to Department of Homeland Security records. He was supposed to exit the country in 2022 but overstayed his visa, according to court records.

How widespread are these scams

The scammers targeting elderly people in Western Pennsylvania represent just a fraction of the fraudsters targeting unsuspecting grandparents nationwide.

The FBI reported last June that they recorded a double-digit increase in financial fraud targeting elder adults. $1.6 billion in losses was reported to the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center between January and May of 2024, amounting to a $300 million increase compared to the same period in 2023. 

A total of $3.4 billion in losses was reported to the FBI in 2023, an increase of 14% over losses in 2022, the report says.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office in Vermont reported one of the most significant cases of the scheme earlier this month.

Federal prosecutors charged more than two dozen Canadian nationals in a massive scam that bilked more than $21 million from elderly people in more than 40 U.S. states.

According to a federal indictment in the case, which was unsealed this week, the “grandparent scam” operated between summer 2021 and June 2024 from call centers in and around Montreal.

Calls were made through phone providers that made it appear as if they were coming from within the U.S., the indictment said.

The swindled money was then transmitted to Canada. The indictment says the transactions sometimes involved cryptocurrency, which veiled the source of the money and identities of those involved.

Canadian law enforcement officers said they found many of the defendants actively engaged in phone conversations with elderly victims in Virginia when they executed search warrants at several call centers last year.

All but two of 25 defendants, who are ages 27 to 45, were arrested in Canada. At the time the indictment was announced, the pair who remained at large – 38-year-old Gareth West, known as “Buddy” or “Muscles,” and 35-year-old Jimmy Ylimaki, aka “Coop” – are among those accused of managing the fake call centers.

Contributing: Marc Ramirez

Michael Loria is a national reporter on the USA TODAY breaking news desk. Contact him at mloria@usatoday.com, @mchael_mchael or on Signal at (202) 290-4585.