‘Clairvoyant’ scam targets the bereaved

A DEATH notice scam has seen bereaved people targeted by fake Turkish clairvoyants.

Keith Brown, a Bournemouth University academic, warned families not to put announcements in local newspapers because criminals abroad can see them online.

He told the National Children and Adult Services conference in Bournemouth that people had been called by “clairvoyants” asking for cash to deliver a message from a lost loved one.

He added: “You pay the fees a few times over, nothing seems to happen, so the person stops paying. They then come back and say ‘because I’m a clairvoyant if you don’t keep paying me I’m going to cast evil curses on you’.”

Turkey is outside the EU, so the Government is powerless to act.