Sheriff warns against scam

Mercer County Sheriff Jeff Grey announced Tuesday of a potential scam circulating in Mercer County.

Callers are advising that they are receiving phone calls from a person claiming to be a “deputy” from the sheriff’s office stating that they missed jury duty on Aug. 5, 2021 and that there is now a warrant for their arrest for failure to appear. The scammers then tell the victim that they need to go to Walmart and buy four gift cards that start with a certain number on the card.

The scammer will then request the card number and tell the victim that they will take care of the warrant for them. In some cases, after the card numbers are given to the scammer, they tell the victim that the last card did not go through and now there are additional warrants on that person’s name and request another thousands of dollars’ worth of cards.

People are being told that if they call our office to check the validity of this, they will be arrested which is not true.

The Mercer County Sheriff’s Office wanted to make it clear that it would never ask for money or gift cards to clear a warrant; nor will you be arrested if you call our office to check the validity of the accusations.

If you receive one of these calls, please hang up immediately and call the central dispatch at 419-586-7724. These scam calls do appear to be coming from a “419” area code, but these calls are more than likely “cloned” from actual numbers. As a reminder, never give out personal information over the phone.

You can check to see if you have an active warrant by visiting the Sheriff’s Office website at MercerCountySheriffOhio.gov.