Elder Abuse And Junk Mail

Having become a trustee of an elderly family member, it has come to my attention how junk mail turns from junk mail to Elder Abuse. My aunt has always been an activist of sorts and has contributed to some worthy causes.  After a stroke 3 years ago, she started responding to all sorts of junk political mail and phone calls. Of course they sold their lists,  which then evolved into legitimate charities, lotteries, sweepstakes, magazines, credit cards, reverse mortgages, Political agendas and whatnot. She now receives over 400 pieces of Junk Mail per month. 

They come with refrigerator magnets, calendars, postcards, dollar bills, stationary, gift wrapping, notepads and address labels. The worst is the lotteries which come with a ‘Give Back’ motif ,which you know are total scams.

In a way, I am lucky because she is not online, therefore the magazines and spam do not come in.

A quick count of some of the legit Charities that she receives a monthly letter from

1. Arthritis Foundation
2. Alzheimers Association
3. American Parkinson Disease Association (This came with a $2.00 check)
4. American Heart Association (This came with a 2018 Platinum Supporter Card)
5. Boys Town: 2 per month (Address labels) and a Certificate of Appreciation.
6. Braille Books For the Blind
7. Coalition To Salute America’s Heroes Foundation: This comes with a $2.15 cent check.
8. Conquer Cancer
9. Easter Seals (With Address labels
10. Guiding Eyes For The Blind
11. Leukemia and Lymphoma Society (Address labels included)
12. Make A Wish
13. Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center
14. Operation Smile (Address labels included and stickers)
15. Paralyzed Veterans of America (Address labels included)
16. Selous Foundation
17. St. Judes Childrens Research Hospital (With address labels_
18. St. Joseph’s Indian School
19. The Navigators (4 times a month) (Address Labels)
20. US Veterans Hospice Committee
21. Veterans of Foreign Wars
22. Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund

Lotteries and Sweepstakes: Many Sweepstakes are mail fraud. She receives over 50 mailings per month. Sweepstakes are one the of top sources of Elder Abuse. The envelope comes in, it looks like you are a winner, a check is enclosed and I have even seen money. As as person gets older, they don’t read the fine print (and who does!) and they seriously think they might win. Most come in to be legit as benefiting a cause of some sort. We have listed some of the top Sweepstakes that she receives and the causes and the locations.

Arizona

1. Chandler, Arizona seems to have the Premium Award Center. Only 2 PO’s Boxes are involved for a total of 13 pieces of Scam Mail.

Pittsfield, MA  Not too many come from here.

Farmingale, NY: Not too many come from here.

Texas 

1. The Sweepstakes Notification Center, Dallas Texas (4 received)

Kansas and Missouri seem to be the Hub for Sweepstake Scams

St. Louis, Missouri 

1. American Association of State Troopers
2. Aggressive Cancer Research a Program of National Cancer Center)
3. AACA (Americans Against Child Abuse)
4. Breast Cancer Outreach Foundation
5. Care For Our Wounded Soldiers
6. Prize Entry Processing For CFM (Missing Children)
7. CPP Child Protection Program
8. DVF (American Disabled Veterans Foundation
9. Fire Victims Fun
10. Healing Heroes Network
11. Help The Vets
12. Hero of The Month and Wish Hero for a total of 7 in 2 months.
13. KIDD Project
14. Kids Wish Network (6 in 3 months)
15. Little Shelter
16. Miracle Flights
17. National Caregiving Association
18. St. Bonaventure Indian Mission 8 in 2 months

Kansas City, Kansas

1. The Executive Processing Office: (Kansas City, KS)

Topeka is interesting cities for Sweepstake Scams: They must be the same company, check out these PO Box numbers” PO Box 8932, 89323, 8976, 8981 758523,  758528, 758536, 75839, 758544

1. Voucher processing for NCCI one comes in with a PO Box 8932 and 2 others come with a PO Box 89323
2. Winner Payout Entry and Authorization NCAF (4 received) National Cancer Assistance Foundation
3. Cash Reply Processing for The Breast Cancer Project (3 received)
4. SAVE (Surviors and Victims Empowered ) 3 received
5. Fighting Childhood Leukemia; 2 received
6. Prize Confirmation/Entry Processing for CCCF (Combatting Childhood Cancer Fund) 4 received
7. Award Registration for CCP (2 received)
8. Prize ID Entry Processing for ICCF (Childrens Cancer Facility in Israel) 4 received
9. Award Processing Center (Armour Rd, Kansas City, MO)  3 total

Now I love these from Merrifield, Virginia seems to have a lot of Junk Mail Scammers

1. United States Deputy Sheriff Association for Sweepstake Prize) Ironic isn’t it? Merrifield, VA
2. National Emergency Medical Medicine Association
3. National Heart Council with a $10,366 prize offering
4. Veterans in Defense of Liberty Sweepstakes
5. NAC (a program of NEMA) which sent 4 sweepstakes in a month
6. KDM (A program of NEMA) Kids do matter which also sent at least 4 sweepstakes.
7. N.F.D  also out of Merrifield, Virginia

Presidential Junk Mail: Counts out to be about 1 per day. I love the Committee to Stop the Trump Impeachment. First he is a ‘genius’ and a billionaire, as far as I am concerned he can fund his own Stopping Impeachment. Not only that, they didn’t impeach Nixon. Both Andrew Jackson and Clinton was impeached by the House of Representatives and then acquitted by the Senate. Seriously, Trump will be over by the time they get around to impeaching him.

1. Stand with Trump Against The Coup
2. 2018 Trump Team
3. Committee To Stop the Trump Impeachment
4. Citizens United For the Trump Agenda
5. National Republican Senatorial Committee
6. The Presidential Task Force
7. The Presidential Coalition
8. David Koch
9. Tea Party Express
10. America First Agenda

Patriot Mailings 

1. Faith and Freedom Foundation (Duluth, Georgia)
2. Patriot Voices (Washington DC)
3. American Center for Law and Justice
4. American Conservative Union by Ted Cruz
5. American Criminal Justice (Washington DC) A project of The National Center for Public Policy Research
6. American Policy Center (Washington DC)
7. Americans For Fair Taxation (Merrifield, Virginia)
8. American Immigration Control Foundation (Monterey, Virginia)
9. Citizens for a Terrorism Free America
10. Conservative Caucas a project of the Americans for Constitutional Liberty : They also do a sweepstakes. They average 2 mailings per every 3 weeks. They are also out of Merrifield, Virginia.
11. FAIR (who knows) (Merrifield, Virginia)
12. Freedom Works with Adam Brandon (Washington DC) 1 mailing per month
13. Judicial Watch (Washington DC) 5 JUNK mails per month.  Many mailings from Illegal Immigration Impact Project, to other corruption issues.
14. Remember Americas Heritage (Washington, DC) 1 mailing per month
15. Secure America Alliance ((Washington DC) 6 mailings in 3 weeks
16. Secure America Now (Washington DC) 1 mailing a week
17. Secure Freedom (Merrifield, VA)
18. United States Justice Foundation (Houston, Texas)
19. U.S. English (Washington DC)

Those that prey on Senior Citizens Fears: For some reason my aunt thinks that she is going to lose social security. Could you imagine what that would do to the economy? Current statistics state that over 25 million Americans aged 60+ are economically insecure—living at or below 250% of the federal poverty level. Take away Social Security and those number and the poverty rate would almost quintuple to 44.4%. Missouri, Oregon, and New Hampshire would see the number of impoverished senior citizens increase sevenfold. The number of retirees living below the poverty line in Wisconsin and Iowa would jump eightfold. (www.fool.com)

1. 60 Plus Association: This comes with a message from Pat Boone
2.  Coalition to Guarantee Social Security (Christian Seniors Association) Merrifield, Virginia
3. Council for Retirement Security
4. Council of Seniors, A program of Citizen Guardian
5. National Council For Surviors
6. National Retirement Security Task Force
7. Senior Advocate
8. Senior Citizens Alliance a program of the Citizen Guardian
9. The Senior Citizen Association of America
10. Senior Citizen Alliance a progam of Citizen Guardian
11. The Senior Citizen League
12. The Seniors Center
13. The Seniors Coalition (Merrifield, Virginia)
14. The Seniors Trust (these come with stamped envelopes of which I have retrunen

Religious Affiliations

1. National Pro-Life Center (A project of P and Schneck and Associates)
2. American Bible Society
3. Christian Action Network (Merrifield, VA) Attention Martin Mawyer
4. In God We Trust by Te Right Rev. Council NEDDII

I Just Got To Eco Ya

• 1.5 trees come through the mail slot unsolicited mail every year per each American.
• 100 million trees annually are killed by unsolicited mail.
• $370,000,000/ year is what Americans pay to dispose the junk mail that doesn’t get recycled.
•  4 out of 10 seniors lose over $36 billion each year to financial abuse.

What does a person do? Personally, I have done as much as I can without forwarding her mail to me. I have contacted companies such as Mayo Clinic to take her off their list, I have returned mail and asked for them to remove from the list. She is on the Do Not Mail list and the Do Not Contact List for Caretakers. I have put everything on a spreadsheet to show how much money she had been sending. (She was shocked) I have discussed a budget on charitable giving and finding legitimate charities. But when they get older, you never know what is going to click and stay.

Resources To Opt Out of Junk Mail 

• Do Not Contact List for Caretakers
• National Do Not Mail List
• Opt-Out Pre-Screen (1-888-5-OPT-OUT)
• InfoCision is a telemarketing company but you might be able to get off the list by calling (330) 668-1400)  or emailing infocis@infocision.com
• Privacy Rights Clearing House Has more resources to opt out of junk mail.
• National Do Not Call Registry: Personally, I actually report each call that comes in, it does not seem to be working although.

Resources 

• AARP Watchdog Emails Warn of Scams Targeting Seniors
• 5 Ways to Prevent Elder Fraud
• Financial Elder Abuse Costs Seniors 36 Billion Dollars
• http://www.sandiegocounty.gov/content/sdc/dpw/recycling/junkmail.html
•  StopWaste.org,  1-877-STOPWASTE (786-7927), 
• Federal Trade Commission www.ftc.gov/spam.
• https://openroadwealth.com/elder-financial-abuse/
• https://www.consumeraffairs.com/news/seniors-bombarded-with-direct-mail-often-write-many-checks-062613.html
• https://www.aarp.org/money/scams-fraud/info-08-2013/protect-your-parents-from-scams.html
• https://www.ncoa.org/economic-security/money-management/scams-security/top-10-scams-targeting-seniors/