Impersonation Crimes

On the morning of Wednesday, May 8, a man claiming to be "Police Detective Frank Dessner" called an elderly woman living on East 70th Street and requested cash to be used in an investigation. The woman withdrew $25,000 from her bank account and gave it to a man she thought was working with the detective. The woman also gave the impostors her bank account numbers. Then on the morning of Thursday, May 16, a man claiming to be "Captain Tom Piscani, head of financial crime in New York," called an elderly woman living on East 79th Street and informed her that she was in possession of counterfeit bills. The man told the victim to meet a "plainclothes officer" in front of the New York Society Library after cashing a check she was to write from her account. When the victim's bank declined to cash the check, the obliging woman met with the "officer" and gave him $3,200 she had brought from home. The "officer" never displayed a shield or ID.