Latest Marblehead Scam Warning Includes Police Imposters

MARBLEHEAD, MA — Marblehead police are warning residents about the latest attempted scam in town involving someone calling and falsely claiming they are collecting donations on behalf of the police department.

"The Marblehead Police Department is not soliciting donations," police said. "Please be very careful when making donations and never give out your personal information to someone who calls you randomly.

"Do your research before donating to a charity as many are not as charitable as purport to be."

Scams have been on the rise across the North Shore in recent years with Marblehead police this winter revealing that one resident lost $60,000 after being convinced that accounts were compromised and that they needed to covert their savings to BitCoin, while police also asked bank and wire service employees to intervene if they believed that senior residents were withdrawing large sums of cash and may be falling victim to the so-called grandparent scam.

(Scott Souza is a Patch field editor covering Beverly, Danvers, Marblehead, Peabody, Salem and Swampscott. He can be reached at Scott.Souza@Patch.com. Twitter: @Scott_Souza.)