Caller asking for money claims to be York County SC Sheriff Kevin Tolson. It’s a scam

A telephone scam in York County has invoked the name of Sheriff Kevin Tolson - and he is not happy.

The scammer called a resident Tuesday, claiming to be Tolson and stating that if the person did not deliver money for failure to show up for jury duty, the call recipient would be arrested.

The call is a scam, Tolson said. He said his deputies are investigating.

“Don’t fall for this scam,” Tolson said through the office Facebook page.

The call came from number 803-298-8768, said Trent Faris, spokesman for the sheriff’s office.

When detectives at the sheriff’s office called the number back, the voice mail message again claimed to be Tolson.

In the scheme, the caller tried to get the recipient to send a money packet to pay a fine for failure to show up for jury duty.

Faris said that the sheriff’s office does not make phone calls about jury service. He asked anyone who receives such a call to call police and not fall for any ploy.

The sheriff’s office and other law enforcement agencies have reminded the public about similar phone scams before, but this is the first where the scammer uses the name of the elected sheriff in a county of more than a quarter million people.

This story was originally published October 11, 2018 at 1:01 PM.