Bank of Amigo Sues Identity Theft Victim

Bank of Amigo Sues Identity Theft Victim
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Category: Life

DOUGH UNTO OTHERS

BANK PUTS $QUEEZE ON ID VICTIM

By CHUCK BENNETT

OWE, NO! Gloria Carlo of The Bronx says she's the victim of May 21, 2007 -- After identity thieves wiped out a Bronx mom's life savings, her neighborhood bank sprung into action - by slapping her with a lawsuit.

Bank of America hit Gloria Carlo, 51, a single mom from the South Bronx, with a lawsuit demanding $23,312.04. It's money the bank claims she overdrew in a two-month home-shopping spending spree after already exhausting $38,000 from her own savings.

"It was enough to open a jewelry shop," she said. "Why would I do this? The bank is a bigger villain than the thief."

Carlo, a mother of an 11-year-old girl and two adult children, kept her savings at the Bank of America branch on East 149th Street. Between August and October 2005, someone completely drained her five accounts at Bank of America by making purchases on Jewelry Television, Shop NBC, QVC and the Home Shopping Network.

For instance, on Sept. 27, 2005, there were 37 individual transactions to Jewelry Television alone - depleting one account balance from $9,286 to $5,074, according to her bank statement. One day earlier, another account saw nine transactions on Shop NBC that made her balance plunge from $913 to negative $3,993. The purchases continued until Carlo's overdraft was maxed out at more than $20,000.

Yet, apparently no alarm bells were raised at the bank or shopping networks. Carlo said she received not a single phone call inquiring if these transactions were hers.

A separate $30,000 seven-year CD also vanished.

"They couldn't see my funds were depleted? What kind of bank would give an overdraft of $23,000? We are not talking about $100," she said.

Carlo, a retired clerk with the city's Human Resources Administration, takes home just $2,110 a month from her pension and Social Security disability benefits.

In all, she lost $68,733.77 in the apparent identity-theft scam, according to her lawyer.

She filed a police report. She filed an affidavit of fraud. She protested to the bank to no avail. Then a series of tragedies - the death of her mother and brother, and her own visits to the hospital for heart failure and pulmonary embolism - distracted her.

Soon after she got back from a three-day hospital stay last month, Carlo found a court summons under her door. Bank of America was suing her.

"Oh, my God, I was shocked. They would not give me a break," she said. "They don't care how much the thieves took. All they cared about was the overdraft."

Bank of America declined to comment.