What happened when you got scammed by your own family?
The Kidnapping Lie
My parents called my work phone and texted, “We effing hate you. Consider yourself disowned,” because I refused to wire them money for my brother’s kidnapping scam. Fast forward to now; they wish that’s all I had done.
Growing up, my older brother treated me as his slave. Whenever he had homework he didn’t want to do, which was practically everyday, he would tell me to do it for him.
And if I ever tried to say no, he would trash my room and force me to clean it up. I would have just told my parents, but back then, I just wanted him to love me. So instead, I chose to keep it a secret.
And for years, I told my parents about how happy I was to have Trent in my life. And my lies were good, too good actually.
So much so that when he broke my hand after refusing to do his homework for five days straight, they didn’t believe me.
“Trent would never do that,” my dad said before slapping me across the face for telling lies.
And even though my intuition was screaming at me to get revenge on Trent, I didn’t. I knew that if he was never punished for being abusive towards me, then his behavior would eventually pass on to my parents.
And I was right because when I was 16 and Trent was 19, I caught him stealing money from our mom’s purse in the middle of the night. But I knew telling on him meant putting my life in danger, so I kept it a secret.
Over the next few weeks, I heard him sneaking out at 2:00 a.m. every weekend. And whenever he returned home, he would make the entire apartment reek of the devil’s lettuce.
I wasn’t sure if my parents knew or not. But a month later, I finally got my answer because just as Trent walked in at 6:00 a.m., my dad caught him.
“Trent, what’s going on, buddy? You’ve been coming home wreaking of dar eggs for weeks now.” I tensed up, and that’s when I heard a smack.
“I’m an adult. I can do what I want,” was all Trent said in response before going to bed and sleeping for the entire day.
When he woke up and joined us for dinner, I expected my dad to hit him back, or at least tell him what he did wasn’t acceptable. But no, he just asked Trent if he wanted some salt with his meal.
And we were all forced to play happy family and pretend like everything was okay. And maybe my parents were happy to live in fear of their son, but I wasn’t.
So a week later, I moved in with my friend who lived a block away. Neither of my parents asked why because they already knew the answer. I didn’t talk to them much after that.
Fast forward to five years later. I was 22, working as an operations analyst and making $50,000 a year.
It was around this time that I got the call. It was my mom, and it was the first time she had called me since the day I moved out.
I picked up reluctantly, and she was in tears. “Honey, me and your father need you. Trent is stuck in Colombia.” I took a deep breath to gather my thoughts and calmly asked what the F was going on.
That’s when I heard my dad’s voice. “Trent told us there was a job waiting for him in Colombia. But as soon as he got in the taxi from the airport, his buddies stole his passport and now they won’t give it back unless we pay up.”
“How much is it, Dad?” I asked with a sigh. “They’re asking for $12,000. And if we don’t pay now, it’ll double tomorrow.” I pinched the bridge of my nose.
“Dad, I’m still paying back my student loans.” “And honey, we wouldn’t ask if we weren’t desperate. Please.”
I walked over to the nearest mirror and stared at myself. Was this really what my life had come to? I don’t even know why I agreed.
I guess I just figured that at least now I would never have to hear about him again. That thought alone was enough to put me on cloud nine. And I spent the rest of the week with a huge smile on my face.
But Trent found a way to ruin that, too. I was fast asleep on a Thursday night when I got another call from my mom.
This time I didn’t pick up, and she started spam texting me about needing another $6,000 for Trent. Turns out after the passport fiasco, my parents never forced him to come home.
So Trent decided to put his trust in the same people who stole his passport because now he was one of them, or so he thought. They took him hostage and demanded money again.
I told my mom no because even if I wanted to help, I simply couldn’t. My bank account was completely empty, and I had already sold my car to help with student loan debt.
In response, her and my dad started texting me at the same time, saying I was an effing disgrace, that I should have saved more money to help pay. I blocked them both, turned on flight mode, and slept like a baby with a silk eye mask over my face, but they still couldn’t leave me alone.
Three weeks later, my mom had somehow reached my work phone. “We effing hate you. Consider yourself disowned,” was the first thing she said. Then my dad chimed in.
“When we couldn’t pay the hostage fee, Trent got set up by his friends for DARG trafficking. Now he’s being sentenced. We might never see our baby boy again. All because of you.”
“Any other good news for me?” I responded with a smirk on my face.
I was about to hang up, but then I heard a voice in the background. It was Trent. “Tell her I’m getting 25 years.”
“Maybe she’ll finally crack.” My heart dropped. They weren’t calling from Colombia; they were calling from home. My family had decided to take advantage of me, and I had fallen for it.
I hung up immediately, my hands shaking as I set down the work phone. My co-workers were staring at me from their cubicles, but I couldn’t focus on their concerned faces.
I grabbed my personal phone and started changing every single password I had: banking apps, email accounts, social media, everything. My fingers moved frantically across the screen as I enabled two-factor authentication on every account that offered it.
I called my bank next, explaining that I needed to freeze my accounts and issue new cards immediately. The representative asked if this was due to suspected fraud, and I confirmed it was.
They put a security alert on my account and promised new cards would arrive within five business days. I did the same with my credit cards, then signed up for a credit monitoring service to watch for any suspicious activity.
