Dillingham police say part of a pattern of young people stealing from the elderly to fund expensive drug habits.
A Dillingham woman has been charged with forging her grandmother’s checks, stealing some $3500 over a two month period. As KDLG’s Dave Bendinger reports, police believe this is another example of an elderly being ripped off for drug money.
Audio transcript: According to DPD, Brianna M. Brandon, 26, took 16 checks and wrote them out for different amounts and occasionally to different people.
The branch manager at Wells Fargo became suspicious by the behavior of those cashing the checks, and called the account owner Mrs. Mable Brandon to ask about those payments. According to police, the elder Brandon said she had not written those checks or given her granddaughter any money. She then notified police, and told them she had recently kicked her granddaughter’s boyfriend out of the house for his drug use, and suspected Brianna had gone with him and taken the check book.
Questioned at the station, police say Brianna Brandon admitted to forging all of the checks and stealing from her grandmother. She’s facing 17 felony charges: 16 for forgery and one for theft.
Last week police charged two women with scamming an elderly man out of close to a $1000 after they claimed to be his new fuel distributor.
Police believe there is a pattern of elders being scammed or stolen from to support expensive drug habits, which can cost a user $100 a day or more to sustain.
Contact the author at dave@kdlg.org or 907.842.5281.