Alert! Scammers impersonate Sergeant Carlos Cornejo to rob Hispanics

• Scammers pose as beloved Colorado police officer, Sergeant Carlos Cornejo.
• Scam victim claims she was asked for $650.
• She said someone asked her for personal information on Facebook.

Sergeant Carlos Cornejo is a well-known Colorado police officer who is beloved by the Hispanic community throughout the country, so Diana Fuentes, an immigrant living in Fort Washington, Maryland, was surprised when she received a private Facebook message allegedly from him.

In the message sent through Facebook Messenger, he asked her for personal information, in addition to requesting $650.

Sergeant Carlos Cornejo scam victim knew something was wrong

Fuentes immediately knew something was wrong and she deleted her personal information from the conversation. She was right, it was a scam. Although the Facebook profile had the photo and name of Sergeant Carlos Cornejo, it was not him, it was an impostor. «Unfortunately that happens very often. It is a very important issue that we all have to pay attention to. It’s easy to create a profile with anyone’s name and send a message to ask for money, help, and you think you’re talking to the person,» the officer explained to MundoNow.

Cornejo took the opportunity to warn, «If someone sends you a message, I have verified my page Sergeant Carlos Cornejo with a checkmark at the end. And that little dove verifies that I’m the one who is talking to you. I’m not going to ask you for money. But you can verify simply by asking the person on the other end of the message to send you a video, and in the video to tell you the date, time and your name… and send it to you.” With this simple process, say the police, you will be able to verify if the person you are talking to is really who they say they are.

This type of scam is very common on Facebook

This type of scam is very common on Facebook. According to the Federal Trade Commission, social networks have become fertile ground where cybercriminals carry out investment, romantic and electronic purchase fraud. In 2021 alone, more than 95,000 users of these platforms were scammed, which increased by more than 100 percent compared to 2021.

This type of theft didn’t slow down in 2022, and the forecast for this year remains the same. «Personally, I don’t send friend requests, or anything like that, I try to respond to comments in public,» Sgt. Cornejo points out as he adds that other people have already been the target of these scams.

What to look out for on Facebook

“It’s sad that these kinds of things happen. Using my information to harm people. I always try to report this, but I ask you to help report it too so that it doesn’t happen anymore.» Facebook already posted the following recommendations:

Things you should be wary of:

• People you don’t know who ask you for money.
• Anyone who asks you to pay a fee to apply for a job.
• Unverified pages claiming to represent a large organization or public figure.
• People who ask you to move the conversation to another not so public or more insecure channel other than
• Facebook (such as another email).
• People who ask you to send them money or gift cards to send you a reward in return.
• People claiming to be friends or family in emergency situations.
• People who misrepresent where they are.
• Messages or publications with misspellings or grammatical errors.
• People or accounts that direct you to another site to claim a prize.