BATH, Maine — Bath police are alerting people to a phone scam that left a Bath Iron Works employee frantic Friday afternoon, thinking his daughter had been kidnapped.
The employee, who lives in central Maine, answered a call on his cellphone while at the shipyard on Friday and was told by the caller that they had kidnapped his daughter, who lives in Gardiner, according to Bath police Lt. Robert Savary.
The caller demanded money for the release of the woman, Savary said, and the shipyard employee said he thought he could hear his daughter screaming in the background over the phone.
A supervisor who met the man as he walked toward the shipyard’s south gate notified police, who met the man at the gate and took him back to the police station.
“He was frantic, and it was very difficult to get information from him,” Savary said.
Eventually police learned the man had been told to wire money internationally.
Bath police requested that Gardiner police officers attempt to locate the daughter, and after going to her workplace, located her at home. The woman was unaware of the situation, Savary said.
Officers then learned that the phone number that appeared on the call, 52 656-322-5469, has been used in previous scams throughout the country.
Police forwarded the number to the Maine Computer Crimes Unit, but Savary said, “There’s essentially nobody we can arrest. There’s nothing we can do except get this information out to the public and caution them that this is going on and please, don’t wire your money. Just hang up.”