A Florida lady was jailed on Friday after stealing more than $400,000 from an elderly cancer sufferer.
Ana Nunez pretended to be the daughter of a 70-year-old cancer patient to pay them a visit at the hospital. Nunez is accused of coercing the patient into signing various forms providing her power of attorney while she was visiting.
She then handed over all of her belongings to the stranger, including her home and bank accounts worth around $437,000.
Nunez is now charged with systematic fraud, exploitation of the elderly, and theft of more than $50,000 from the elderly. She has prior convictions for grand theft and falsifying papers on her record, as well as a probation sentence that concluded in 2019.
Nunez’s son, Pablo Figueroa, is accused of helping his mother carry out her plan. He had been arrested in May.
Elder abuse, such as that performed by Nunez, is frequent in the United States, with FBI data estimating that older adults were defrauded of $1 billion in 2020 alone. According to the survey, senior persons in Florida, Texas, and California are among the most often targeted. They are also more likely to be conned out of bigger sums of money than younger ones.
In July 2021, a guy on Long Island, New York, was arrested stealing the identities of three senior adults between the ages of 90 and 94 who were all residents of the Atria Bay Shore assisted living home. Darrel Sharpeson, 37, applied for multiple loans and purchased a dozen iPhones using their personal information. The first incidence of this behavior was discovered in October of this year.
