Pattern: Elderly Victims
Victims: Elderly persons (may range anywhere from 50-100 as youths perceive age, but 65+ is targeted as elderly in official statistics)
Perpetrators: Traveling criminals sometimes target this population, sometimes groups of young males target elderly victims, health care aides may take advantage of their charges, the elderly are victims of financial scams, the elderly are sometimes victims of serial home invaders
Times: Time of day is not a significant factor except in serial crimes; spring and fall are times when traveling criminals are more active
Entry/Approach Methods: Traveling criminals way come to the door offering home repair services, sometimes a pair of women comes to the door and when one is keeping the victim busy the other steals things, telephone/mail solicitors may scam the elderly and get them to withdraw money from the bank
Weapons: Force is used in home invasions – sometimes victims are bound. Intimidation and fear are used. Scam artists use ruses.
Vehicles/Transportation Routes: Traveling criminals have routes and move up and down the U.S. Youths who target the elderly usually live right in the same neighborhood and travel by foot
Stolen Goods: Cash, jewelry, other valuables are taken.
Method: Victims are sometimes targeted by youths in their neighborhood who know the pattern of the victims’ behavior. The more vulnerable elderly are identified before being targeted.
Motive: Ease of victimization, cash
Query terms: elderly, old, ages ranges of victims (50+), home, residence, aide, glass of water, foreign, accent, home repairs, roofing, withdraw, scam, fraud.
Suggestions: The elderly can only be identified if officers collect data on age of victims – make sure this is possible in your agency. Collect all crimes targeting elderly and look for patterns – keep this up-to-date. Identify any past perpetrators who have targeted the elderly and keep information on them and their MOs in a file. If there is a relevant crime pattern, work with senior centers and other agencies to increase community awareness and efforts to protect this population.
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