Every week, leaders in area law enforcement are on KSFY Action News' Wheel of Justice.

This week, Mitchell Police Chief Lyndon Overweg gave the Wheel a spin. After doing so, he took time to chat with KSFY's Drew Sandholm. Here's how that conversation went:

KSFY: This week on the Wheel of Justice, we were talking about scams. You were saying that there are several of them plaguing people in your area and of course, across South Dakota. Do you want to tell me about some others that are circulating out there, that people should know about?

Overweg: One of the more common ones, some people may heard of, is called the "900" scam. They want to you call a 900 number and they do give you a small excerpt on there that the cost maybe like $3.99/minute, but you have to do this to claim some sort of prize. The downside is, once they have you on the phone, they're going to stretch it out to like 30-35 minutes and you can't get off without getting to the end of it and soon... it usually costs them about $35 to $40 or $50 just for the one phone call and in the long and short of it, there's no prize at the end of it anyways.

Some of the other ones we also see involve sweepstakes to where you have to pay a certain redemption fee for the sweepstakes or you have to pay a processing fee or legal fees where you're going to have to pay $2,500 to claim your $4-5M prize.

Any time you have to pay money to get money, it's a red flag and it's a scam. Don't do it. You're never going to get ahead in this situation.

If you ever have to wire money outside the country or even in the country and give access to another country to obtain it, that's another big red flag. You're going to lose every time, okay? 

Any time there's sweepstakes out there or unclaimed prizes is another one: where you have to pay money to get money, it's a scam. It's a scam. It's a scam. It's a scam. We can't say it enough, but people continue to lose money on it and a lot of times we say, if you've lost money, make sure you come forward, report it, but there is also some public embarrassment also, that people always don't like to come forward and we do see that occasionally. Sometimes it's up to $20K that they've lost because it seems that once they've find people that will bite on this, that will provide money to them, they continue and they'll do it everyday. They'll max all their credit cards out. They'll go through all their savings until they got no more money left.

They'll go to the point of even saying they're going to send a courier to pick the money up.

They'll go to extremes, saying they've already talked to 'Detective Such-and-Such,' from their local police departments. Any time somebody brings that up, make sure you call your local police departments and verify. I mean, we're not going to do that on the phone. I don't think there's any police department that would. They're going to come out and see you in person, especially... we don't get involved in these types of sweepstakes or anything like that. But they'll do that as a type of reassurance-type thing, as they'll throw some name out there of some detective that may not even work in your city, but they'll do it. We did have some of them in Mitchell also. They just throw that out as a reassurance-type thing for them.

KSFY: Do you think that people that are hesitant to report these crimes because they're embarrassed or what have you, might take some value in -- I guess, do you have any words of advice for those people to kind of coach them through how they maybe could report these crimes?

Overweg: Well, just go to your local law enforcement. You're not going to be the first one. You're not going to be the last one. Okay? We're going to try and help you recover it. If the money is gone and it's out of country, we may not be able to get it back. I mean, we're going to be very honest with you and tell you up front.

What we like to get out ahead of time is, once somebody calls like this or if you're even contemplating following through on it, make sure you get a call back number. Verify it. Check on the company (to see) if it's a verifiable business.

The other thing, we always tell them, if they don't want to call law enforcement, at least call a family member. Call an attorney. Anybody. Somebody they can trust. Just bounce of them and say, 'What do you think? Does this, I mean it sounds too good to be true to me. Should I try it? Shouldn't I?'

Always run it by somebody else. Never jump at the first opportunity. If it's a valid-type situation, they're not going to want -- you don't have to do it right that day. You should be able to wait a day or two to do some research, that sort of thing.

KSFY: I gather that the scams you're talking about often people not from this country. They're from overseas. Maybe in Canada or Mexico.

Overweg: Or Nigeria or Africa. We see them all over.

KSFY: Now when they get their victims from South Dakota or who knows where, the money is wired to those countries where they're calling from or writing from and the money is lost. When I've done stories on this previously, agencies, authorities, and the like have said there's little to nothing they can do to reprimand or get these guys.

Overweg: Right. A lot of times there's no laws that apply to them on the other country. Or our laws don't apply and our warrants don't apply to them.

KSFY: So do you see there's any end in sight, aside from public awareness?

Overweg: Public awareness is a huge one. I don't know what else they'd try right now. If there's some type of international prosecution, but that's very, very tough to do.

KSFY: I suppose with all the other conflicts going on in the world this is probably on the back burner.

Overweg: Right. I mean the main thing we always tell people: if it seems too good to be true, most the time it is. Okay?

KSFY: Yeah. Very good. Say, I want to ask you just a couple quick questions here just about yourself as police chief in Mitchell. That was your first job is your current job. You've been working there for more than 20 years too. Tell me about that.

Overweg: Yep. I went to Dakota Wesleyan University, done my internship with the Mitchell Police Department, got hired on with them about three-weeks afterwards, and kind of moved through the ranks and I'm now actually Chief of Public Safety -- to where I'm Chief over at Police and at Fire Department and a few other departments there in the city. But yeah, it's been a great time. Mitchell is a great city. There's a lot of support for us and I've seen a lot of interesting things.

KSFY: Now more than 20 years ago, do you remember going out on your first call? 

Overweg: I remember a few of the first ones.

KSFY: What was that like?

Overweg: It's an eye-opener at times. I'll tell you that. Even when I done my internship, I can recall a few of the things we had to do.

KSFY: Is there a story that maybe you can share? Something you remember?

Overweg: One of them involved a high-speed chase, where the car had wrecked and we were able to find the subject. Another one... some of them are more tragic and them are the ones that kinda stick out a little more, but yeah. I mean there's been a lot of great times also, where we've been able to help people. We've been able to capture things. Solving bank robberies and solving homicide cases and I worked as a detective for about ten years and I worked with the Drug Task Force in the area there, getting a lot of drugs off the streets, those types of things, and we continue to do all that this time.

KSFY: Yeah, well you certainly have your work cut out for you, so I'm very appreciative of (how) you're taking time to speak with me in our KSFY Studios and again, I hope you come back and visit us here at KSFY. Thanks a lot, Chief.

Overweg: Thanks for all that you do. I appreciate it.

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