Duo Tried To Steal Money In Bogus Bail Scheme: PD

WEST BABYLON, NY — Two men — one from Brooklyn, the other from Baldwin — have been charged in a bogus bail scheme in which a woman was almost scammed out of $50,000 to help her grandson out, Suffolk cops said.

An 82-year-old Michigan woman received a call that her grandson was arrested after a car crash and needed bail money, so she sent $10,000 cash to an address in Brooklyn on Aug. 20, police said. A man called her afterward to claim “a pregnant woman’s unborn child was killed” in the crash, police said, adding that the woman was told she needed to send $40,000 cash to an address in West Babylon.

Soon after, the Financial Crimes Unit received information about the scam and began an investigation, police said, adding that when the package containing $40,000 was dropped off outside of a home on Fulton Street in West Babylon on Aug. 25, detectives were waiting. Benson Massillon was caught walking up to a home to pick up the package and carrying it to a vehicle, and then he and the driver, Lenard Gillis, were arrested, police said.

Massillon, 34, of Brooklyn, and the driver, Lenard Gillis, 35, of Baldwin, were each charged with third-degree attempted grand larceny, fifth-degree criminal possession of stolen property and conspiracy. They will be arraigned at First District Court in Central Islip on Thursday.

The money will be returned to the woman, according to police.