A 66-year-old man was wrapping up a withdrawal at a bank ATM in Villa Park, California, on Nov. 18, 2025, when money landed at his feet. He bent down to pick it up. That was the entire point of it.
One man had already watched him punch in his PIN. A second dropped the money. While he was reaching for it, a third switched his ATM card for a fraudulent one, according to the Orange County Sheriff’s Department. The real card and the PIN were then used to make purchases and pull out money. He realized the next day and reported it on Nov. 22.
Three men were arrested on Jan. 6, 2026. North Operations investigators with the sheriff’s department identified Romanian nationals Romita Achitei, Paul Agafitei and George Asafiei after reviewing bank surveillance video and tracking a grey SUV. All three face multiple felony charges, including grand theft, identity theft and forgery. The department has linked them to alleged distraction thefts in Orange, San Bernardino, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Sacramento counties. At least a dozen victims have been identified, and investigators believe there are more.
The Dropped Twenty Is Not An Accident
A man and a woman are wanted for running the same play on older ATM users around Southern California, the Los Angeles Police Department says. One of them watches the PIN go in. The other drops a $20 bill and points it out. The moment the victim turns, the card still sitting in the machine gets replaced with a near-identical counterfeit.
An 83-year-old man lost thousands of dollars that way on Jan. 15, 2026, at an ATM in the 2100 block of Colorado Boulevard in Eagle Rock. A couple of hours later, the same pair was seen at a bank in the 800 block of North San Fernando Boulevard, using his card. Investigators say the two had been working the scheme for at least a month.
The police advice here is short and worth memorizing. If somebody alerts you to money on the ground while your card is still in the slot, do not turn away from the terminal.
Keep Strangers Out Of Arm’s Reach
Cover the keypad with your free hand every single time, even at a machine you use twice a week. The Orange County Sheriff’s Department put it plainly in its release: “It is important to remain vigilant when at the ATM or any time you are using a debit card. Always cover the keypad when entering your PIN and avoid engaging with strangers while completing your transaction.” The department also warned about people approaching you on the way to your car or on your way out of a store: “If someone approaches you, make sure to keep your distance and do not allow any stranger within arm’s reach.”
Because the replacement card is built to look like yours, the only check that works is reading it. Before the card goes back in your wallet, look at the name and the last four digits. Two seconds. If a stranger starts talking to you mid-transaction, hit cancel, take your card, and deal with the person after the machine has let go of your plastic.
The victims in these cases have been older adults, so if you have a parent or grandparent who still pulls cash out on Fridays, this is a conversation worth having with them.
When The Machine Says Broken, Your Money May Already Be Gone
Philadelphia police have found a cheap metal plate slipped into ATMs that stops the roll-down door from opening. The machine counts out your money and the door tries to open, but the plate holds it. You hear the machine working, you get nothing, and you walk off thinking it is out of order. The thief comes back, pulls the plate, and takes your money.
Since March 15, 2026, the devices have turned up at nine locations across the city, on bank machines and on ATMs inside dollar stores and mom-and-pop shops. During the weekend of March 28, 2026, officers responded to five bank locations with the devices attached. Capt. Robert McKeever of the Major Crimes Unit said the weekend timing is deliberate. “Because now the branch is closed, he won’t be disturbed. And also, when people go in there, if it doesn’t give them the money, the branch is closed and now they can’t take care of it until Monday,” he said.
Do not try to pry the door open, since the machine might simply be broken. Pull up your account on your phone right there in the vestibule instead. If the withdrawal posted, you were robbed, and you want that on record with your bank the same day rather than Monday afternoon. Police in Philadelphia are asking anyone with information to call 215-686-TIPS (8477).
The Five-Second Check Before Your Card Goes In
On Aug. 13, 2026, Boston police from District D-14 in Allston/Brighton responded to a skimming device found at an ATM inside the 7-Eleven at 241 Market Street. Nobody spotted it from the outside. It was found when the machine was serviced.
That is the hard part about skimmers. The readers hide inside the card slot and often cannot be seen at all, and the camera that grabs your PIN can have a lens as small as the tip of a ballpoint pen. Boston police list the tells worth running your eyes over:
- The card slot feels tighter than usual when you push your card in
- A panel or part looks like a different material than the rest of the machine
- There is a small hole near the keypad or the card reader
- Store or manufacturer decals are missing or look peeled off
- Broken lights, a raised PIN pad, or parts that wiggle
- Stickers stuck in odd spots
Grab the reader and give it a tug. People feel rude doing this in a line. McKeever’s take on that: “If you see something, if it doesn’t look right on the debit machine or something, you can pull on it a little bit to see if it moves. I mean, there’s nothing wrong with that.”
Use Credit At The Pump And The Pharmacy
Skimming is not only an ATM problem. Boston police say skimmers are common at pharmacies, gas stations and grocery stores, and at checkout counters the criminals use plastic overlays molded to look exactly like the top of the payment terminal. The overlay captures the card data and the PIN you type into it.
Paying with a credit card instead of a debit card keeps your PIN out of the transaction and keeps anyone who copies the card away from your checking account. Tap-to-pay and chip are better than swiping. Cards with no chip, including most EBT cards, are the most exposed, and in Philadelphia police found skimmers attached to benefits access machines. If a terminal at the register feels loose under your fingers, stop and tell the clerk.
Somebody Watching You Walk Back To The Car
Police in Independence, Missouri, have a name for the version where nobody touches your card at all. It is called jugging. Thieves sit and watch people take out money at banks, ATMs and check-cashing businesses, then follow them somewhere else and take it there.
Put the money in your pocket or bag before you step away from the machine, not in the driver’s seat with the door open. Keep cash, purses and bags out of sight in the car. Watch your mirrors for the same vehicle behind you through two or three turns. If you think you are being followed, do not drive home. Drive to a police station or somewhere busy and well lit, and call police from there.
The Gas Station Machine That Only Goes One Way
Adrian, Michigan, police warned in August about a surge in crypto ATM fraud that cost local victims thousands of dollars in a single week. The callers pose as law enforcement and threaten arrest until the person drives to a gas station machine and feeds money in against a scannable QR code. Multiple victims in the city lost nearly $10,000.
Lane Montz, president and CEO of the Better Business Bureau of Northwest Ohio and Southeast Michigan, said the machines themselves are legal and the trick is getting people to use them. On the pitch itself, he was blunt: “Nobody that says you have to pay some sort of a debt by cryptocurrency… that is not valid. There’s no government agency that will take crypto as a payment, and you should not be paying anybody with cryptocurrency that you put into an ATM machine account.” Once it is sent, Montz said, nobody can get it back.
Adrian police have taped warning flyers above the machines in Lenawee County, most of which sit in gas stations. Anyone pressured to use one should call 911 and ask for an officer.
Turn On The Alerts Tonight
Text and email alerts from your bank or card issuer take about three minutes to set up in the app, and they are the only thing standing between a swapped card and a drained account overnight. In the Villa Park case, a full day passed before the victim knew anything was wrong. An alert would have pinged on the first purchase.
Speed matters on the back end too. Under Regulation E, reporting a lost or stolen card within two business days caps what you can lose at $50. Wait longer and it can rise to $500 or more. If you think your card has been compromised, call the issuer’s fraud department, kill the card, and ask for a replacement with a new PIN rather than the old one.
Where you withdraw is worth rethinking as well. Machines inside bank branches, under cameras, or at drive-up windows are harder for anyone to tamper with or crowd. Sticking to your own bank’s ATMs also saves you out-of-network fees, which averaged $4.86 a withdrawal in Bankrate’s 2025 survey once the operator surcharge and your bank’s fee stack up. Need more than your daily limit? Walk inside to a teller, because counter withdrawals are not capped by the ATM limit.
Every one of these depends on a few seconds when you are looking at something other than the machine. Dropped money, a tap on the shoulder, a door that will not open, a phone call about a warrant. Finish the transaction, take the card, read the card, then deal with whatever the world is waving at you.
