Donna Matthews knows the real prize patrol. She's a sweepstakes regular. She picks the magazines, and places the stamps.
But when someone called claiming she won, she wasn't buying it.
"First of all that's now how they're supposed to contact me," says Matthews.
She listened anyway, after all, she's been attaching those little stamps for years.
They claimed there were processing fees that had to be applied before they could process the winning check.
They told her to go into WalMart and send them $155.
She didn't do that. But as luck would have it, the phone rang again, only this time it was her mother Billie Bost. They told her that she won $600,000 and sent her a check that needed to be deposited before her winnings would be released.
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"He said well as soon as you deposit, you call me," said Bost.
NBC 5 Responds was there as she called them back, but we took over the phone.
The man on the other end of the line hung up. So we called Donna's prize winner. We identified ourselves as NBC 5 Responds and that didn't go so well.
The more we questioned, the more he upped the money she had to pay, all the way to $950. They said she even needed to take out an insurance policy with Geico on the prize winnings for even more money. Eventually, he hung up.
Two different men, two different numbers preying on this North Texas mother and daughter who are fans of the real Publishers Clearing House.
We should mention the real Publishers Clearing House posts right on it's website to watch out for these guys.
Even our prize winning experts admits these men were hard to ignore.
"This is what the public needs to be aware of... they know how to hit that core desire of what you dream about, of what you wish you did have..." said Matthews.
Police couldn't help because no money was exchanged. Even after it is, it's next to impossible to get any back. Don't let them get into your head. Never pay, and never cash a check sent to you out of the blue.
