When Karla Jean, 72, reported that she’d been the victim of a con, she never dreamed her story would get this much attention.
She can thank her granddaughter, Amanda Sapp, for that.
After she was victimized on Monday, Sapp took to social media, posting on Facebook about what happened to her grandmother.
People started commenting almost immediately.
Jean was at her home in Lutz on Monday when she heard a knock at the door. It was a gentleman in a burgundy minivan with two others. The man offered to give her an estimate on some tree trimming work.
The man seemed legitimate. She trusted him.
She walked around the back of her house with the man as he pointed out a tree that was leaning on her fence.
“Then he said, ‘I also want to talk to you about another tree way on the other side of the property.’ Way down in the back.”
Jean thought about it for a moment, and then she remembered she had left her door unlocked.
“So I said, ‘no.’ I was going to down there but I says, ‘I gotta go in the house and I’ll come out back.'”
When she went into the house and into her bedroom, she saw things weren’t the way she left them.
“My purse was on the bed and there wasn’t any cash sitting right there and I had just put cash there,” said Jean.
“And I looked over on my jewelry box and the second drawer was open, just enough not shut and I looked on my armoire and it was open.”
The thieves had stolen Jean’s cash and some of her jewelry.
The men were still outside when she discovered the items missing.
Before she called the sheriff’s office, she tried to do a bit of evidence collecting on her own.
“I was trying to get the tag number and I reached up and pulled [the tailgate] down and I couldn’t get a picture because he was there and pushed it right back up,” said Jean, who said the men then took off.
Detectives are investigating and looking into the possibility there may be additional victims. In some cases like these, especially those involving victims that are older, the crimes aren’t reported. Either the victims don’t realize they’ve been had, or they chalk it up to being their fault.
After her granddaughter’s post about the crime, people have been stopping by asking if she’s okay. Even people who don’t know her are asking about her at her church
“Two friends of mine, they were doing service work up there, Bible service work,” said Jean. “They hadn’t seen… they were here in a minute. I’ll be all over the Kingdom Hall before you know it.”
The three men were last seen leaving the home in the area of Livingston and Sunset Lane in Lutz in a burgundy or wine colored minivan. It didn’t have any markings to indicate it was a commercial or work van.
Anyone with information on these individuals is asked to call the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office at 813-247-8200.
