Child Identity Theft and Financial Abuse Within Families

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Axton is now a professor of consumer studies at Eastern Illinois University. She specializes in child identity theft and financial abuse within families. "Because I've become so analytical about it, I don't have any emotion," she says.

When Axton Betz-Hamilton was 11 years old, her parents' identities were stolen. At that time, in the early 90s, consumer protection services for identity theft victims were basically non-existent. So the family dealt with the consequences as best they could. But when Axton Betz-Hamilton got to college, she realized that her identity had been stolen, too. In fact, her credit score was in the lowest 2%. As she was working to restore her credit, she inadvertently discovered who had stolen the family's identity: a woman named Pam Elliot. And knowing it was Pam Elliot would change everything for Axton Betz-Hamilton.

View the photograph Axton describes here.

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