The Rise and Fall of Scam Calls in the United States

The Mount Washington police chief decided to type the words McDonald's strip search into Google. To his and Detective Stump's surprise, the search resulted in hundreds of hits. Similar phone calls had to be made throughout the United States. In all of the incidents, a male caller would claim to be either a police officer or another kind of authority figure then ask a store manager to assist with an investigation. Their requests always involved ordering a strip search be carried out on a young woman, often a teenager. By 2004, there had been 70 of these hoaxes perpetrated across 32 American states.