First of all, I want to thank all of my friends and family who have been so supportive through this ordeal and have been encouraging me to write this GoFundMe. I hope that reading about our experience will alert all of you to the criminal capabilities that have been sharpened with AI technology.
I'm Deborah Del Mastro, a professional musician and actress, retired and living with my husband, Paul, who is also a professional musician and retired. Paul and I play together in a few great bands, and we live off Social Security and the money we make from playing music. Both of us have 2 adult kids each. We have a wonderful life together, and our kids are the most important people in our lives, as you can imagine. We are a happy family, despite not having as much as others. It doesn't matter - we have many friends and wonderful colleagues and are very happy in our life.
On Thursday, May 14th, I had the absolute worst day of my life. I'm still not okay after this horrifying day of being terrorized and extorted by a criminal with high-tech capability.
In the early morning, at the breakfast table, I received a local call that I answered. Someone on the other end told me that they were part of the Mexican drug cartel and that my daughter had seen something she shouldn't have while a drug deal was going down. She had her phone out, and his boss told him to "take her." Then he asked if my daughter was prone to panic attacks. I'm still trying to understand what was going on, and he puts on a woman who is clearly having a panic attack, sobbing, crying, and saying, "Mom! Mom! I'm so sorry, I'm so scared!" IT WAS MY DAUGHTER'S VOICE!!! I was shocked and couldn't speak, while the criminal on the phone started barking directions, telling me that he wanted $20K for my daughter's return or they'd kill her and my family or they'd sell her for that money.
The rest of the next 5 1/2 hours was complete terror. I had to have my husband come pick me up when I accidentally locked my keys in my car (in panic), and he was thrown into this extortion scheme and was just as terrified as I was. If I had not heard my daughter's voice, twice!!, I may have had the intuition that something was wrong, but even later in the process, the criminal had me speak to "my daughter" to tell her (he dictated what I could say or else...) that the nightmare was nearly over and that we'd get her soon. She said, "I'm so sorry, Mom, I love you," and once again - IT WAS MY DAUGHTER'S VOICE.
All in all, we wired $5400 to Mexico, cash pick up within 10 minutes, in 4 different transactions in 4 different places. It was all the money that we had in our savings and checking accounts. I/We would have done anything for my daughter's safe return. We were constantly told that we didn't have enough money for them to return her to us - they would sell her instead. But at last, when he probably realized that he couldn't get any more money from us, he said that he had released her in Pittsburg, CA, at the Walmart - where he had directed us to go twice. Luckily, it was a scam, and she was not there but at work, safe and sound. We were out of our minds - first that we had been scammed out of our savings but mostly relieved that my daughter was safe after all. I have no idea how this criminal connected me to my daughter's voice - it is a frightening reality now.
We are looking to just replace the money we lost, nothing more. Friends have already helped with anonymous donations (Thank You!!), so we will not ask for the full $5400, but if anyone would like to help, we appreciate it!