DOJ outlines efforts to combat elder abuse, fraud in annual report to Congress

by Kimberly Bonvissuto 

With “millions” of older adults falling victim to elder abuse and fraud each year, the Department of Justice has released its sixth annual report about its efforts to tackle those crimes and prosecute offenders.

The DOJ’s “Annual Report to Congress on Department of Justice Activities to Combat Elder Fraud and Abuse” report to Congress outlines its efforts from July 1, 2023, to June 30, 2024, to combat elder abuse, neglect, financial exploitation and fraud.

During that period, the department pursued more than 300 enforcement actions against more than 700 defendants charged with stealing almost $700 million from 225,000 victims. The government provided services to more than 230,000 older adult victims and returned more than $31 million to them.

“Because millions of older Americans suffer some form of elder mistreatment each year — and because many more abuses go unreported or unseen — everyone has a role to play in this work,” Attorney General Merrick Garland wrote in a foreword to the report.

Working with partners including the US Postal Inspection Service, state partners and Medicaid Fraud Control Units, as well as law enforcement corpus, the department pursued more than 30 different types of elder fraud schemes. 

The scams with the highest financial losses for older adults — including senior living residents — were investment scams, where older adult lost $1.2 million. Tech support scams led to $590 million in losses, business email compromise scams led to $382 million in losses, romance scams cost victims $357 million and government impersonation cost victims $180 million. 

The department’s National Elder Fraud Hotline received more than 50,000 calls in the past year and helped older victims to report potential crimes and to local available resources and services. The five states with the highest number of calls were California, Florida, New York, Ohio and Texas. The most common types of fraud reported in those calls are romance scams, identity theft and business imposter scams. 

During a September hearing on fighting fraud held by the Senate Special Committee on Aging, US Sen. Bob Casey (D-PA), committee chairman, released the group’s ninth annual fraud book, “Fighting Fraud: Scams to Watch Out For.”

According to that report, FBI data showed that fraud losses among older adults reached $3.4 billion in 2023. According to the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center, or IC3, investment scams were the costliest scams for older adults, with reported losses topping $1.2 billion last year, a 400% increase since 2021. 

The Federal Communications Commission reported that health-related scam calls targeting older adults tend to spike during Medicare’s open enrollment period, October to December. Last year, there were $17 million in confirmed losses due to healthcare scams. Mike Braun (R-IN), ranking member of the Senate Aging Committee, said that Medicare lost $60 billion in 2023 due to fraud, errors and abuse.

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DOJ outlines efforts to combat elder abuse, fraud in annual report to Congress