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WEST VALLEY CITY — Despite appearing to come from the correct phone number, authorities say calls purporting to be from the Salt Lake Valley Emergency Communications Center and telling people they have a warrant out for their arrest are part of a fraudulent scheme.
"These calls are showing our nonemergency phone number as the caller ID," Geana Randall, spokeswoman for the dispatch center, said Thursday. "The caller is male with a foreign accent. The caller also gives instructions on how to pay the warrant (and) avoid further trouble."
The phone number, 801-840-4000, is the nonemergency point of contact for residents trying to reach officers of several Salt Lake County emergency agencies at all hours of the day, including the West Valley, West Jordan, South Jordan, Draper, Murray, South Salt Lake and Cottonwood Heights police departments. The dispatch center also takes calls for numerous fire departments.
The Salt Lake Valley Emergency Communications Center is coordinating with investigators and the Utah Attorney General's Office about how to counteract the imposter phone calls, Randall said.
The caller is male with a foreign accent. The caller also gives instructions on how to pay the warrant (and) avoid further trouble.
–Geana Randall, dispatch center
"Of course, these phone calls are fraudulent and are not being made from anyone affiliated with (the dispatch center). … As always, we urge citizens to be wary of these types of calls and other scams," she said in a statement.
