I received a phone call the other evening from someone claiming to be a paralegal,he said he was representing fifth third bank and that I ha...

Question

I received a phone call the other evening from someone claiming to be a paralegal,he said he was representing fifth third bank and that I had an outstanding bad check with them from2011,he said that they were going to have me arrested and brought up on civil charges unless I paid them a little over two thousand dollars for the bad check(including fees and interest).until I got the phone call the other evening I never knew anything about any bounced check,I never received any type of notice from fifth third in 2011 or ever about a bad check.what legal course of action should I take.

Answer

This is almost certainly a scam. Ask him his name and what branch of Fifth Third Bank he works at so that you can call Fifth Third to confirm that he works with them. My guess is he won't give you an answer to that question. You might want to start tape recording his phone calls to you as threatening arrest for failure to pay a debt is a violation of the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act if this guy qualifies as a debt collector under the statute.