Replace Stolen Savings

Hi,

My name is Cheri (I am my mom's caretaker- She is 96 and I am 76) and I am fund raising in a attempt to replace money saved for Property Taxes and new bathroom flooring.

My mother and I have been saving to replace old worn out floor in the main bathroom for almost a year.

Yesterday, I fell for a scam that ended up stealing $5000 from my savings account. I am ashamed to say I was suckered into believing I was receiving refund from a canceled "Geek Squad" subscription.

Because I had previously had a "Geek Squad" account on my computer I wasn't surprised that it was being renewed for $399.95 for two years. I called the number on the emailed invoice and told them to cancel this renewal as I no longer had a computer so didn't need the service any longer. They quickly had me download an 'AnyDesk' app to fill out the refund request. However, they asked me to first transfer their refund to my bank account for $50, to make sure transfer would go through, then they would transfer the other $350. I filled out form however instead of $50 the transfer went through for $5000. The person I was talking to was upset and said that he would be fired if I did not return $4500. His supervisor approved giving me an extra $100 for my trouble. I was asked to remove $4500 from my checking and I could keep the $500 to cover the cost of the subscription and the extra $100 for the inconvenience. I was also asked not to tell the bank about the error as they would freeze my account for up to 10 days and the agent would be fired for the mistake. Because I have had experience with having to change my account number I knew that errors always resulted in the fraud department closing your account even if you had been hacked which causes lots of issues with incoming automatic payments. So, anyway I withdrew the $4500, leaving the extra $500 in my account and then went to a bit coin ATM that I was told I had to use to quickly return the money.

Which I did even though the ATM was in a sketchy part of town and I was nervous with having that much cash in my possession. Of course, the agent to whom I was talking was very nice and apologetic for my trouble and grateful I was kind enough to care if he was fired.

It wasn't until I returned home and checked my online banking that I realized that the $5000 was taken from my savings!!

I am ashamed that I fell prey to this scam as I try to be careful and up to date on current scams.

I'm am so embarrassed, but do not want to tell my 96 year old mom that I allowed myself to be suckered into having our savings stolen. So I am asking for help on this forum. Most especially so I will have the $2000. Needed to pay my property taxes that come due in October.

Any help will be greatly appreciated.