City to release timeline of phishing scam that resulted in theft of millions

City Council Tuesday discussed in executive session the phishing scam that resulted in the theft of more than $3 million intended for the streetcar project Downtown.

Officials told ABC-7 they are working on developing a timeline that will let taxpayers know exactly how and when the theft occurred.

The City will discuss the timeline with the Camino Real Regional Mobility Authority during a meeting November 29, 2016, then release the timeline to the public.

“There’s a lot of new information that was shared with us that we want to be able to share with the board of the RMA,” Mayor Oscar Leeser said, “We will release the information as soon as we can because it’s important that the public sees and is able to track it from start and finish.”

In mid-October, city officials revealed a person or group pretending to be a vendor involved with the streetcar project scammed the city out of about $3 million by using a phishing scam.

Phishing is when criminals pose as a legitimate person, business or agency to commit fraud. In this case, the fake vendor used email contracts to scam the city.

Dr. Mark Sutter, the city’s chief financial officer, said the first payment to the phony vendor was for about $300,000 and a second payment was for about $2.9 million.

Sutter said the city has recovered about half of that money: nearly $1.6 million from the $2.9 million, and $292,000 from the $300,000 payment.