A ‘Robbed Twice' Kind of Feeling

By Loren Steffy, Houston Chronicle 

January 29, 2010

Joe Van Slyke awoke last March to find two women in her room. They told her they were new nurses at the Sugar Land assisted living center where Van Slyke lives.

The 90-year-old retired teacher had returned from having dental work done and had dozed off. She'd left her door ajar so her sister, who lives across the hall, could come check on her.

One of the women told Van Slyke they needed to review her medications and took her into the bathroom to look at prescription bottles. Meanwhile, the other woman rifled through Van Slyke's purse, taking her cash, credit card, Social Security card and driver's license. 

Later, one of them called posing as a bank employee and asked Van Slyke to confirm her mother's maiden name and her birthday. By then, Van Slyke had discovered the theft, and turned the phone number, stored in her caller ID, over to police.

The police arrested the two women, one of whom confessed, pleaded guilty to burglary and is serving 10 years in state prison. The other remains in custody and is scheduled for trial in late April, according to Robert Yack, the Fort Bend County assistant district attorney who handled the case. 

That should have been the end of it, but Van Slyke's nightmare was just beginning. She still had to deal with her bank.

Immediately after the theft, Van Slyke notified several banks where she had accounts, including Washington Mutual, where she maintained a checking account that she rarely used.

While other institutions changed her account numbers or gave her a PIN, she said WaMu assured her that her account was safe.

Addresses didn't match

Months passed before she realized she hadn't gotten a statement for the WaMu account. When she called, the bank, which had been bought by Chase, her address no longer matched the one on the account. Van Slyke has lived at the same retirement home for more than four years.

Someone, apparently using the information stolen from her apartment, changed the address on the account and systematically drained it.

The bank first told her it wasn't liable because she hadn't disputed the withdrawals within 60 days. Van Slyke reminded bank representatives that she'd notified them of the initial theft. She said it never tried to verify the address change, even though the account should have been flagged for possible fraudulent activity.

After a couple months of giving her the runaround, Chase mailed her checks for the missing account balance on Dec. 30. In a final irony, the bank sent them to the erroneous address. 

“I feel like I've been robbed twice,” Van Slyke said. “I can't sleep at night.”

Chase spokesman Greg Hassell said the bank has investigated Van Slyke's case and has agreed to restore her account.

“Having determined that Ms. Van Slyke was the victim of fraud, Chase will reimburse her account for all unauthorized charges,” he said.

Money is on its way

That doesn't mean all is forgiven.

“It just stinks, because they tried to freeze me out and make me give up,” Van Slyke said.

Van Slyke's story has a happy ending. By this week, she had recovered most of her money, and Chase has told her the rest is on the way.

But it shouldn't have happened. For too long, banks have been lax about protecting customers' data and responding to breaches, whether it's individual identity theft like Van Slyke's or thousand of accounts compromised by poor computer security. Since 2005, more than 7 million records at banks nationwide have been compromised by security breaches, according to data compiled by the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse. And those are just the cases the banks have acknowledged.

Van Slyke admits she should have been more skeptical when the women walked into her room, and she should have noticed the lack of bank statements sooner. But her quick actions in responding to the theft were enough to catch the crooks. Why wasn't it enough to get the bank to protect her money?

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