ARUNDEL — When she was 12 years old, Beatrice Boucher earned 25 cents a night baby-sitting neighborhood kids. At 15, she worked at Fishman’s on Biddeford’s Main Street. She worked in shoe shops, was a waitress and cleaned houses. She raised two children, lost a teenage son in a car crash and has been widowed three times.

In her retirement, when life was supposed to be easier, Boucher found herself in the grip of lottery scam artists 1,800 miles away in Jamaica.  Unbeknownst to her, they changed her phone number so only they could call, and her family couldn’t reach her for several days. During the months she was in their clutches, the 82-year-old was bilked out of about $80,000.

They stole her money and her peace of mind, and they continue to prey on people across the country. And while local law enforcement was initially stymied in their quest to find a federal agency to prosecute such a wide-ranging case, it is now in the hands of a federal task force under the U.S. Department of Justice Office of Consumer Litigation, said Maj. Bill King of the York County Sheriff’s Office.

York County Sheriff Maurice Ouellette said officers realized early on the case was huge in scope and complexity, with players from New Jersey to Jamaica. Officials in Jamaica, he said, weren’t helpful at all.

“We knew how to do the investigating, but we had no place to get it prosecuted,” said Ouellette. The situation was frustrating until the task force emerged, he said.

Biddeford Mayor and Maine House Rep. Alan Casavant, a relative of Boucher’s stepdaughter, called the crime “elderly terrorism,” and has been talking to Sen. Susan Collins and Rep. Chellie Pingree’s offices about it.

The scam starts with a phone call informing the recipient they’ve won the lottery, including a $2.5 million check and a new car. All the “winner” has to do is send a processing fee, but the fees keep mounting and the prizes never arrive.

Boucher was skeptical at first. She said she didn’t play the lottery, but the caller said companies whose products she bought submitted her name.

“They made me believe it,” said Boucher Wednesday.

Callers told Boucher to wire cash or send it in the mail, disguised between magazine pages. She took cash advances on her credit card and cashed certificates of deposit. Sometimes the money went to Jamaica; some went to addresses in the United States. Some was sent to victims who’d also been bilked, and then invited by the scammers to take a cut. Scammers would call as many as 30 times a day.

Boucher told her son, Rick Chretien, and her stepdaughter, Carol Cadorette, about her win. Both said it sounded like a scam. She told Chretien she wasn’t sending money ”“ but she was. Bank employees worried as the withdrawals mounted, and when Cadorette made inquiries, they thanked her for asking. An employee at a money transfer business warned Boucher that she was being scammed.

“The last time I went there he said he wouldn’t take my money,” said Boucher. Still in the grip of the scammers at the time, she found another way to send the money.

Boucher isn’t the only Mainer to succumb to the scam. Doreen Manke of Derry, N.H. said her elderly stepmother in Androscoggin County has sent more than $100,000 to Jamaican scam artists and fears she continues to do so. The scammers are clever; befriending their prey through frequent phone calls, said Manke, who described their hold over her stepmother as akin to brainwashing.

Sandra Raymond of Arundel said her elderly aunt in Cape Elizabeth sent more than $150,000.

“Her reverse mortgage was tapped out and her house was about to go into foreclosure” when authorities contacted her, Raymond said. “When I got involved, she had $12.50 left in her account.”

When Chretien learned his mother was sending money, he called York County Sheriff’s Office. Investigators traced connections in several states. Det. Michael Hayes, the primary investigator, traveled to New Jersey and found suspects who admitted they’d forwarded victims’ money to Jamaica ”“ as a favor to friends there, they claimed. Hayes said they showed no remorse.

Detectives recorded multiple calls to Boucher’s home during the investigation. In one conversation, “Mark” said they’d stopped by her home to deliver the check, but that she wasn’t there.

“The deviousness, you can’t even describe,” said King. “I call it domestic terrorism.”

Ouellette said FairPoint Communications played a pivotal role in the case. During an interview, a FairPoint security official, who cannot be named, called a scammer named “Tony,” pretending to be the son of an elderly lottery winner. Tony was among the scammers who had called the Cape Elizabeth woman. He reassured the FairPoint caller about the winnings. The FairPoint official said scammers also use software to scout local landmarks and tell victims they’re in the neighborhood, on their way to deliver a check.

Assistant Attorney General James McKenna said the agency warns Mainers about the scams, but victims often refuse to believe it is all a lie.

Boucher has been an outgoing, active senior citizen, enjoying meals with friends and seniors events. The scam has taken a toll on her health, she said, but she’s on the mend and hopes to be active again soon.

Boucher said she thought of how she could use her winnings to benefit her family. Authorities say scam artists prey on those feelings and caution victims to keep the win a secret until the check arrives ”“ but of course, it never does.

If someone is asked to pay a fee connected to a lottery win, told to keep quiet about it, or asked if they know about money grams and other transfers, it’s a scam, said King.

He said adult children may be reluctant to question their parents when financial matters look awry because they don’t want to appear as if they’re protecting an inheritance, but that questions should be asked anyway.

Boucher said she’s speaking out so others won’t be taken in by the scam, and she has already warned a relative who received calls as well.

Her advice is straightforward: “Don’t believe it,” she said.

— Senior Staff Writer Tammy Wells can be contacted at 324-4444 or twells@journaltribune.com.