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Secret Service and San Diego prosecutors describe large, transnational scam networks; urge statewide coordination
Summary
Special Agent Sean Bradstreet and San Diego Deputy District Attorney Scott Perello told a California Senate committee that transnational scam camps and domestic courier networks funnel billions out of the state, and called for more resources and coordinated reporting to disrupt operations.
Special Agent in Charge Sean Bradstreet of the U.S. Secret Service’s San Francisco Field Office and Deputy District Attorney Scott Perello of the San Diego District Attorney’s Office told the California State Senate committee that scams are run by organized, transnational networks and cause large monetary losses to Californians.
Bradstreet said his office receives one to two calls daily with similar scams and estimated an average reported loss of about $400,000 per victim for cases reaching his field office. "Our average loss out of our office is probably 400,000 per victim," he told the panel. He said the Secret Service and partner teams have seized substantial sums: "our local office over the last year seized $27,000,000 just in digital assets." He also displayed a graph his office pulled showing California losses of roughly $2,500,000,000 in the last year, a figure he called conservative because many incidents go unreported.
Bradstreet described overseas "scam camps" that produce coordinated operations, showed images of large compounds in Southeast Asia and explained techniques such as fictitious websites and sideloaded apps that give scammers read/write access to victims’ devices.
Perello, who leads the San Diego Elder Justice Task Force (EJTF), said local coordination of law enforcement, adult protective services and federal partners lets investigators identify couriers and money‑movement networks operating inside California. "When we start investigating [couriers], we learn that the same couriers are showing up on ring doorbells in Ventura County, in Placer County, in Santa Barbara, and Riverside," Perello said. He described San Diego's practice of cross‑referencing local police reports, IC3 complaints and Adult Protective Services referrals to build daily situational awareness and to pursue prosecutions and recoveries.
Perello urged California to scale the model statewide and to provide dedicated funding for investigators, analysts and APS workers. "We are disrupting the elder fraud and money laundering networks that are here operating in California and throughout The United States," he said, and added that counties across California want to replicate the task force but lack resources.
Both witnesses framed the schemes as large‑scale criminal enterprises that shift tactics rapidly and require sustained, multiagency responses.
