TFD warns about firefighter impersonator

The Tulsa Fire Department and the City of Tulsa are warning Tulsa residents about a con artist posing as a firefighter, trying to talk his way into people's homes.

Cheryl Surratt is one of several residents TFD knows about that has gotten the suspicious call. Around 11:30 last Thursday, Surratt says she got the strange call from somebody claiming to be with an organization affiliated with TFD. The caller said he needed to come into Surratt's home the following Thursday so he could inspect her dryer vent and make sure it's not a fire hazard.

"First of all, when I looked at my phone: out of area," Surratt said. "He couldn't tell me his name. He couldn't tell me the name of his organization that was affiliated with the Tulsa Fire Department."

Captain Stan May, Public Information Officer for TFD, says Surratt was exactly right to think the call was suspicious.

"We don't have programs where we solicit to come out to your house and inspect your dryer or your electrical," May said. "We do do inspections on businesses."

"Any time we call, we leave a number and the officer's name."

But Surratt doesn't feel any better knowing she didn't buy the caller's story.

"What was he going to do once he got inside my home," she asked. "Was he going to plan on robbing me, or...?"

Surratt's son, Otis, worries that since most people are taught from a young age to trust firefighters, that trust could lead people to become victims. He says that's a tough lesson to teach his young daughter.

"We've got to be mindful and understand that people are not who they say they are," Otis Surratt Jr. said. "And we have to just take a step back and realize what's really going on."

Cons preying on people's natural trust of firefighters is difficult for TFD to deal with, as well.

"They let us into their house to help with their smoke detectors, they let us work with their children, the elderly," May said. "But we have to have that trust. But these guys are trying to prey on that, and it makes it difficult for us to do our job."

May says the bottom line is anybody representing an official city or county agency who calls you or comes by your home should be wearing a uniform and/or badge, should give their name, and have another verifiable form of identification. If the caller or person at your door doesn't have those things, hang up or don't answer the door, and call police.

In most of the reported cases of people receiving these calls from impersonators, May says the caller claims to be from "TFD Connections." That organization does not exist as officially affiliated with TFD.

If you receive one of these suspicious calls, you're asked to call police and report it.