Am I being scammed by the Police?

[nodummy]

I was a general sales manager for a police supply online buisness. i basicly delt with buisness to buisness accts. we had a police dept customer place a special overseas order which they did aknoledge the 5 to 6 week lead time. after 4 weeks the cusomer (asst mayor of a small town) began emailing me asking me for the status of their order. it was by just chance that i replied to their email origionally. she argued and continued to send rather rude emails stating if we cannot complete this sale in a timely mannor that she would like a refund. the order was shipped direct to the customer from china. i contacted china and they said another 10 days due to delays inbuilding the product. the order was cancled and the refund request was sent to the owner of the company. about 8 days later i had left that position to take a position in radio as a on air personality. i contined to get emails from this person even after explaining that i no longer work for that company and to contact them. She replied with threats that they will begin criminal prosecution if i do not pay their $679.99 within 3 days. I explained again that i no longer worked there and that i moved on to a radio career. She then emailed my general manager at my new job stating that she found his info after contacting my local police and went on to advise him of the situation and that i owed her and her city $679.99. I was promptly brought into the office of the GM with the HR persona and was told to simply put an end to this and that this large media corporation could not afford to have a radio personality of theres caught up in this if it were to go public. i then advised this customer again that they didnt pay me. my new job has nothing to do with this transaction and to stop emailing me. a reply was sent CC: my GM that i had until monday to pay or they will prossecute. I again was called into my part time job's offices and given a reminder that these events are troublesom to the corporation and the emails will be added to my employee folder. I was emailed again today stating that they had not received a payment for their refund and they will not stop contacting me or my employer until this is settled. is this illigal?

 

[jsmith416]

What is your question here?

If it's "Can my employer fire me for my alleged involvement with an overseas transaction in which I was allegedly involved?" the answer is unequivocally YES.

You were probably an attempted scam victim by this party that placed the order and if I were in your shoes I would tell your employer that. You said the order was canceled and the buyer was refunded so why would you be under any obligation to complete the sale? Or I am missing something here and the buyer sent the money but did not receive their order?

 

[nodummy]

Scam?

No this is not a scammer. this really is an asst mayor for a small town in texas. They were not credited back by the company as of yet. the company traded owners ()the reason i left). Now the new owner has agreed to refund their order but they are so persistant and insistant that i pay them back and made this quite clear to my new employer. bottom line is, they didnt pay me. why are they threatening to have me arrested if i dont refund them myself?
Isnt that called Duress? Shpuld i be suing them or paying them?

 

[jsmith416]

Why are you so concerned whether or not they get their money back if you're the manager but not the owner? If the owner of the company you work for is telling you to do something I suggest you do it or you might be fired. Is it your own personal money? If not then why do you care so much? You seem to flip between "you" not being paid and the new owner deciding to refund their money. Please clarify the organizational relationships here as you have not been very clear. (at least to my old brain)

 

[nodummy]

What

I dont think your reading. The customer paid. That money went into someones poket. not mine. I left he company and months later the customer is wanting me to pay them back or i will go to jail. they called my new employer daily. he asked them to stop calling. they didnt pay me. i dont work there. i was the guy who answered their customer service email. they continue to call my boss, me and still threaten to have me arrested. i havent commited a crime.

 

[csi7]

It seems like there is a missing part to this situation. If it is due to the publicity stunt on the buyer's part, and they are a public official, you can report this misuse to the state where the public official is located.

 

[jsmith416]

If the situation is as you described I can't think of any reason why you would owe this party any money. Tell them that you will report them for harassment if they don't leave you alone. Your boss should do the same. You could also call their bluff and tell them you're never paying and to go ahead and sue or file a police report or whatever else it is they say they will do if you don't pay them. They have nothing so it will go nowhere.

 

[Mass_Shyster]

Tell them that you will report them for harassment if they don't leave you alone.

Report them to whom? The principal?

The person doing the harassing is "the asst mayor for a small town in Texas". Do you think reporting this to the mayor will help?

 

[jsmith416]

Report them to whom? The principal?

The person doing the harassing is "the asst mayor for a small town in Texas". Do you think reporting this to the mayor will help?

Continual harassment is illegal no matter your job title. I'd start with the state police and every state has an agency that will take reports of public officials abusing their power.

Or call their bluff and tell them to screw off. That's a lot less work than filing police reports.