PEOPLE mourning the death of a popular Worcester pub landlord who died suddenly have been left outraged after scammers conned money by claiming to provide a livestream of his funeral service.
The funeral of 39-year-old Alex Pope, late landlord of the Paul Pry pub, took place at Worcester Cathedral on Monday, February 19.
Following the funeral, the pub’s official Facebook page shared a post detailing the scam ‘Alexander James Pope Funeral Service Live’ Facebook page which requested users’ bank details in order to access the stream.
The post detailed the family’s gratitude for ‘all of the love and support’ shown to themselves and Alex before explaining how many had money taken from their bank accounts.
The post read: “To our knowledge there are multiple people who have unfortunately had money taken without permission, which has both shocked and angered us.”
It went on to explain the Facebook page requesting people’s bank details was in no way affiliated with the Paul Pry pub. The scam page is no longer accessible on Facebook.
They added: “If you have been scammed by this page please contact your bank immediately.”
Replying to the post, many users were shocked to find out the page had been a scam after many had shared it, in good faith, with hopes of giving people access to the landlords funeral.
When the Tinyurl site, used to con unsuspecting victims, is typed into Google you are directed to a site called ‘angelstudious.tv/Alexander-James-Pope/’, however the livestream cannot be found.
The site appears to be a bogus page created using a WordPress blog template. None of the sections on the site, such as ‘contact, ‘about us’, ‘team’, ‘history’, or ‘careers’ lead anywhere.
An official livestream, which required no sign up or expected donation, was hosted by the Paul Pry pub on their Facebook page. The livestream is still available for those wishing to pay their respects to late landlord, Alex.
The incident has not been reported to the police.
Visit https://reporting.actionfraud.police.uk/ if you’ve been a victim of a scam.
