ORLANDO, Fla. – The phone call seemed genuine. So did the story—and even the person who later arrived at Bonnie’s home to pick up the money.
There was just one problem: The friend who supposedly needed help was never involved.
Bonnie has worked as a professional puppeteer for more than 20 years, entertaining children throughout Central Florida while using her performances to teach kindness, honesty and the importance of doing the right thing.
“I teach morals in my show. I teach kindness and caring, doing good things. Don’t steal. Don’t do wrong,” Bonnie said.
That instinct to help others, she said, was exactly what the scammers exploited.
“I try to be a good person myself, and that’s what they did to me,” Bonnie said.
One afternoon, while she was at home relaxing, Bonnie’s phone rang.
The caller claimed to be her friend Carl. He said he had been arrested after drinking and crashing into a car carrying a pregnant woman.
“It’s me, it’s Carl, I’m in jail,” she recalled hearing. “I was drinking and… I hit a pregnant lady, and I broke my nose, and I’m—can you help me, please?”
When News 6 asked whether the caller sounded like Carl, Bonnie said there was no doubt.
“Exactly like him. Absolutely exactly like him.”
The caller said he did not want his parents to learn about the arrest and told Bonnie that a public defender would soon contact her.
A few minutes later, another man called.
Bonnie said the man introduced himself as “Adam Wise” and claimed to be the public defender handling Carl’s case. He told her Carl needed money to be released from jail.
In reality, Carl was not in jail.
He had not been involved in a crash.
And Bonnie had never been speaking with him.
When Bonnie eventually spoke with the real Carl later that day, he told News 6 he had no idea what she was describing.
“I couldn’t believe it,” he said. “It didn’t feel real.”
By then, Bonnie had already turned over thousands of dollars to the people behind the scam.
This wasn’t a case where someone simply asked her to wire money or buy gift cards.
She said the callers sent people to her home.
Bonnie recalled being instructed to put cash inside an envelope, write down a case number and include paperwork supposedly connected to Carl’s case.
Then a vehicle arrived.
“I got the money. They sent a courier,” she said.
She described multiple vehicles arriving as the people on the phone continued directing her through the process.
That detail closely resembles a tactic the FBI has warned about.
In a September 2025 warning, the FBI said criminals have used grandparent, government impersonation and other schemes to convince victims to hand bulk cash or valuables to couriers sent to their homes or other meeting locations. In some cases, scammers provide a code, password or serial number to make the transaction appear legitimate.
The FBI has also specifically warned about schemes in which scammers pose as a relative who has been arrested, introduce a fake attorney and then arrange for a courier or rideshare driver to pick up cash supposedly needed for bail.
Bonnie believes artificial intelligence may have been used to clone Carl’s voice.
News 6 has not independently determined how the caller produced the voice she heard.
However, the FBI says criminals are using generative AI to make impersonation schemes more convincing. In a public warning, the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center said criminals can create short audio clips that mimic the voice of a loved one and use those recordings to impersonate someone in a crisis who needs money immediately.
The report specifically identifies voice cloning in “distress” or grandparent-style schemes, where a criminal mimics a loved one experiencing an emergency. Victims reported more than $5 million in losses from distress scams with a likely AI connection in 2025, according to the FBI.
The problem is hitting Florida, too. IC3’s 2025 Florida data lists 2,183 complaints with an AI-related descriptor and more than $77 million in associated reported victim losses. Those figures include multiple types of cybercrime in which AI was reported as a tool or medium; they do not represent voice-cloning scams alone.
As News 6 began digging into Bonnie’s experience, we found reports from other victims describing remarkably similar scenarios.
Reports to the Better Business Bureau’s Scam Tracker include people receiving calls claiming a relative was in jail and urgently needed bail money.
FIND OUT MORE: “Why My Son Has a Striking Resemblance with Former President Obasanjo” – Actor Ajibola Finally Opens Up – NewsFinale
In one Florida report filed in July 2026, a person said someone tried to convince them to send money to bail their son out of jail. The caller allegedly used the name of a real sheriff’s deputy and knew information about the son’s actual case and location. The person recognized something was wrong before sending money.
BBB has also warned that scammers can use voice-cloning technology to make fake emergency calls sound more believable, including calls purporting to come from relatives involved in accidents or other emergencies.
In Bonnie’s case, the details included:
A car accident involving a pregnant woman
A broken nose
A loved one supposedly in jail
An alleged attorney
An urgent demand for thousands of dollars
People arriving to collect cash
Eventually, Bonnie said the alleged attorney asked for even more money.
She refused.
When she later tried calling the number back, she said it was disconnected.
Later that day, she finally reached the real Carl. Instead of sitting in jail with a broken nose, he told her he’d had a normal day and was eating dinner.
That’s when the full scope of what had happened became clear.
“It’s my survival, my nest egg,” she said. “I desperately, desperately need this money.”
She said she gave it up because she truly believed someone she cared about was in trouble.
“I believed he was in dire circumstances and I didn’t want him to be in jail,” she said.
How to protect yourself from an AI voice or emergency impersonation scheme
The FBI and BBB say one of the most important things consumers can do is slow the situation down. These schemes are designed to create fear and urgency before a victim has time to verify the story.
If you get a frightening call from someone claiming to be a friend or relative in trouble:
Hang up and call them yourself. Use a phone number you already have for the person rather than a number provided by the caller. The FBI specifically recommends independently contacting the relative to confirm an emergency.
Don’t trust a voice simply because it sounds familiar. The FBI warns criminals can use AI-generated audio to impersonate personal relationships and ask for immediate financial assistance.
Create a family verification word or phrase. The FBI recommends establishing a secret word or phrase with family members that can be used to verify someone’s identity during an emergency.
Ask something the real person should know. A personal question can add another layer of verification, but don’t rely on information that could easily be found on social media.
Treat demands for immediate bail money as a major red flag. The FBI says consumers should be suspicious of calls demanding immediate action and bail money for a family member. FBI Miami has also warned that law enforcement would not contact a relative to collect bail money on behalf of a loved one.
Be extremely cautious if someone wants to pick up cash. The FBI has documented scams in which criminals arrange couriers to retrieve cash directly from victims.
Don’t assume caller ID proves who’s calling. Scammers can spoof phone numbers to make a call appear to come from a trusted person, business or government agency.
Most importantly, don’t allow a caller to prevent you from independently verifying the story. A legitimate emergency will still be an emergency after you take a few minutes to make another phone call.
Orlando police told News 6 the case remains an active and ongoing investigation.
If you want to help Bonnie, click here.
Copyright 2026 by WKMG ClickOrlando – All rights reserved.