$300,000 Taken in Swindle, Police Say

A 76-year-old Southern California man, described as wealthy but senile, was rescued from an apartment near the Las Vegas Strip after being held captive for six weeks and swindled out of $300,000, police said. Two women and a man were arrested on charges of swindling the man, a Maywood resident, through a sham marriage. The victim’s name was not released by authorities. Police Lt. Joe Greenwood said the suspects, whom he described as a Gypsy family, brought the feeble man from Southern California to Las Vegas in March and that one of the women, Judy Tom, 34, married him at a wedding chapel March 23. The police investigator said the elderly man “authorized the transfer of over $300,000 from his banks in California to several Las Vegas banks and made his new wife a signatory on the accounts.”