A $7.5 Million Lie: PCH Sweepstakes Scam Targets Veteran
The Perfect Scam
AARP
4.5 • 1.1K Ratings
🗓️ 6 February 2026
⏱️ 48 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
When Manny, an Air Force veteran living in Las Vegas, loses his wife of 62 years, he turns to playing Publishers Clearing House online games to help ease his loneliness. He is thrilled when, one day, he receives a call from Publishers Clearing House informing him that he has won a $7.5 million prize. Manny dreams of finally replacing his old water heater, fixing up his house, and leaving a substantial legacy for his children, but first he must pay fees to release the prize money. The scam continues for months, draining Manny's savings, until Manny's daughter receives a call from an FBI agent. The story has a hopeful ending as local media and businesses come to Manny's aid.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This week on The Perfect Scam. |
| 0:04.0 | I got a call from a man and he says, |
| 0:08.0 | did you ever play Publishers Clearing House? |
| 0:11.0 | And I said, yes, I did for about a year. |
| 0:14.0 | Well, he says, they have a check for you for $7.5 million. |
| 0:20.0 | You work all your life to save your money, |
| 0:25.6 | your retirement is your lifeline. And when things like this happen, you don't know that you're |
| 0:34.4 | talking to a scammer. |
| 0:44.3 | Welcome back to The Perfect Scam. I'm your host, Bob Sullivan. |
| 0:52.3 | I'll never tire of hearing from veterans about the amazing acts of heroism they witnessed, or they took part in while defending our way of life. |
| 0:56.3 | Today's special guest, Manny Guerrero, certainly has his share of stories, and that's why, |
| 1:02.7 | well, it's all the more infuriating to hear about what Manny went through when, after 62 years |
| 1:09.9 | of marriage, he turned to games just to help ease |
| 1:13.8 | the pain of his lonely heart. |
| 1:16.2 | But Mani's story has a hopeful ending too, so stick around to be inspired twice by today's |
| 1:23.1 | episode. |
| 1:24.1 | You've had some experience working with airplanes, haven't you? |
| 1:28.2 | Oh, yeah. |
| 1:29.0 | Tell me what you did. |
| 1:30.5 | Well, in 1953, I went to school for aircraft school. |
| 1:35.7 | I went for the B-47 bomber, the first swept back wing aircraft that America had. |
| 1:41.7 | So you ended up working on airplanes for a long time, right? Oh yeah, but I became a supervisor pretty fast. Ah. How long were you in the Air Force? Twenty-two years. Twenty-two years. That's a long time. Thank you for all that service. And where were you stationed most of that time? Well, I was stationed at McDeal Field, Tampa, Florida. |
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