Tyler based FCIC helps in preventing $131 million in financial fraud

TYLER — In the first half of the year, Texans have lost more than $4 million to scams, our news partner KETK reports. The team in charge of preventing and investigating many of these fraud cases is the state agency, Texas Financial Crimes Intelligence Center, which is based in Downtown Tyler. Director Adam Colby (pictured) said criminals move from city to city and they come into connect the crimes. After opening in January of 2022, FCIC has worked around 1,800 cases and some of them are linked. “We saw the need, because one agency may be working a case while another agency may be working the same case completely parallel of the other investigation, so that’s what we do. We are connecting all of this up,” said Colby.

In the first 18 months, the agency has prevented more than $131 million in lost money and recovered more than 600 card skimmers.

“We’ve recovered thousands and thousands of card numbers, we recover skimming devices for gas pumps, ATM’s and point of sale terminals,” said Colby. FCIC partners with the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation and together they focus on disrupting organized groups. Cases like these are put on their radar by local law enforcement and financial institutions.

“We get information from the banks that leads us to believe a gas pump skimmer is or was at a specific station. We dispatch TDLR and TDLR goes out and recovers those skimmers,” said Colby. Currently, there is no other financial crime agency like this one in the US. This makes their job even more important.

“Now we are matching up cases across the state and in many cases across the country and we are not just working with Texas law enforcement, we are working with federal partners as well,” said Colby.

Due to an increased budget, they have expanded their number of analysts from three to 17 people, and renovations for a new forensic lab are coming soon. The agency also partners with the Smith County District Attorney’s office.

“We are proud of the excellent work the FCIC has done so far. This Texas initiative is a model for the country of how to effectively fight financial crime, and it is saving Texans millions of dollars already,” District Attorney Jacob Putnam said.

Colby added that if you believe you are a victim of financial fraud to please report it to your bank and to law enforcement and that bank will not do it on your behalf.