Funeral or Fake? People asking for money in Arizona, possibly part of a larger network
PHOENIX (AZFamily) — People asking for money at Phoenix intersections may be linked to a larger group doing the same thing in other cities nationwide.
Their message tugs at the heart – a child, reportedly the one on the sign, dead from cancer – and asking for money for a funeral.
But we found that may not be the case.
Arizona’s Family Investigates spent months tracking this group from 32nd St. and Thomas to 27th Ave. and Camelback in Phoenix.
The people asking for money say they do not speak English. But one woman held a sign with a girl’s photo claiming the child died of cancer. In Spanish, the woman told us the girl was her cousin and died two days prior, and they did not have money for the funeral.
But a closer look at the sign showed something that stood out on the girl’s photo – a slight watermark. Arizona’s Family Investigates grabbed a photo of the sign and ran it through reverse image search sites. The results showed the girl’s photo was available on stock image sites, essentially available to anyone.
One viewer saw the questionable signs in Phoenix with similar handwriting and alerted Arizona’s Family in March. The woman, named Diana, did not want to show her face out of concern for her safety, but she wanted to warn others because something did not seem right.
“Just seeing them every day for a few months. The same people looking like they’re in uniform,” Diana said. “Normally, I see people share stuff on social media, or I see it on the news, and I was just like, there’s something not right here.”
Arizona’s Family Investigates spent months looking for the groups in Phoenix and found they might be part of a larger group.
Our sister station, WNDU, in South Bend, Indiana, spotted the signs on street corners in their city. The pictures and circumstances are different, but the handwriting on the signs – very similar to the ones in Phoenix.
In 2023, a person held a sign saying a teenager died in a car accident. In 2024, a person said a 9-year-old died in a car accident. Police in South Bend posted on social media disputing the claims made on the signs, saying the car accidents were not local.
The signs have also been spotted in Ohio, Missouri and Tennessee.
When Investigative Reporter Jeremy Finley at our sister station, WSMV in Nashville, Tennessee, confronted the group in 2023, a woman did not want to show him the sign and, at one point, claimed it was her sign for her “job.”
A year later, a similar group showed up in Nashville, and when asked questions, they knocked the phone out of the reporter’s hand.
Seeing those examples from across the country, Diana wants to alert people across the area to ask questions before they hand over cash.
“It sounds like there’s a ring or something going on,” Diana said. “[I] just to warn people, say, hey, don’t, don’t give people money.
“They’re taking advantage of people and their kindness, and when they can, they can give their money somewhere else, you know, to people who actually really need it.”
We shared what we found with this group with the Phoenix Police Department. They said it does not violate the city’s aggressive panhandling ordinance, but we found it could violate another city ordinance, which bans soliciting contributions from the occupant of any vehicle. However, the Phoenix Police said they did not want to comment on our story.
In another case in Rialto, California, where the signs were slightly different, police made arrests on charges of theft under false pretenses.
The police department in California reminded people while they may want to help, “you need to be cautious of anyone asking for money for medical expenses, funerals, or similar requests.”
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