WWMMD?

IAmSherlocked

Hi Guys, first off, I just want to clarify that I am in no way looking for actual legal advice. Just looking for some opinions. My mom called me regarding a weird situation and thought I would post it here in case anyone has any thoughts. This is off-topic and not really MM related.

My mom received 2 calls today (she was out so they went to voicemail). The first call was from a private detective and the second call was from an attorney's office near where I live (she lives halfway across the country). Both left messages saying that they were looking for my brother-in-law, and that my mom was a point of reference and to please call them back. My mom has maybe been in the same room with my BIL 3 or 4 times since I started dating DH 10 years ago, so it's not like she is close to him or anything. My mom isn't sure whether she should call these people back or just ignore their calls.

I do know that BIL has had collections agencies called on him before and I wouldn't be surprised if he was in trouble again (about a year ago people were calling his parents looking for him), but do you think my mom should call these agencies back? She has a feeling they will continue to call her since a few years ago she was being called incessantly by people looking for my dad, and even though she kept telling them she didn't know where he was (which was the truth) they kept bugging her calling several times a day--she doesn't want the same thing to happen again, especially since she knows nothing about my BIL or how to contact him. She has no idea how she would have gotten on a list as a point of contact for him, and I don't know either.

My mom said she was going to give my MIL a call just to give her the heads-up and see if they had heard of anything going on with BIL. I guess I'm just wondering what you all would do in this situation...

Thanks!

smerka

I have gotten collection calls for both of DH's brothers. One I passed the message along so I assume said brother called them back. The other one I told them very emphatically that we have NO contact with the brother, which is true. I never got another call for either brother. If I were your mom, I'd wait and see if they call again before I called back. If necessary, ask for their address to send a certified letter demanding they stop calling since she doesn't have any information.

Wulfgar

My ex used my parents as reference and contact information.  It took years for them to stop getting calls.

IAmSherlocked

So my mom has received a couple more calls since I originally posted.

She called my MIL to let her know and MIL said that they've been getting calls all day too, but she at least feels better now that she passed along the message that someone was looking for BIL. My in-laws are not happy at all, since they have had to deal with this sort of stuff with BIL before. Hopefully whatever it is gets all sorted out soon.

I'll tell my mom to send them a letter if they keep pestering her. It's just so weird that they managed to find her name to try and contact since even before I got married/changed my name, my mom and I had different last names. Oh well.

Erikan73

While housesitting for my parents there were calls from a collection agency. They were trying to find my roommate who had never lived at my parents home or had any contact with them except at my wedding. Turns out the collection agency did a search of prior addresses & found my name associated with the same address of him (makes sense since we are roommates) so they started going through all known addresses associated online with my name & started calling those. So maybe they did something like that. They somehow got your name & that you may be related to BIL & are trying to do a search by past addresses & phone numbers associated with you to see if you will give up any information. If they continue to call the best thing she can do is let her know that he doesn't live with her and she doesn't have contact with him. They should leave her alone then.