On Jan. 16, Lehigh County District Attorney Gavin P. Holihan announced a state prison sentence for a man charged with stealing more than $500,000 in gold and approximately $91,000 in cash from a 74-year-old man.

Hirtik Hemchand Khatri, 25, of Lawrence Township, N.J., pleaded guilty Nov. 20, 2025, to felony charges of theft by extortion, theft by unlawful taking of movable property and criminal use of a communication facility. At a hearing Jan. 16 before Judge Thomas M. Caffrey, Khatri was sentenced to serve 12 months, minus a day, to 36 months in prison for both theft charges as well as two years of probation for criminal use of a communication facility. Khatri was also ordered to pay restitution to the victim of $688,372.

On Feb. 3, 2025, the Whitehall Township Police Department was contacted by a 74-year-old victim whose name will not be released. He told police he had been the victim of a lengthy scam that resulted in a huge financial loss.

The fraud reportedly began with an email to him about an allegedly fraudulent charge on the victim’s PayPal account. He was told he would be responsible for the error and needed to repay PayPal by going to an area gas station with a Bitcoin kiosk to complete the transaction.

The scam continued with numerous calls, each with a variation on the original theme that an error had been made and the victim had to repay the error with cryptocurrency, gold or cash. The victim was told that if the payments were not made, he would be arrested and put in jail. This fear caused him to continue to make the payments.

Ultimately, the victim withdrew funds from his IRA and purchased more than 200 gold bars worth almost $600,000, which were picked up from the victim by Khatri. A license plate reader was able to identify the car Khatri was driving when he picked up the gold at the victim’s home. The victim then identified Khatri from a photo lineup.

This case was investigated by Whitehall Township Police Detective Lindsay Yetter, the Lehigh County Elder Abuse Task Force, Homeland Security Investigations in Allentown and Trenton, Homeland Security Investigation Agent Sean Crawford and Lawrence Township Police and was prosecuted by Chief Deputy District Attorney Ramma R. Mineo.

The Lehigh County Elder Abuse Task Force has seen a growing number of fraudulent scams and anticipates these will continue to target older citizens. Part of the reason older citizens are targeted is because they have more savings than younger people and are often easier to defraud when using new technologies like PayPal, Bitcoin and electronic transfers.

Officials remind people to be suspicious of anyone who contacts you by phone and asks for large sums of money in any form. Anyone who requests or demands large amounts of funds, especially in untraceable methods like cryptocurrency, precious metals, gift cards and cash, is almost certainly part of a scam.

Anyone who believes they may have been scammed in Lehigh County may contact the Elder Abuse Task Force at 610-782-3700.