`THEY PREY ON ELDERLY WOMEN . . . WOMEN LIVING ALONE AND TOO TRUSTING' : WARY NEIGHBOR HELPS END RIP-OFF OF SENIOR.

Byline: Dennis McCarthy 

Rosemary was standing alone in the back yard when her neighbor Tom McArdle found her the other day - standing there leaning on a walker covered in specks of fresh silver paint.

``Rosemary, what have you been doing?'' he asked. ``Where did all that paint come from?''

The old woman turned and pointed to her roof. ``Some nice men came by and fixed my roof,'' the 86-year-old widow said, handing her neighbor the piece of paper in her hand.

``They said a big rainstorm was coming, and that I had leaks in my roof, so I better get it fixed fast. They showed me the water on the walls inside my house, said the rain was leaking down.''

McArdle looked at the signed contract in his hand, and shook his head. A former banker for 25 years, he knew a rip-off when he saw one - and this one definitely had all the earmarks of one, he felt.

The contract was dated Jan. 27 at the top, but at the bottom, where Rosemary had signed her name, the date was Jan. 30, the first day they showed up.

``They blew right by the three days a person legally has to change their mind after signing a contract,'' McArdle said. ``The work shouldn't have even started until after the three-day right of recession had passed.''

Rosemary's right of recession had lasted about five minutes. She had just paid $2,000 to have her roof spray-painted with silver, aluminum sealing paint. The job took an hour and a half to complete, she told her neighbor.

By the time McArdle got Rosemary to her bank to stop payment on the check, it was already too late.

``The guy had beat it right over to the bank to cash the check before the paint was even dry,'' McArdle said. ``I was so mad, I couldn't see straight.

``We already had plenty of heavy rain this winter, and there were no leaks in her roof. It was fine.

``The water the guy found on her walls inside probably came from a squirt gun he had in his pocket, because those walls weren't wet before he got inside her house,'' McArdle said.

He called the company and left a nasty message, telling them to call him right back. Then, McArdle drove to the address on the business card, and found

it was a telephone answering service office and mail drop in Van Nuys, not a painting or roofing company.

``When I finally got a call back, I got right on the guy,'' McArdle said. ``The first words out of his mouth were, `I've got an attorney.' I told him, big deal, I had an attorney, too. He hung up.

``A few days later, he called back and offered to kick back a few hundred dollars. I said that wasn't enough. He finally offered to give Rosemary back $1,000. He said he would mail her a cashier's check.''

But, instead of mailing it, the cashier's check was delivered in person to Rosemary when McArdle wasn't around.

``Now, Rosemary's scared to death, afraid they're mad at her,'' he says, the anger rising in his voice again.

``They prey on elderly women like Rosemary, women living alone and too trusting. I wonder how many other elderly women they're ripping off.''

The Los Angeles Police Department's Gray Squad - set up in the San Fernando Valley to educate and warn senior citizens about scams and rip-off artists - is wondering, too.

``We get a lot of rip-offs like this, and unless we know about them, there's no way to stop them,'' said Officer Ron Gould.

Any seniors who have had a similar experience to Rosemary's, should call Gould at [phone]. In the meantime, police are checking the company's contractor's license to see if there have been any similar complaints lodged against them.

``If there have, we'll be opening a file with the city attorney's consumer fraud division,'' Gould said.

As a postscript, late Wednesday, after I had contacted the company questioning why an 86-year-old widow should be charged $2,000 for an hour and a half's worth of work spraying sealant paint on a roof that didn't need it, McArdle received another phone call.

It was from a representative of the company who said there had ``been some confusion, and that they would do whatever it took to make Rosemary happy.''

The check for the other grand is in the mail.