A man and a woman managed to get into an elderly woman's Plant City home by conning her at the drive-thru window at a nearby Burger King.
They made her believe the two knew each other from her doctor's office.
According to police, the woman approached the 85-year-old's passenger window asking her a vague medical question about her hand.
"She asked how I was doing," Patricia Bauman said. "She kind of looked at me and said, 'How's your hand?"
Bauman did have a problem with her hand about a year ago.
"I said, 'It's better now.' I said '7 doctors appointments, but I got it cleared up,'" Bauman recalled.
That woman convinced Patricia that she used to work at her doctor's office. She then asked Bauman to pull into the parking lot so they could catch up.
"I said 'No, I have to go home,' So they followed me home," Bauman said.
The woman brought 26-year-old Anthony Demitro with her. She claimed Demitro was her 17-year-old brother. The two then joined Patricia on her front porch for lunch.
"She said 'He's (Demitro) not feeling well today. Is it okay if he uses your bathroom?'" Bauman said.
Bauman says Demirto was in and out of the home several times while she and the woman sat on the porch for about 45 minutes.
"It was just idle chatter," Bauman said.
Finally, Demitro came out of the home saying he was feeling so ill, the two needed to leave.
After they left, Bauman went inside and noticed a very small detail in her guest bedroom. The bed-skirt was slightly shifted. She looked under the bed and noticed a small safe was missing. Nothing really important was in the safe, but a coin collection was also missing from her home. The coins are valued at $126.
Deputies arrested Demitro, but the Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office isn't releasing any information about the woman who was with him.
Bauman has one piece of advice for anyone approached by a stranger.
"Make up any excuse you can think of, but don't further any conversation with them," She said.
