Profiteering

Profiteers are apparently using the Persian Gulf crisis to swindle consumers, using such schemes as urging veterans to buy cemetery plots before war casualties fill local graveyards. One Long Island consumer affairs official said she has received reports of possible scams including: * A woman who said she got a computerized call from a phony lieutenant colonel urging her to hit the “nine” button to learn how to order a BOGUS MILITARY BRACELET.

* A county official who received a seven-page appeal for donations of $15 to $100 that supposedly would be used toward GIFT PACKAGES FOR SOLDIERS.