Learn English – Does ” since forever” make sense

To "freak somebody out" is to startle or upset or scare them. They can get angry as a consequence, but that is not the direct meaning.

You really freaked me out when you told me the tests showed you had cancer. I'm glad it turned out to be a false positive.

You really freaked me out when you lied to me about the test showing I had cancer. Did you think that was funny, you jerk?

Both first sentences use "freaked out" to express consternation. But the consequences are different in each.

There certainly are figurative usages involving catch. For example,...

catch a cold slang for to make a loss/lose one's investment
catch it, catch merry hell, etc. be in serious trouble
catch on grasp (understand)
catch the news [find time to] listen to/watch the news on radio/TV
etc., etc.

But there are only two relevant instances of caught a scare in the entire Google Books corpus (and one of those is just wordplay against one has caught measles). I would say it's just an exceptionally rare case of OP's friend (mistakenly?) trying to use the format in contexts where no-one else does.