Online Romance or Stalker/Catfish?

by Ericka Cherry

This week’s “Catfish” took a trip to Creepy Town when it appeared Nev and Max might be dealing with a stalker. The online romance between Ayissha and Sydney started off innocently enough, but things went south quickly when the latter avoided taking the relationship offline.

Sydney and Ayissha had developed a storybook romance from a chance Twitter encounter, but by the time Ayissha contacted N and M, Sydney’s stalkerish behavior had reached scary heights. A explained how S would never meet her in person when she came into town and kept blaming her second job for it. Because of the issue, the two lovebirds eventually ended their romance.

After the breakup, Ayissha went to a party and kissed another girl. Oddly enough, her now ex-girlfriend texted her that same night, saying only, “I have a feeling… Ur somewhere ur not supposed to be.” After an argument, Sydney admitted to being named Whitney and sent her ex an entirely new set of photos. Despite the admission of guilt, Ayissha still had a lot of love for Whitney and found it difficult to quit her, even though Whitney had already caused A to miss midterms and drop out of school. The tarnished love story had some big consequences.

The sleuths started by going through the catfish’s Facebook page. Immediately, they noticed that she and Ayissha shared mutual friends. Three of these pals — Markeith, James and Eric — also shared many mutual friends with Ayissha. Nev and Max reached out to the guys to find out if they knew Whitney; as they waited for responses, they discovered that Whitney’s phone number was associated with a Whitney Shanice Robinson.

The next day, one by one, each of the boys responded to Nev with variations on the same response: “I don’t know who Whitney Shanice is.” The similarity of their responses led Max to realize that Whitney was likely running the guys’ profiles to keep multiple tabs on her victim’s behavior by checking their mutual friends’ statuses.

At this point, there was nothing left for Ayissha to do but confront Whitney. Both sides were apprehensive about coming face to face but finally agreed to meet near W’s home in Texas.

As is typical with catfish, Whitney looked quite different from the two photo sets she sent Ayissha, but she wasn’t as vicious as expected. In a local park, she explained to an understandably distraught Ayissha that catfishing gave her a way to reach out and gain love from people after her mom’s negative reaction to her coming out.

It was a sad, potentially scary situation that seemed to find a good ending — even though the two women did not remain in touch: At the close of the show, Ayissha was back in school and Whitney had joined the Navy.




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Online Dating Hunting Grounds for Romance Fraudster

A Ghanaian man accused of posing as a US soldier on an online dating site has been arrested on suspicion of conning a British woman into sending £271,000 to Africa.

In what is thought to be the biggest case of its kind so far, police detained Maurice Asola Fadola, 31, who is thought to be behind a series of "romance frauds" – targeting women through dating sites, and fabricating an elaborate series of stories to convince them to send money to Ghana.

The British victim, who did not want to be named, struck up a relationship over the internet with a man she believed to be an American soldier serving in Iraq.

After several months of correspondance, in which he told of his life dodging bullets and bombs, he told her that he was leaving the army – and perhaps they could meet up. But while his luggage was being returned to the US, there were a series of "problems" which the British woman was enticed into helping out – to the eventual cost of £271,000.

The head of the Ghanaian Serious Fraud Office described Mr Fadola as a suspected "kingpin", and his arrest after months of painstaking intelligence gathering is the high point of a joint Ghanaian-British campaign against alleged romance frauds.

Last month officers from the Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA) travelled to the Ghanaian capital of Accra to work alongside Ghanaian police in arresting Mr Fadola.

Officers had planned to mount a "sting" operation; setting traps for when he came to collect money they had sent to a money transfer service, or lying in wait for him to pick up a parcel of laptops or mobile phones from the Post Office.

Police froze his bank accounts, and when he came into the Serious Fraud Office in Accra to try and brazen his way into releasing the funds, he was arrested.

Mr Fadola, who lived in a luxurious mansion on the outskirts of Accra, is being held in custody and questioned over money laundering and passport offences, which carry a maximum sentence of 25 years.

Colin Woodcock, head of SOCA's fraud department, said that his team was working alongside Ghanaian authorities, sharing policing techniques with local forces to track down the fraudsters.

"At first we thought it was just people sending £50 here or there," he said, "but although the bulk are small frauds, now we know that some people are being robbed of hundreds of thousands.

"It's an international problem, involving police forces from across the globe working together to squeeze the criminals."

More and more cases of romance fraud are being discovered.

In August last year Philip Hunt, 58, threw himself under a train after losing £82,000 in a romance fraud. He had met a Nigerian girl on the internet, who convinced him to spend the money with promises of starting a life together.

"These people are out to get people when they are very vulnerable. They're in there like vultures," Lesley Smith, Mr Hunt's former partner, told the inquest into his death.

Mr Woodcock said: "The bottom line is: don't give anyone your money. Imagine you'd met someone in a pub for the first time, and they said I'd love to see you again but can you buy me a laptop?

"We're seeing an explosion in this. Everyone is on online dating nowadays, and criminals have cottoned onto it. These people destroy lives. It's loss on a catastrophic scale."

2 of EOPC's examples:
Nathan Ernest Burl Thomas, Jr.
Doug Beckstead

original article here

Beware of Scammers on Tinder

Have you grown tired of snuggling with your cat on Saturday nights while your friends are out enjoying couples bliss? 

Then you’ve likely been on the hunt for a relationship. This can sometimes become a long and frustrating process. 

If you’ve been looking for love in all the wrong places and decided to start an online search, beware. Romance scams have been cropping up again lately, and unsuspecting lonely hearts are being bilked out of thousands of dollars. The most recent version of this scam involves the mobile dating app Tinder. 

Unfortunately, Tinder’s popularity has made it a magnet for scammers. The Better Business Bureau released a warning for consumers, alerting them to scammers who are using Tinder to spread malware or obtain money. 

Instant attraction 
The scam usually starts with you browsing for profiles, and then receiving an immediate response from a match as soon as you swipe right to communicate interest. After a lengthy messaging session (the fraudster is trying to get you buttered up so you’ll let your guard down), your potential suitor will then suggest texting instead of continuing to communicate through Tinder. 

Trouble in paradise 
And that’s when the trouble begins. Your new match may start telling you about a new service or product that you should try. The Better Business Bureau says the scammer will usually send a link with referral codes. This is done so that the spammer will receive payment for referring new customers. Then, you’ll be asked to download an app, but once you click on the link that was provided, your phone is infected with malware. Furthermore, some scammers will request personal information such as your address, pretending that they need this information so they can send you a romantic gift. 

The Better Business Bureau gives these tips for spotting a Tinder Scam: 

1. You receive a lighting-fast response 
If you are a little suspicious of a fast response from a Tinder suitor, your instincts may be accurate. The Better Business Bureau says that some of the Tinder profiles are not real, but are in fact spam bots. If you get a message immediately after you are matched, proceed with caution. 

2. The scammer pressures you to communicate outside of Tinder 
Another red flag is if the new guy or gal fires off multiple messages and then tries to get you off Tinder as soon as possible. The spammer may suggest text or chat. The BBB says it is common for Tinder users to move on to a text conversation but that a spammer will make this suggestion almost right away. 

3. You don’t have their attention 
Be even more suspicious if the answers to your questions don’t make sense. This could be a sign that answers have been automated. The BBB suggests asking a few questions to see if the responses add up. If you get crazy answers, it’s time to shut the conversation down. 

4. Their photo is too good to be true 

Be leery of Tinder users who post glamour shots. Unfortunately, that toned hottie drenched in baby oil may not be the real deal. So if you’re drooling over your match’s photo, be prepared for disappointment. While we hope that’s not the case and you find your love connection, don’t be surprised if you end up with more than you bargained for — and not in a good way. 

original article here

SCAM ALERT: Stephen Perez AKA Norita Binti Yakob in Malaysia - Affection Love Scam # MY004598HT6

Are you a victim of the affection scam run from Malaysia under the name of Stephen Perez AKA Norita Binti Yakob?

DId you send money to the bank account of Norita Binti Yakob? If so, please email me as we are putting together a group of victims so that the Malaysian Police will take the matter seriously. So far more than $400,000.00 has been scammed, and that number is growing.

CONTACT US HERE

Lack of Help for Victims of Cyberpaths & Scammers

by James Eli Shiffer

Jody Buell thought she was falling in love, but she fell for some­one who didn't exist.

The Burnsville, Minn., woman didn't catch on to the scam until she had spent more than $10,000 on her on­line admirer.

In­stead of sink­ing into de­spair, howev­er, Buell decided to get even.

For the past two years, she has been help­ing oth­er fraud victims get advice, support and fel­low­ship from an on­line group called romancescams.org. Since the Yahoo group was founded in 2005, it has helped more than 50,000 people from around the world.

"It's ba­sically a war," said site founder Barb Sluppick, a scam victim who lives in Mis­souri. "They're battling us for our mon­ey. We're fight­ing back, but we're fight­ing on our own because the govern­ment doesn't seem to want to get in­volved in this."

Govern­ment of­ficials say the biggest hur­dle is that the vast major­ity of suspects are located out­side their ju­ris­diction, usu­ally in oth­er countries. The epi­center of the scams appears to be West Africa, partic­ularly Nige­ria, where young men reportedly work through the night in Inter­net cafes per­pe­trating dozens of frauds.

"I've had scam victims from around the country getting ahold of us because they can't find anybody to pick up their case," said Jim Arlt, in­terim di­rector of the Minnesota De­part­ment of Public Safety's alcohol and gambling enforce­ment unit. "I am astounded at re­ally the lack of co­or­dinated effort in this area."

In the past year, the FBI has received more than 4,000 complaints about dating-site fraud, but the agency has no es­ti­mate on the financial impact, FBI spokeswoman Jenny Shearer said.

In some cases, the losses are dev­astating. An Arizona man who con­tacted romancescams .org said he was tak­en for $1million, and in Au­gust, a New York man shot him­self af­ter los­ing $50,000 to an on­line scammer.

When Buell first joined the group, Sluppick had to moderate her com­ments because she was still so angry. Now Sluppick consid­ers Buell her sec­ond-in-command.

Looking back, Buell said she can't be­lieve she mis­sed the warning signs. She said she decided to tell her story publicly for the first time because she counsels oth­ers to feel no shame for be­ing the victims of crime.

"Who in this world does not want or need to be loved?" said Buell, a longtime in­sur­ance bro­ker.

In 2008, the dating site eHarmo­ny.com matched Buell, 53, with Claude Eichmann, who de­scribed him­self as a Mary­land busi­nessman with an international mining compa­ny. Their friend­ship blossomed by e-mail, in­stant messaging and phone conver­sa­tions.

Paul Breton, a spokesman for eHarmo­ny, said he can't disclose the meth­ods his compa­ny uses to weed out crooks. But he noted the site also in­structs users to pro­tect them­selves by rec­ognizing the signs of a fraud - some­one who wants to move too quickly, who draws you into a sudden person­al cri­sis, who has a complicated story, who asks for mon­ey.

Buell's friend­ship with "Eichmann" played out over 3-1/2 months. His photo showed a smartly dressed man with unruly black hair. Af­ter a number of weeks they exchanged phone numbers, and while Buell was initially put off by his ac­cent, he re­m­inded her that he had grown up all over the world.

"Ev­ery time I would raise a doubt or a question, he would have a plau­sible answer," she said.

The two planned to meet, but first he had to trav­el to the West African nation of Ghana to open an office. Then trou­bles began. His office equip­ment suppli­er fell through. Could you send mon­ey? he asked. Buell refused, but he persuaded her to buy $10,000 worth of com­put­ers and phones and spend an­oth­er $1,300 to ship it to Ghana. Buell even included a pair of Timber­land boots he coveted, plus a lock of her hair.

Then "Eichmann" became ill and asked her to pay for his malar­ia medicine. Buell implored him to con­tact the U.S. Consulate, but he resisted he idea, so she went to the embassy website her­self. On the home page, she no­ticed a link to "romance scams."

"I clicked on it," Buell said. "It was like ice went through all my veins. Ev­ery­thing that hap­pened to me was listed on that website. My dream per­son turned into a nightmare in 15 sec­onds."

Buell reported the crime to IC3, the fed­eral Inter­net crime clearing­house, but she doesn't expect any fol­low-up. (IC3 reports an 9+ year backup on reports; many they dismiss.)

Af­ter Buell's sad encounter, an old boyfriend invited her to go on a bike ride. On the trip, he popped the question. Now she's happily married, but she's not for­getting what hap­pened to her.

original article found here

Yet Another Online Dating Scam

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Tim Dog, born Timothy Blair, entered a guilty plea to grand larceny in northern Mississippi after defrauding a woman named Esther Pilgrim out of thousands of dollars.
According to the Washington Post, the former 1990s rapper entered his plea last month after causing Pilgrim to amass $32,000 in credit card debt. Stipulations of his plea agreement include five years of probation and restitution payments of $19,000 to Pilgrim within the probation period. 

The two originally met on an online dating site and began a long-distance relationship. 

The rapper said he was trying to rebuild his career and needed investors for his comeback album. 

ORIGINAL ARTICLE FOUND HERE

Online Dating: Buyer Beware!

by Cassandra Pybus

(AUS) Even reputable internet dating sites are not immune from scammers trying to to take advantage of vulnerable people.

Last summer I went to a wedding celebration that was an unexpected delight, not the least for the bride who met her new husband on an internet dating site. Having just come to the painful terminus of a three-year affair, I could not suppress my wistful envy at her glowing happiness. The champagne flowed freely and several friends became bold enough to suggest that I should try internet dating. After all, what was to lose?

I failed to disclose that after my divorce in 2007, when I was living in the United States, I had signed up with the dating website e-harmony, but found shopping for intimacy such a humiliating experience that I aborted the process by changing my email address. I knew that it was easy to reactivate my membership - I needed to pay some money, revise my geographic location and supply a valid email. So I did as my friends had urged. What was to lose?

At first there was a flurry of e-harmony emails proposing likely matches for me, but when none of those men chose to contact me, silence followed. I had given the whole business away when, out of the blue, e-harmony sent me a very encouraging request for contact from Alan from Artarmon, a widower of 60. His profile said he was a consulting engineer, who appeared to be intelligent and well read, in addition to being a handsome man, if his photograph was to be trusted.

I felt a quickening excitement: I was lonely and sad and here was a successful, interesting man who liked what he saw in me. I stared at his email for a long time, thinking that someone with my life experiences was an unlikely choice for Alan from Artarmon and the message seemed rather generic, as if he had sent it to lots of women fishing to see who would respond.

I took a deep breath and cautiously typed a response to express my surprise and ask if he really meant to address me in particular. Expecting that would be the end of it, I went to bed at midnight, determined to put it out of my mind, which I never managed to do.

Next day I was doubly surprised to find Alan from Artarmon had replied in haste to assure me that he was much taken with my profile. He said he really liked that I was independent and was not tied to one place and promised to write at length after he had finished at work.

Blow me down, later that day there was another email telling me all about himself. His real name was Charles Carroll - his middle name was Alan - and he was a drilling engineer consultant with a postgraduate degree from the University of Queensland, who travelled overseas a lot and was currently working for a company in Reading, England. His wife had died a few years ago and there was an adolescent son in school in Malaysia.

It was a really long email, suggesting he had plenty of time to kill in his hotel room in Reading. He provided a lot of personal detail about his family background, his personal take on ethical behaviour and cultural interests that were highly compatible with my own.

Charles was clearly keen to impress upon me that he was the real deal, and not some flaky pervert; he even provided his personal email address so that we could communicate directly, rather than pay e-harmony for the privilege.

It was all very reassuring and I indulged myself in a little flurry of anticipation as I read and reread his message. But nagging at me was the bit about his son: wasn't he a bit too old to have a child in school, and why would he send his son to school in Malaysia?

Google can usually solve all such conundrums, but my cunning interrogation of the web was unable to find the consultant drilling engineer called Charles Carroll. It was only when his name was matched with a phrase from his message that Google found him, or rather located a copy of an email message from him that was almost identical to the one I had received, with a few variations such as a postgraduate degree from the University of Virginia. This email was sent to a woman living in America through a different internet dating site and was now posted on a website called romancescams.com.

A few hours of compulsive web searching revealed that the photograph I had seen on his profile was stolen from a male model named John Daniel, and that this image, paired with many different aliases, had been posted hundreds of times on internet dating sites, as well as Facebook.

In reality, the promising widower from Artarmon in Sydney was a room of electronically savvy youth in Lagos, Nigeria, who could just as readily be a woman named Emma, as circumstances required. The common scenario was that Charles, or Emma, worked for an international construction company, or an aid agency, and in the course of developing an intense online romance would be deployed in Africa, where a life-threatening drama would require a major injection of money.

The revulsion and shame I experienced at having been hooked, if not actually reeled in, by this scam was much worse than humiliation; I was swept by a wave of nausea.

But why have such a visceral reaction? Like anyone who uses email I am continually the target of scammers, but this was much more insidious because it was communicated to me by a respectable business that traded on being empathetic and trustworthy.

A letter from Mobuto's widow asking me to launder her husband's ill-gotten millions does not land in my inbox as legitimate communication from my credit union, nor does a begging letter from a young man orphaned by a war in Africa get forwarded by Save the Children.

Moreover, the mercenary or compassionate impulses that are triggered by these familiar scams come a very poor second to the powerful desire for intimate connection. This is what makes the online romance business a superb conduit for criminal activity.

According to the FBI, the romance scam is the work of very smart and very dangerous people who have connections to terrorism and who rake in billions of dollars with the tacit support of the online dating industry.

In Australia, online romance scams cheated men and women out of about $23 million last year, according to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, whose website carries the story of one man who paid his life savings of $200,000 to the orphanage that Emma claimed to have established in Africa. With that kind of money in play, scammers will take considerable time to cultivate strong feelings of intimacy and trust.

People who think themselves in love are highly vulnerable and will throw all caution to the wind to make romance tangible. It makes this a particularly cruel form of theft; one that leaves its victims doubly traumatised. I felt nauseous after the simple exchange of emails, so what was it like for a woman so deeply in love with Charles that when urgent medical treatments were needed to save his life she was willing to exhaust her savings and then take an extra mortgage on her house. Having paid a total of $95,000, she was suddenly unable to make contact. She lost her heart and she lost her house as well.

In February the ACCC issued best-practice guidelines for internet dating sites, advising they post prominent warnings and institute internal vetting procedures.

Yet six months later, a very respectable dating site actually directed me to a notorious scammer whose bogus identity should have been detected by digital security to identify the common heuristics of scam emails and the originating IP address.

There are still no prominent warnings on the home page of e-harmony or other reputable dating sites like RSVP that are known to be thoroughly infiltrated by scammers.

You would have to search deep into the dating advice section of these sites to stumble across advice that they might be used by unscrupulous people for criminal purposes. In such advice the onus of protection is placed squarely on you rather than the business that is charging money for every hopeful communication they encourage you to make.

In my particular case, e-harmony was very prompt to respond to my outraged complaint: they removed me from the site, as I requested, and refunded my money. They also sent a computer-generated message, which doubtless went to numerous other women, to say that they had removed Alan from Artarmon from their service and that ''privacy laws prohibit us from disclosing the specific reasons for our decision''.

I doubt that privacy laws pertain to an international criminal cartel operating out of Nigeria, and it's more likely that the lucrative internet dating business is reluctant to confess to a business model that regularly exposes its customers to serious criminal fraud. Despite the intervention of the ACCC, when it comes to shopping for intimacy, buyer beware.

ORIGINAL ARTICLE FOUND HERE

ROMANCE SCAMMER IN JAIL

by Pat Coughtrey

The man behind a sophisticated and lucrative online dating scam, who used love as a means to dupe women, has been sent to jail for six years and four months.

Hery Agunu, 25, was sentenced on October 25 after he had pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit fraud by misrepresentation after a bank in America stopped a payment which it believed to be fraudulent and alerted the US authorities.

They handed the case over to the Met Police’s Operation Podium, which led the investigation that tracked Agunu down.

The court had heard that Agunu, from Forest Gate, used Facebook, dating websites and other social media to portray himself as a white, widowed American businessman in search of love and companionship. He built a number of aliases, using details of real people.

He spent anything from two weeks to months on grooming his victims into forming a relationship with him and even falling in love. Then he would persuade the women that he was struggling financially and needed to borrow money until he got paid.

In one scam, Agunu told the victim he had won a multi-million pound contract to deliver “platform and transport services” for the Met Police during the Olympic and Paralympic Games. He went to great lengths in researching and writing a fake lucrative contract showing himself as the winner of the work.

Bankrupt

Podium have identified 17 victims from America, Canada and Trinidad and Tobago, aged from their mid-fifties to late seventies. One victim, a 69-year-old woman from the US, sent Agunu £144,000 as a result of his scam. Another victim lost so much money to him that she has had to declare herself bankrupt.

Agunu worked with 39-year-old Evelina Sisin from Edmonton, whose bank account was used to launder some of the money. She pleaded guilty in June to money laundering and was sentenced to 18 months in jail on October 25.

After the case, Det Supt Nick Downing, of Operation Podium, said: “Agunu was a sophisticated and charismatic operator who deliberately wormed his way into way into women’s affections, promising love and marriage, simply to rip them off. He has made thousands of pounds, and left a number of women suffering more than just financial loss.

“My advice to anyone is simple – no matter what the circumstances, never give money to anyone you meet online and cannot prove for yourself they are who they say, even if they use the name of a well-known organisation, such as ours, or produce professional-looking documents in an attempt to add credence to their claims. Such things are all too easy to fake.”

Agunu, of Odessa Road, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to defraud at Isleworth Crown Court on October 22.

The judge ordered that other offences of money laundering lie on file.

ORIGINAL ARTICLE FOUND HERE

PROFESSOR DUPED INTO DRUG SMUGGLING BY ROMANCE SCAM

By Tom Worden

(U.K.) Professor Paul Frampton, 68, claimed he was duped into carrying the drugs by gangsters who struck up a relationship with him online by pretending to be former Miss Bikini World Denise Milani.

In fact, the Czech-born model, who is in her 30s and married, had never been in contact with the Oxford-educated physicist and had no idea that her identity was being used for the honeytrap sting.

Frampton, originally from Kidderminster, Worcestershire, was arrested in January after being stopped at Ezeiza International Airport in Buenos Aires, Argentina, as he tried to board a plane to Peru with two kilos of cocaine in his luggage.  The drugs were found wrapped in gift paper hidden inside the lining of his suitcase. 

Frampton said in a newspaper interview after his arrest:

‘Perhaps I should have realised earlier but the fraudster was very good and very intelligent. For 11 weeks I thought I was chatting with an attractive woman.’

The divorcee, who had been living in the US and teaching physics at the University of North Carolina for over 30 years, had first travelled to La Paz, Bolivia, where he thought he was going to meet Miss Milani for the first time.

He mistakenly believed he had been chatting regularly with her over the internet for several months, when in fact the messages were sent by someone else using her identity.

Prof Frampton said it was a 'honeytrap sting' involving bikini model Denise Milani claiming he had beentricked into carrying the drugs by gangsters who posed on the internet as the 32-year-old model

In La Paz he met a middle-aged man in a hotel who gave him the suitcase, saying it belonged to Miss Milani and asking him to take it to her. The following day he travelled to Buenos Aires and was instructed to fly to Brussels where he believed he would finally meet his ‘girlfriend’. But after waiting 36 hours at the airport for her to send him an electronic ticket, he changed his mind and decided to return to the US via Peru.

The scientist has now been convicted of drug-trafficking at a court in Argentina after prosecutor Mario Villar read the court emails and text messages he sent his ‘girlfriend’ and a friend in the US while waiting at the airport.  According to Argentinian newspaper Clarin, they included ‘I’m worried about the sniffer dogs’, ‘I’m looking after your special little suitcase’ and ‘In Bolivia this is worth nothing, in Europe it’s worth millions’.

The prosecutor also showed the court a note written by the scientist reading: ‘1grm/200U$S. 2000grms/400000 U$S.’ A source told the newspaper: ‘At the trial he said he had written it after being arrested, but the arrest witnesses were asked to come back to court and they denied that.’

Miss Milani, who was completely unaware she was being used as a honeytrap, has since spoken of her shock at being dragged into the sting. The scientist’s ex-wife, Anne-Marie Frampton, 71, has described him as ‘a naive fool’. They divorced several years ago after 15 years of marriage but remain close friends.

Frampton, who graduated with a double first from Brasenose College, Oxford, was sentenced to four years and eight months in prison, which he is expected to serve at Villa Devoto Prison in Buenos Aires. The jail was the scene of some of the worst riots in Argentine history in 1978 which left 62 people dead.

The scientist was originally held there on remand but had been released and put under house arrest for health reasons. He suffers from high blood pressure and lung problems.  He had been facing up to 16 years behind bars.

His defence lawyer Eduardo Oderigo said: ‘There were many good reasons to have acquitted him. I set them out in his defence. I am convinced of his innocence.’

ORIGINAL ARTICLE FOUND HERE

Romance Scam Victim Duped into Being a Drug Mule

A one-time Somerset Ward city council candidate is at his wit’s end over his mother’s year-long incarceration on drug charges in Peru. Don Fex says his mother, Norma, 59, was the victim of a romance scam. A U.K. man lured her to the South American country and duped her into being a drug mule, he says.

Now Fex says his mother is struggling with harsh jail conditions and he feels Canadian consular officials aren’t doing enough to get her back home. It was supposed to be a romantic getaway, but Norma’s boyfriend didn’t show up in Peru. The scammer claimed he couldn’t get a flight out and suggested they change plans so she could come right away to the U.K. says Fex, relating what his mother told him.

Her U.K. boyfriend told her he’d just have a business associate drop off some documents for her to take to him. He didn’t mention the 2.2 kilograms of cocaine sewn into the suitcase that held the documents.

“She’s five feet tall. She wears kitten sweaters,” Fex said of his mother. She’s never been in trouble with the law he said, adding she worked as a security guard in Windsor, Ont.

Peruvian lawyers said fighting the charges might prolong her incarceration. Norma co-operated and pleaded guilty, hoping to be extradited quickly after sentencing, said Fex. She was sentenced three months ago to more than seven years. Fex says his mother had little money when she arrived in Lima. She didn’t speak Spanish and found herself in a dingy hotel in a slum. Fex says his mother jumped at the chance to get out. He says she looked in the suitcase and found Spanish documents, but never thought of tearing open the suitcase lining. She was arrested at the airport.

His mother must pay for everything she needs in jail, even drinking water. He’s been sending money every month to cover her costs, but she’s recently been transferred to a prison two hours outside Lima. He says Canadian consular officials have told him they will now only be able to visit her once every three months.

Department of Foreign Affairs officials have told him extradition can’t begin until all of Norma’s fines are paid, but he doesn’t think the Canadian consulate has followed up on a request for a tally. A Department of Foreign Affairs spokesperson said in an email consular services are being provided to a Canadian citizen in Peru and consular officials remain in close contact with local authorities, “and with the citizen’s family.”

Fex wants that contact to start yielding results more quickly. “It’s in their power now to speed things along,” he said.

Fex had no idea his mother was in Peru until he got an emergency call from his uncle.

“The shock has worn off and now the anger has set in,” he said.

original article found here

Online Dating is Eroding Humanity

by John Walters

(U.K.) The internet is changing the way society communicates, processes information and knowledge, and configures its relationship towards authority. Some of these developments are exciting and challenging, but in one particular sense the internet poses a fundamental challenge to the way humans interact. The following criticism and concern regarding online dating is not at all intended as a criticism of good and heartening personal stories – I, too, know people who have met their significant other through online dating.

Today, internet dating has become more or less accepted as a way of forming relationships. There has been some criticism, but it has usually been of the functional and operational kind, regarding subscription costs or users providing false pictures or information. There has been little thought or comment on why matchmaking websites might be a bad thing per se.

Online matchmaking is premised on the notion of making rational choices. It is perhaps fitting that the language of economics and business has finally – in our late capitalist society – permeated the most irrational, the most human of all areas: the interpersonal. Internet dating is like shopping at LoveMart. We watch and read the adverts (people's profiles) and – based on what we are told is factually relevant data – we then, allegedly, make a rational decision to try the product. The more choices available (ie the more popular a matchmaking website), we are told, the better for those making the choice. Yet it is these intrusions by business speak into the very inner workings of society that should be of great concern.

This is further emphasised by the manner in which these processes are explained by proponents of online dating, as "opening up options" and "putting yourself out there". One site, Match.com, offers both efficiency ("Receive your compatible matches straight away") and informed choice ("Choose who you'd like to get in touch with"). The irrational and unpredictable nature of something very human – love and the interpersonal – is turned on its head and transformed into a rational product.

Furthermore, the way dating websites calculate matches distorts the very core of interpersonal relations. Online seekers of partners and friends rely on computer calculations of a set of hard questions. There is little room (if any) for subtlety, deviance, or exploration. The questions that many of these websites use are so mind-numbingly awful ("Are you happy with your life? A. Yes, B. No, C. Most of the time") that it cannot even be claimed to replicate real conversations. If I were asked most of the questions used to calculated compatibility on a normal date in a pub, say, I would run a mile. And that's the point: this is not an extension of humanity and human interaction; it is a fundamental shift. Interpersonal relationships are being transformed into products that can be (supposedly) objectively measured and objectively chosen, even though such relations represent the exact opposite.

In his book Éloge de l'amour (2009), Alain Badiou noted two slogans for two online dating websites. The first claims that one can have love without the unexpected ("Ayez l'amour sans le hasard!"). The second promises that one can be in love without falling in love ("On peut être amoureux sans tomber amoureux!"). Love – this great irrational driver of humanity – has become an object, which people wish to be fully informed about, choose rationally, and not suffer any unexpected disappointments from. It is, as philosopher Slavoj Zizek has noted, like caffeine-free coffee.

We want to enjoy these essence-free products, but without the irrationality of consuming bad things or accepting the spontaneous and unpredictable nature of emotions and feelings. Everything that makes culture and society real, impulsive, and often erratic is stripped away in favour of rational choice-making. We don't want to harm ourselves; we don't want suffering; we don't want hardship; we don't accept difficulty and disappointment. We simply want (and demand) the 100% consumer fulfillment of obtaining products based on rationality. This criticism can be extended of course to other forms of online communities, such as Facebook, where contact-less friendships are reduced to pokes, LOLs, and vacuous innuendos.

Some critics, such as Badiou, have suggested that online dating is taking society back to a pre-modern version of arranged marriages. I would say it is worse. Society has invited the language and practice of market rationality into its midst. It has taken over not merely communal aspects of society, but the very essence of what it means to be human.

original article found here

Woman Scammed via Online Dating Site

by Alison Smith Squire

When Alison Peters’ 42-year marriage hit a rocky patch, she sought comfort with a man she met on a dating website.

But unbeknown to Alison, 65, a teacher, her new romance was an internet scammer – who was to cruelly fleece her of £120,000.

Today, Alison who is now living in a caravan and trying to piece her life back together said: 'I can’t believe I was so stupid. I thought I was an intelligent woman. But I have lost my savings, my home – and almost completely lost my marriage.

'My life has been left in ruins.'

Alison’s nightmare began last year after she decided to try online dating.

She says: 'I’d recently moved out of the home I shared with my husband David, 68. We were going through a rocky period in our 42 year marriage. “David said he wanted a fresh start. He wanted to sell our house. He wanted to buy a boat and go sailing round the world without me. I was devastated. I hoped he was having a mid-life crisis but then he put our house on the market and we’d both seen solicitors and decided to divorce.'

A few weeks earlier Alison, a mum of two and grandmum of four, had been to a friend’s wedding.'She was marrying a wonderful man she had met on the internet,' she recalls, 'and so as my marriage was over I thought why not. My profile said, "Woman going through divorce... I am looking for friendship, good conversation and companionship".  I put up a photo and was amazed when a few days later I had seven replies.'

One was from Steve Myers. Claiming to be a widow aged 55, he said his wife had died twelve years ago. Half English and half Hungarian, he’d lived in America for a long time but he now had houses in Virginia, the U.S. and Croydon.  Says Alison from Basingstoke, Hants: 'Steve claimed he worked as a self-employed petroleum engineer earning £100,000 a year and travelled the world.  'Within an hour of messaging, I found myself pouring my heart out to him: "You deserve better," he wrote sympathetically after I’d said how devastated I was about my marriage. 'He sent me a photo and when I saw his kind face, I couldn’t help but warm to him.'

The next day Steve rang explaining away his unusual accent with the fact that he travelled so much.  Over the next few days Alison could barely wait until the evening when they would chat online.And over the next couple of weeks his emails became affectionate. 'He would write, "You’re someone I could marry" and when I said I was a Christian, back came another email full of bible quotes.'

Within five weeks the pair had agreed to meet. But as the big day arrived there was a problem.  Recalls Alison: ‘He told me he’d been called to the US. He said, ‘"There’s an oil contract in Malaysia that my company bid for – a $5.2 million dollar contract. I need to go to a conference in the US run by a large energy company."'On his way to the airport, I got another surprise phone call: "You couldn’t top up my mobile phone credit could you?" he asked, "Only I’m not going to be able to do it while I’m away." 'I said, "Of course not," What was £50 pounds between friends…'

Over the next couple of weeks, Steve continued to email. It was agreed Alison would pick him up from the airport and Steve sent his flight details.  'My stomach tingled as I imagined us running into one another’s arms,' says Alison, who booked a hotel for him. Only the day before he was due to return her mobile rang. She expected to hear Steve’s voice but it was another man on the end of the phone.'The Asian sounding man had a message for me. There had been a big explosion and accident on the site in Malaysia. Unfortunately Steve had to cancel his flight to the UK and fly to Malaysia that day.  The news hit me in the stomach. I’d been so excited to meet Steve at last. I’d even already paid for his hotel room.'

A few days later, in November, Steve rang, this time asking for $12,000 to buy equipment.  Alison admits: 'A tiny part of me nagged that it wasn’t genuine. But he told me he was going to give me a share of the 5.2 million dollar contract. And when tenatively I mentioned about scams Steve was so offended.'

Over the next few weeks she wired over the rest of her £23,000 savings.  'Once my daughter Catherine overheard me talking about money with Steve but I assured her I wasn’t sending him money,' she says.  However, she was still paying £50 a month for his mobile phone bill and Steve had promised her he’d soon be back in the UK.  And by now January 2012 she’d taken out two bank loans on the internet and sent over another £20,000 for more equipment.  'But when Steve asked me for more money to pay tax I told him he’d have to wait until the house I shared with David was sold.;

Then in February Alison rang husband David to discuss the house. 'Just hearing his voice made me realise how much I wanted to be with him, she recalls, 'and David felt the same about me.  'I told Steve from now on our relationship could be on a business footing.'

In February the house was sold and Alison moved into a caravan until she could afford another property. But Steve needed more money.'Steve had so many bills to pay and was under so much strain, he’d been diagnosed with prostate cancer. So I sent him £70,000. It was terrible news but at last the contract was finished. 'Steve': This is one of the pictures that the scammers pretending to be a man called 'Steve' sent to Anne 'Steve': This is one of the pictures that the scammers pretending to be a man called 'Steve' sent to Anne

‘At the same time I received an email from an organisation called Crown Third Party Finance to let me know 5.2 million dollars was waiting to go into my account.'The only snag was before it was to be released, I’d have to pay £10,000 for a special certificate.' Alison had no money so went to David, who thought it was a scam – but Alison showed him documents and convinced him to hand over the money.  She says: 'I expected to see millions in my bank account soon.'  But, of course nothing ever arrived.

On her daughter’s advice, Alison went to the Police – who believed she’d been part of an elaborate sting. They promised to investigate but warned Alison she was unlikely to get the money back. 'As soon as I got home, I emailed Steve,' says Alison, 'I was in a terrible state. I said, "You’re a scammer and I’ve gone to the Police. Because of you I’ve lost everything …"

'Incredibly, Steve emailed back denying it was a scam. But by then I knew it was. I put my head in my hands and wept. When I found Steve wasn't real, but a person made up by some scammers to dupe me I felt so betrayed.  At the time I had liked him so much. At my lowest my confidence was bolstered. At the time I truly believed I'd found a true companion, someone who understood me.  To find out he wasn't real and just concocted for me was terrible.'

She adds: 'Thankfully David has stood by me. And in fact he has helped me through this terrible time. In a way it's brought us both closer together and it's made us realise we don't want to throw away 42 years of marriage.  We still have our ups and downs but we're determined to make our relationship work. A few weeks ago he moved into the caravan with me and has bought a boat. We are hoping to buy a little bungalow together.

'But I will never get over losing so much money. I still wake up every morning and ask myself how I could have been sucked into a scam like this. I still feel incredibly foolish for believing all those lies.  But the lies were clever and I was at a vulnerable stage in my life. Even the Police said I was "ripe for the picking", I only hope telling my story will warn others.'

original article found here

SURPRISE! Con Men Targeting Online Dating Sites

By Tamara Cohen and Lynn Davidson

(U.K.)  Dating and social networking websites are becoming a magnet for confidence tricksters preying on ‘lonely hearts’, a study reveals. It says as many as 200,000 people may have been persuaded last year to give money to fraudsters using false identities to pursue relationships with them.

But because of the shame victims feel, fewer than 600 cases were reported.

The researchers say ‘rom cons’ are particularly traumatic because of the ‘double hit’ of losing money and what victims had hoped was a romantic relationship. In some cases, victims have committed suicide.

The research at Leicester University – the first to measure the scale of this relatively new crime – found that in a YouGov poll of more than 2,000 British adults, one in every 50 knew a victim.

The fraudsters – usually tied to organised crime and based outside the UK – often use pictures of soldiers or models when making contact with their victims on dating or social networking websites. They then act swiftly to move the ‘relationship’ away from the monitored sites to personal online services such as private email accounts to carry out the fraud, claiming to be in dire financial straits or needing urgent funds that they promise to pay back. In some cases, when victims do not send cash, scammers involve them in money laundering by asking them to accept payments in their bank accounts.

The study’s author, Professor Monica Whitty, said: ‘Our data confirms law enforcement suspicions that this is an under-reported crime, and thus more serious than first thought.

‘This is a concern not solely because people are losing large sums of money to these criminals, but also because of the psychological impact experienced by victims. It may be the shame and upset experienced by the victims deters them from reporting the crime. We believe new methods of reporting the crime are needed.’

Action Fraud, the national fraud reporting and advice centre, identified 592 victims of the crime in 2010. Of these, 203 lost more than £5,000. But the losses can be as high as £240,000, according to the Serious Organised Crime Agency.

Colin Woodcock, senior manager for fraud prevention at the agency, noted that the research found 52 per cent of people had heard of online romance scams, showing ‘progress has been made in raising awareness’.

But he added: ‘Millions of people in the UK remain at risk.

‘By being aware of how to stay safe online, the public can ensure they don’t join those who have lost nearly every penny they had, been robbed of their self-respect and, in some cases, committed suicide after being exploited by these criminals. It is crucial that nobody sends money to someone they meet online, and haven’t got to know well and in person.’

original article found here

EOPC HAS KNOWN THIS AND BEEN SAYING THIS FOR YEARS!

ROMANCE SCAM STRIKES WITH MATCH.COM AGAIN

Valley News Live - KVLY/KXJB - Fargo/Grand Forks

(U.S.A.) She says she gave up everything for love, only to find out it was all a lie. It's what investigators call the romance scam.

Carolyn Benningfield says she had the all-American life - an Air Force husband, two sons, and a middle class home. But after her husband died three years ago, she felt lonely.

"I was looking for a good Christian man and I went on Match.com," said Benningfield.

And after a few months and a few misses, Benningfield thought she found her match - a widow from another town who shared her Catholic faith.

"I thought my dreams had come true."

The two hit it off early this year, chatting online every day. But soon the conversation turned to money, when the man said he'd lost his luggage on a business trip to Ecuador.

"He asked me if I could loan him $1,000."

So she did. But as time went on the requests grew larger, he convinced Carolyn to invest thousands in his oil company.  She sent dozens of transfers to different accounts he claimed were used by his company, $40,000 to a bank in New Zealand, 3,000 each to people in Russia and Ecuador.

She never met the man and now believes he was using a false identity.

"The banks tried to warn me but I decided not to believe what they said because in my heart I felt it was true."

In the end, Benningfield gave the scammer all she had, a total of almost $800,000. She's also facing a potential tax lien on her home for emptying out her 401K.  Benningfield reported the fraud to Police, but since it involved international money transfers she had to take the case to the FBI.

Benningfield says she still keeps in touch with the man, in hopes that he might want to give some of the money back.

original article found here

...ONLY AFTER ONE THING

by Jill Papworth

OFT warns against scammers who build fictitious profiles on dating websites and befriend other users before asking for cash. Con artists on dating websites may ask for money to cover urgent medical treatment for a family member

Romantics should be on their guard against internet dating scams that can not only rip you off financially but also break your heart. The latest scam alert from the Office of Fair Trading warns that the increased potential to meet people online is being used by criminals to con people out of their money.

"Romance fraudsters" target singles columns and dating websites to search for victims. They create fictitious online profiles and send out unsolicited emails or letters, often with fake photographs, using the trust they build up to persuade their victims to part with large sums of money in frauds that can go on for years.

These typically involve the scamster telling their victim they want to meet them but are stranded without the money to travel or cover visa costs. They may also say that they or a family member require urgent treatment for an illness. The OFT says in one recent case a British national was kidnapped after travelling to west Africa expecting to be met by someone with whom they had established an online friendship. The individual had no idea that the online 'friend' was the fictional creation of a criminal group. The victim was assaulted, imprisoned for four days, and was released only when a ransom was paid.

"All fraud is destructive but dating scammers are particularly ruthless as they abuse the emotional trust and attachments that people invest when looking to meet someone," says Heather Clayton, senior director of the OFT's consumer group. The OFT says dating site users should take the following steps to avoid becoming victims:

• Know what you are paying for and what the dating agency promises to provide in return.

• If you receive any requests for money, be suspicious, even if you have known the person for a number of weeks.

• Be sceptical and ask yourself simple questions, for example, "Why am I the only person who can help them, when I have just met them?"

• If you meet somebody unknown to you, always meet in a public place and take a friend with you for support if you are unsure.

The Serious Organised Crime Agency (Soca) adds that if you do decide to travel to meet an online friend, particularly if you go abroad, tell someone trustworthy where you are going, plan regular contacts and agree what they should do if you miss a contact.


original article found here

AUSTRALIAN MAN DUPED OUT OF $25,000. BY ROMANCE SCAMMER

by Stuart Cumming

(AUSTRALIA) Retiree Darrell McGovern has been left with a broken heart and swindled out of more $25,000 in less than two months.

The 64-year-old divorcee is urging Darling Downs residents not to send money to anyone who asks for it on the internet. His betrayal in an online romance scam began when he met someone claiming to be Ghanaian woman Rita Addison in an internet chat room in mid-April. Email addresses were exchanged and very soon the pleas for money started coming in.

“She told me her mother and father had passed away and she had been sent to live with her uncle,” Mr McGovern said. Lump sums and smaller amounts of money were sent as Mr McGovern's new friend made claim after claim, including needing money to come to live with him at his home on the outskirts of Oakey.

It was late last month when Mr McGovern asked an Australia Post Shop worker if he was correctly filling out a money transfer for $2000 that he was alerted to the scam. “The attendant said ‘I think this is a shoddy deal',” Mr McGovern said. “He took the letter in to his boss and came back out and told me to go to the Office of Fair Trading. They told me it definitely was a scam.”

Mr McGovern said he knew many people would probably say he got what he deserved, but hoped his story could prevent others from making the same mistake. “To tell you the truth, I really fell in love with that girl.”

original article found here

Match.com Can't Screen for Sex Offenders

By Benjamin Radford

One of the world's top dating websites, Match.com, announced that it would begin checking its members against a national sex offender registry. The announcement was made about a week after a class-action lawsuit was filed against the company by two women who claim men they met through the service sexually harassed them.

Whether an attempt to ward off future lawsuits or merely a publicity stunt, the measure is nearly worthless and in fact may do more harm than good by fostering a false sense of security. There are several obvious flaws with the plan.

The first is that users on social networking and matchmaking websites typically do not have their identities verified. Thus anyone (including convicted sex offenders ) can post whatever name they wish to use on the site and easily avoid triggering a match on registries.

Even if Match.com members' names were somehow verified, names are very common. A match with a name on a sex offender registry would also require a matching address to be sure it's the same person. Anyone can rent a post office box (or use a friend's mailing address) to easily avoid triggering an alert.

Second, even if the information provided to Match.com was completely accurate, it may not match what's on the nation's sex offender registries, which are notoriously unreliable. A 2010 study of Vermont's sex offender registry found that half of the entries sampled contained significant mistakes and wrong information, including two people who should not have been listed. Audits in other states, including Georgia and Texas, found that the registry information for offenders was often wrong, incomplete and outdated.

Third, statistics show that relatively few assaults are committed by convicted sex offenders. That is, a given person (adult or child) is far more likely to be sexually assaulted by someone who is not listed on any sex offender registry than a convicted sex offender. The vast majority of physical and sexual assaults are committed by friends, family and other loved ones, not a recently met stranger hiding a sex offense conviction. This is one of the fundamental flaws of Megan's Laws and other offender notification measures: They distract attention and resources away from the greater threat.

Even Match.com's president, Mandy Ginsberg, acknowledged that the new measures "remain highly flawed." The rules of safe dating have not changed in decades: Meet in a public place, tell a friend where you're going and don't give out personal information too early.

Benjamin Radford is deputy editor of Skeptical Inquirer science magazine and author of six books.

original article here

Another reason to NEVER USE ONLINE DATING!

Hundreds of Victims of Romance Scams

Almost 400 Canadians complained they were victims of international ripoff schemes involving "romance" last year, according to the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre.

Victims reported losing almost $3.5 million, with more than a third of the money lost by victims between the ages of 40 and 49. One octogenarian victim reported losing $20,000.

"It's the kind of scam that's not reported," said Cpl. Louis Robertson of the fraud centre.

Robertson said 586 people complained to the fraud centre that they had been approached in a romance scheme, with 390 reporting they lost money.

The corporal said that likely reflects only a tiny portion of actual victims, perhaps as few as five per cent of people swindled by Internet romancers.

He said that given the nature of the crime, many feel too embarrassed to come forward.

original article here

Cyber Thieves Play Their Victim's Heartstrings

By THOMAS MICHALSKI

There are countless cyber crimes reported to law enforcement and other government agencies. They include work-at-home, check cashing, lottery and too many others to mention.

A computer is described as a device, electronic or otherwise, that performs high-speed mathematical or logical operations or that assembles, stores, correlates, or otherwise processes information.

The earliest form of computers actually date back to 3500 BC in India, Japan and China. The first recorded "computer crime" occurred in 1820 when Joseph-Marie Jacquard, a French textile manufacturer, invented a device that allowed the repetition of a series of steps in the fabric weaving process. His employees, fearing that their jobs were in jeopardy, sabotaged the new technology.

Computers have come a long way. Unfortunately, cyberspace is now the home to hundreds of Internet crimes that are designed to part innocent people from their money. Most illicit acts are described in the Information Technology Act of 2000 that covers everything from e-mail spoofing to illegal financial scams, pornography, online gambling, forgery, defamation and even cyberstalking.

One of the more popular illicit flim-flams involves romantic letters that eventually become pleas for money.

For this story, I answered one of those letters sent to my company e-mail address. It was one of many transmitted daily by swindlers from all over the world.

This particular one came from "Miss Grace," a self-described "single girl looking for honest and nice person, somebody who care and fear God whom I can partner with."

Her English was terrible, but we played her game for nearly three weeks.

Miss Grace, who also billed herself as "Grace John," claimed to be a 26-year-old West African. She sent a photograph of an attractive young woman with a winning smile.

In the initial Jan. 20 letter she wrote, "I would like to know you more, most especially what you like and what you dislike.

"I am sending you this beautiful mail, with a wish for much happiness," Grace wrote.

My reply was a faux background. "I too am looking for someone. My last wife just died. I've had four of them."

That probably set off the bell at Grace's scam central. A lonely old man. A target!

Grace's Jan. 27 letter was long and personal. In it she relates the story of her father, Dr. Benson John, the "director of project department of gold and diamond," and a successful importer and exporter of cocoa.

"I lost my parent during the war when rebels attacked my house one early morning killing my mother and my father," Grace wrote. "I am 5 feet 7 inches height, fair in complexion with average weight. I am very good at cooking. I love music and I like dancing too."

In another letter Grace called me an "angel" that brightens her day. She wanted my photograph. I declined, and elaborated on my alleged wealth that I said included airplanes and racing cars.

The hook was set.

On Jan. 28 Grace dropped the bomb. Her father, she wrote, left $5.9 million and Grace wants to share it with me. She wants to transfer all that money into my account and all I have to do is send her money for airfare and expenses. She further warns that I must keep the arrangement secret, but first I must contact her bank.

"I hope you will never let me down," Grace says.

She describes her life in a "deportation camp." In later letters Grace says she lives with a "pastor." She won't say how she can use a computer from the camp.

"The bank told me to look for a foreign reliable and honest partner who will assist me in the (money) transfer," Grace writes. "I am glad that God has brought you to see me out of this situation and I promise to be kind and will equally need you in every area of my life."

The bank, she writes, is the Bank of Africa-Senegal. I'm to contact a Mr. Paul Sidibe. She signs the letter, "Always and forever yours, Grace."

On Jan. 30 she pushes me, the faux old and lonely rich man, to provide my personal information to her "bank." I tell her I have more than $5 million in my checking account. That must have caused her and her cronies to salivate.

"You are always on my mind," Grace wrote. She signs her letter, "From my deepest heart, yours forever, Grace."

I told Grace on Feb. 2 that I would not provide the information she requested. On Feb. 3 she asked for money to scan copies of her father's account records. On Feb. 4 she was informed that I was a journalist doing a story on Internet fraud. I asked her a series of questions that received no reply. It was a short lived romance.

Her e-mail is one of many similar ones sent under various names. Consumer Fraud Reporting, a free online site (http://www.consumerfraudreporting.org) that warns of specific types of financial and other cyber crimes, shows an example of a letter from a "Miss Nafisatu John Apollo." It is very similar to Grace's. Maybe they're related? They each have "John" in their name.

Government agencies warn people who receive these kinds of letters to ignore them. They yank at the heartstrings of the old and lonely. Another Web site, www.ic3.gov, is used by law enforcement agencies to track cyber fraud. It is a joint effort between the FBI, the National White Collar Crime Center and the Bureau of Justice Assistance. (IC3 currently has a 6-7 year backlog of cases to investigate - do not expect a speedy answer.)

"If something sounds too good to be true," said Officer Donna Saxer of the Pinellas Park police crime prevention unit, "then it probably is."

ORIGINAL ARTICLE

EOPC EXAMPLES:
DAN JACOBY

ANDREW TAMMAR & MARLON WORTHAM

ED HICKS/ CHARLES HICKS/ CHARLES GREENE

JAMES BRIAN ELLINGTON

JOSEPH CAFASSO

MATTHEW COX

PHIL HABERMAN