Possible Internet Scam! Read!

Detectives are investigating possible scam
By Ron Maloney
The Gazette-Enterprise

Published June 7, 2007
SEGUIN — If you were looking for high-paying, part-time job, a classified ad promising $2,700 a month for “only a little of your time” probably sounded too good to be true.

As it turned out, it was.

The ad, which recently had a 10-day run in the Seguin Gazette-Enterprise, has allegedly been used to lure at least two local residents into an Internet-based check scam that has become the object of investigations by the local sheriff’s and police department detectives.

So far, no one who has responded to the ads in this area is known to have lost any money.

Similar ads have been placed in other community and regional newspapers and seem to be an Internet scam du jour, the latest in a long line of Web-based frauds that traces back to so-called “Nigerian scams.”

The Better Business Bureau of Metropolitan Dallas issued a press release warning of a variation of the scam appearing in local newspapers in October 2003, and cable network MSNBC did stories on it and similar frauds in December of that year.

The “Nigerian scam” is a sort of updated, Information Superhighway version of the age-old “pigeon drop” confidence game in which the crook convinces the victim or “pigeon” to “invest” his or her money for a shot at a bigger payout at the end of the deal.

Of course, at the end of the deal, it’s the pigeon who is left holding an all-too-often empty bag.

Seguin Police Detective Lt. Mike Watts said the employment ad that ran in the Gazette-Enterprise resulted in a local woman trying to cash four bad money orders at Cash Express on East Court Street on May 17 in a case under investigation by Detective Sgt. Curle Price.

Watts said the purported financial instruments were obvious fakes, and were similar to four others that had been brought to the business the week before.

“The paper did not feel like a legitimate check,” Watts said. “The woman said she’d been looking for a part-time job, answered the ad, and got them in the mail. She was asked to cash the checks, keep 10 percent for herself, and to send the rest to Nairobi Kenya, in Africa.”

In addition, Watts said, there were several other stops along the way in destinations such as Alexandria, Ohio, and Amityville, N.Y.

Sheriff’s Investigator Lt. Kevin Jordan reported a similar case Wednesday. In that case, which is being Investigated by Robert Murphy, the victim was also promised 10 percent to cash what appeared to be traveler’s checks and forward the proceeds to Nairobi.

In recent weeks, Jordan said, several attempts had been made to cash such checks at local banking institutions, and at least one, Randolph Brooks Federal Credit Union, is refusing all such checks.

In the incident reported to Murphy, the woman contacted sheriff’s investigators because she suspected a scam, and Jordan said she was right on the money.

“I would say to use caution when answering this type of ad, whether you read it in the newspaper, hear it on the radio or see it in your e-mail,” Jordan said. “Scrutinize any information you get, check it out and follow up on it before you get into any of these types of situations.”

Publisher Neice Bell said it gets more difficult to confirm the veracity of an ad or an advertiser located somewhere else in the world when you’re only doing business over the Internet by e-mail, which was the case with this ad.

“While it is impossible for the Gazette to substantiate the claims made in advertisements prior to their publication, we have been working diligently with the local authorities to minimize the damage done by what has apparently turned out to be a fraudulently submitted advertisement,” Bell said.

Managing Editor Chris Lykins said the newspaper cooperated completely with the police and sheriff’s investigations.

“When we were contacted by the authorities, we immediately turned over all the information we had to assist in their investigation,” Lykins said.

Texas Press Association Advertising Director Ken Long said he’d heard of similar scams.

“I’m familiar with these scams,” he said Wednesday. “You’re the first paper to call and tell us you’ve received one of these ads.”

Jordan said anyone reading such an ad — particularly if someone is asking them to invest their own money or send something overseas to a country that has no extradition treaty with the United States — remember that if something looks too good to be true, it’s probably exactly that.

“If anyone suspects they may have been approached with one of these type circumstances, they should contact their local law enforcement agency to verify its validity,” Jordan said.

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