Dear God, I wish I had time to do something like this! This is great! I will be keeping tabs to see how the story progresses. I assume you’re trying to confuse and flummox the perpetrators to the point that they trip themselves up and make it easier to arrest them, or at least sidetrack them enough that they aren’t scamming other innocent folks.
What would be very interesting would be to introduce the idea that the scammers might actually be dealing with an international aid conglomerate with billions of dollars to disburse, just to see how greedy they really are. Any chance of introducing them to another scammer mill, just to watch the two of them try to bilk each other?
Good stuff Mangetout, you soooo need to get one or both of these people in a public arena where an “exchange” will be made.
Then, with a telephoto lense take a few snapshots of the perps. Better even, would be to have them somehow leave finger prints on something, like a door handle or a beverage container.
I think someone would have to set up a mock bank account with maybe like $10 in it just so you have a paper trail, photos, e-mails, and possible finger prints.
The ID card looks like this. Ecks bears a striking resemblance to Prince Andrew, don’t you think? (BTW, I sent it as an attachment, not a back-traceable link as I have provided here)
Dramatis Personae:
(In case anyone is getting confused)
Mrs Grace Pearl Johnson - The scammer
Mr (Barrister) Patrick Adam (or Adams) - Also the scammer, or possibly his confederate
Mr Mange Tout (AKA Nemga Tuot) - Me
Mr Richard Dastardly - Also me
Mr Witon Ecks - Me again
I’m seriously in tears over that dummied passport! You sir, are a genius.
But please, do something really good, like requesting some pictures or something. Such requests usually result in some pretty amusing photoshop attempts.
I think it would only be reasonable to request a photograph of my would-be benefactors, wouldn’t it?
I think Ecks might ask for a photo of Mrs Johnson, then show it to his colleague, Zedd (actually, I think he’ll be calle Tsedd). Tsedd will fall in love with Mrs Johnson at first sight.
It would be just as easy and almost as satisfying to type up the whole thing, use the Bork Bork Bork Firefox extension to alter it, then send it. I personally wouldn’t put even a tenth of the effort into it that you are.
Also let me add that there’s no better way to hurt someone than to make them fall in love with you. I know from experience. And yes, I was the injured party…
So that Richard could forward it inline to Mrs Johnson (CC: Patrick Adams and W Ecks):
Dastardly also replied to Mange:
(So that Mange can forward it inline when he fires off a quick message to the scammers later today)
Ecks has also replied to Dastardly:
(What a nice guy he seems! Butter wouldn’t melt).
Ecks will email the scammers (with inline forward of Mange/Dastardly conversation), reiterating the instruction not to respond to Mange or Dastardly, but only after they have already done so.
Communicating between my puppets this way makes it look much more authentic from the POV of the scammers when I forward messages instead of just composing them from scratch.
I can now almost type fluent Blikster without using the translation program.
If they’re offering to meet up in London, I would seriously get in touch with the fraud squad. They might even get you to wear a wire and indulge in skullduggery! Though do be careful: these people are cleverer than one thinks, and can be extremely ruthless.
Checking email IP address headers would help you to find out where they are - the last one we had was in Burkina Faso.
I’ve forwarded the email that contained the scammer’s phone and fax numbers to the fraud department of the Metropolitan Police - I expect that will mark the end of this little tale, at least the scambaiting aspect of it.
I didn’t intend it to be anything other than incomprehensible, but I do like the way it happens to render certain words:
People – poupla
English – Amglish
Gullible – gollidla
Vacuum – fecoon
I just noticed that Patrick Adams has promised to send a photo of Mrs Johnson, although it sounds like maybe he wants me to wiggle a bit further onto the hook before he does.
I’ve put the ball back in his court by having Ecks reply:
BTW, does anyone recognise the man in Patrick Adams’ fake passport? I keep thinking I’ve seen that face somewhere before (i.e. that he’s done the same as me - pull a picture of someone off the web to use in creating the fake ID)
Niiiiice. I’m pretty sure he spent the better part of 60 seconds working on that.
Aside; what if you really were hooked and it turns out you’re flat broke, or only have a few bucks in your bank account for them to steal? Is it worth all this effort on their part? This is fraud, they can be traced, right? So to go through all this effort doesn’t seem like it would be profitable, plus they probably only hook .05% of the people they bait.
That means they would have to bait a lot of folks for a small return and the more they bait the higher their chances of getting caught is, right? Or am I way off on this evaluation?
According to the Metropolitan Police page on 419 scams, lots of victims end up getting pressured to borrow or embezzle money to try to get to the big payout - I understand the scammers start off hitting them with small fees and charges and this makes the victims more committed to the scheme - they keep on throwing good money after bad, thinking they will be able to repay any loans or embezzled funds after they get the millions.
