Scamming on the streets

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Hello I'm New here! Joined: 21 Sep 2008 Posts: 15

Hi all,

I am pretty new here and I apologise if this is the wrong place to bring up this discussion. But I wondered if anyone had met a scammer in real life?

I recall a year or so ago standing on an almost empty underground station platform, when I was approached by a well dressed man. He leaned in close and began to tell me something, unfortunately he was so softly spoken that I didn't understand at first and caught only a few words like "airport". Ah he's lost, I thought and began directing him to the tube line he wanted for the airport. He then laughed and suddenly spoke a lot more clearly - apparently he had accidentally left his wallet and travel documents in a cab and needed to board a flight today, thus he was asking for money to go and get another cab to find the first!

Of course at this point I told him he wasn't getting anything. The change in his smiling, friendly demeanor was instant, suddenly he straightened and with a bored look on his face walked off. At the time it struck me how funny the situation was - it was like the guy had just stepped out of a scam email!

I know why he targeted me (young woman, by herself, blah blah women=easy payday) and I kick myself for not making some excuse to take him to the station manager (He'll obviously try it on with more vulnerable victims).

Anyway, that's my tale, but I don't think its the only one to happen on the streets of London!

Posted: Mon Sep 22, 2008 10:45 am

It sounds like a well dressed beggar rather than a scam. Round here they have lost their money and need £1 for the bus home. If you give it them then they ask for more.

If they dress well and need to go to the airport via a taxi or 2, they can up the ante.

Posted: Mon Sep 22, 2008 10:46 am

hash_condisions wrote:

Hi all,.. But I wondered if anyone had met a scammer in real life?

Firstly, welcome to Eater.

I've met a real life 419 scammer in real life but didn't know it at the time. He was shacked up with the daughter of a friend in London and subsequently got her pregnant. She now has a gorgeous little two year old girl. He sadly didn't want to know. His visitor's visor expired ages ago and he is living and working in the country illegally. He is Nigerian. Very polite he was. He called me "Sir". He holds done a day job flogging mobile phones(ooo the irony!) and makes a little extra with his 419 activities. How do I know that? Because his girlfriend told her father who then told me. I know this guys real name and that of his brother back in Nigeria. I would just love to get the b*gger deported, but I have to be careful because of the proximity to the scammer's ex-girlfriend's family.

Posted: Mon Sep 22, 2008 11:42 am

Hi Hash,
What you describe is just begging, with a lie attached. I suppose in the broad scheme of things, it can be described as a scam at a push, but it's far from advance fee fraud... he's not offering you anything for starters!

I've come across a few scammers in the last 8 or 9 months, there are lots in London. I've baited two into meetings, only for my character to fail to show. I watched from a cafe over the street. I wouldn't condone that normally, but in the (very busy) circumstances it was safe. Mainly though, I just spot them when I am out and about... after a while, you know them when you see them, it's a combination of how they dress, how they look, how they talk on their phones, and in particular what they say. I won't go into specifics here as there is a danger of being misunderstood by the uninformed. Wink

Welcome to 419eater. Smile

Hello I'm New here! Joined: 21 Sep 2008 Posts: 15

roycropper> ah yes I have seen many of those types of begging too - its sad that it is mostly for drugs.

Tommo shanter>That is a tricky situation to be in. I'm curious - have you ever baited him as an unknown online user?

Mugatu>Oh don't I know it! I am sure most of the ones I bait on Gumtree are actually located in London. Makes it all the more nicer to throw some bait their way Smile

The guy I met on the underground was an unusual version of the bus-fair begging I have come across before. As I recall he was asking a lot of money.

I am intrigued to hear some people have 'met' (although they don't know it - lol, the best part) scammers. I wonder if any scammers realise they have met a baiter Twisted Evil

Posted: Mon Sep 22, 2008 6:22 pm

I've run into a few of those before. I remember one guy in NYC who claimed to have lost his wallet. He said he had all of his photography equipment nearby (out of sight of course), and he needed money for a taxi to somewhere far away an expensive. He asked for my address and swore up and down he would mail the money back as soon as he got home. I think he may even have offered his driver's license as collateral, fake and dispensable no doubt. I didn't give him anything, but he was very convincing and I did wonder for a while if he was legit... until a few weeks later when I heard someone telling the same story at a party.

Posted: Mon Sep 22, 2008 6:26 pm

I have "met" some scammers . This summer i was at an petrol station not far from the german border when suddenly a big BMW stopped in front of me . A man who was of arabic origin jumped out of the car and asked me if i would buy his "golden" ring because he ran out of money . So i kind of baited him (and i didn't know about eater than) and let him tell his whole story and ask questions . Then he tried to sell his "golden" neck chain and i could give him anything i wanted for it . Just when he thought i would get my wallet i told him he would never get any money from me , so he went to someone else . I went inside the petrol station and asked the employees there if these people did this scamming more often . One of them went outside with me and said he'd seen them before (by now the whoman who was first only sitting in the car was out and tried her luck with other people ) When the scammers saw the employee they jumped in the car and drove away at full speed . The BMW had german registration plates but the scammers were talking dutch .

Posted: Mon Sep 22, 2008 6:32 pm

hash_condisions wrote:

I wondered if anyone had met a scammer in real life?

Yes, and here are the pics.

http://forum.419eater.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=118127&highlight=atlanta

Posted: Mon Sep 22, 2008 6:34 pm

I can't find the eater videos at the moment but here is a short part of one
linky to Scammer Sting
Now could you recognize real scammer in the street? It could be anyone!

Posted: Mon Sep 22, 2008 7:20 pm

hash_condisions wrote:

...Tommo shanter>That is a tricky situation to be in. I'm curious - have you ever baited him as an unknown online user?

No, because it is too close to home and my friend is an idiot and would drop me in it without even realizing it. Sadly, I don't have the lad's email addy. One day though...

Tommo

Master Baiter Joined: 04 May 2007 Posts: 187

I've been targeted by a "dropped wallet" scam, though I didn't recognize it till I'd left the scene. My grandmother got approached by the same guys later that day. (Neither of us lost money to them.)

Foreign worker with a winning lottery ticket whose boss is keeping his passport hostage. Another passer-by, with absolutely no connection to the first guy, also stops by to help. According to the script, Scammer #2 suggests buying the ticket from #1 for pennies on the dollar; victim pays and is trusted with the ticket. Naïf that I was, I kept telling the first scammer to get help from his ambassador...

Posted: Mon Sep 22, 2008 11:26 pm

The one we see around here is asking for money for gas to get to the next town over which is "home". I don't know if this is begging in the traditional sense in that the person is homeless/down on his/her luck or scamming in the sense that this is how the person makes a "living".

Elite Baiter Joined: 17 Sep 2004 Posts: 1269

I ran into somebody at the gas station who claimed he needed money to buy bus tickets for him and his pregnant wife in the dead heat of summer. I told him I didn't have anything and he walked off. I should have asked where his wife was.

Posted: Tue Sep 23, 2008 5:34 am

Some years ago, I got to witness a 3 card monte "game." I even watched my friend loose the price of a meal. Yes, I told him it was a con, and yes he already knew that. To my eye it looked like a mob straight out of the old books! Although it could have been just a straight robbery set up.

I wasn't able to stay long enough to judge the slight of hand skills of the man "tossing the boards." But he was using the standard bent cards and throwing motions. I didn't get to see a fake roll, or any of the more amazing tricks that are possible, like a bent corner or a paperclip on the target card. But I don't think the guy was all that good; he was throwing too fast.

For me, the cool thing about (419) baiting, is that not only can I see scams in action, I can do a small part to mess them up. And do it without risk of getting physically assaulted.

Of course the best scams I get to see are the ones run by baiters on scammers. (I won't respond to any ethics replies to this post.)

edit: spelling

Posted: Tue Sep 23, 2008 6:05 am

song odors wrote:

Some years ago, I got to witness a 3 card monte "game."

Westminster Bridge or Embankment in London, alongside the guys selling dreadful souvenirs and cheap cartons that might contain cigarettes, there's a three-card scam/game going on pretty often. It's a little crate covered in black cloth.

But I am rarely troubled in London, I suppose I have developed the right kind of 'leave me alone' field over the past five years.

Posted: Tue Sep 23, 2008 1:01 pm

I have not witnessed it, but on the local news a couple of weeks ago there was a story about an elderly gentleman in our city who was approached as he left his bank. The two people asked him to help them claim their lottery prize. They told him it would cost several thousand dollars, accompanied him back into his bank, where he withdrew the money, and said they had to mail it and would he mind getting the postage also. Being the kind and helpful sort, he agreed. When he came out of the post office, they were gone, and the envelope that supposedly contained the cash contained only cut-up newspaper.

Posted: Tue Sep 23, 2008 1:11 pm

Begging on the London Underground - never happened back in my day. Grrrr. Still, I guess it makes a difference from the scruffy "gypsy" woman clutching her "hungry baby" AKA "doll" working the train carriages. These people do it because they can. Double Grrrrrr

Posted: Tue Sep 23, 2008 1:22 pm

In Greece and Italy, Ive seen women begging using real babies. Twisted Evil

That pisses me off, both from an emotional blackmail point of view (I don't give a monkeys if 'mom' gets her next fix or not, but I don't want the baby to starve), and because I worry for the baby's welfare being dragged around in the heat all day.

Posted: Tue Sep 23, 2008 2:45 pm

I was having a smoke outside a shopping mall in Penang, Malaysia and 2 Africans, students I'm guessing, came up to me and told me the normal NOK scam they where the sons of a King blah blah. I'm Aussie and 6'7" I guess I stand out a bit in Asia so I must have looked like a good target.

I laughed at these guys, patted the "leader" of the two on the shoulder and said, "I've heard it before mate, see ya later" and walked away. I could hear them laugh as I walked off.

Posted: Tue Sep 23, 2008 3:21 pm

As I went out a couple of years ago, two men got out of a van and tried to sell me a plasma TV for a ridiculously low price. The box would have only contained bricks, of course.
I phoned the police with the van's registration number, but they weren't really interested.

Posted: Tue Sep 23, 2008 4:17 pm

@tommo - shop him annonymously - i would!

Quote:

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Hello I'm New here! Joined: 21 Sep 2008 Posts: 15

Mr Tambourine Man wrote:

As I went out a couple of years ago, two men got out of a van and tried to sell me a plasma TV for a ridiculously low price. The box would have only contained bricks, of course.
I phoned the police with the van's registration number, but they weren't really interested.

Sort of reminds me of our local Potato man, he sometimes turned up in a dirty van and one of his helpers would jump out and knock on doors, asking if people wanted potatos (they always looked bad!). We agreed at the time, that just as the ice cream man needs a tune, so does the potato man - except it would be a gruff sounding voice Very Happy

Props to the person who got the vids - fantastic work!

Posted: Tue Sep 23, 2008 7:32 pm

haywood_jablowmi wrote:

@tommo - shop him annonymously - i would!

Nothing would give me more pleasure! The problem lies in the fact that that I'm not anonymous. Not that I'm not afraid of dying, because I believe we all have to die sometime dear. Laughing

I'm just biding my time. View it as a pan on the stove that is simmering but not boiling.