Received a summons for interrogatories from incarcerated lad

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Master of Master Baiters Joined: 26 Aug 2006 Posts: 577

drab wrote:

I'm aware that attorneys don't issue summons. As I stated a couple of times now, the attorney emailed me a copy of the summons in pdf. He didn't issue it. It is from an African court.

Post it up for a look see. Redact you identifiable information and do it behind log-in forum - not here which is open. Or just PM to someone you trust at EATER.

Posted: Fri Apr 02, 2010 7:39 pm

Danger.

Never edit a PDF to black out text. The underlying text remains and can be viewed in an editor. Many released documents have leaked real personal info this way in the past.

Print the blacked out PDF. Scan the image, and then make a brand new PDF without the original blacked out text in it.

Philo Kvetch wrote:

Love to see the pdf w/ personals blacked out.

Are you really sure it is from an African court. I have lots of emails from a prominent banker, officers of the gas and oil division, etc. in Nigeria too. Fake documents are the norm. Unless you locate the court outside the scammer channels and verify it, it's probably fake.

Posted: Fri Apr 02, 2010 8:15 pm

drab wrote:

I'm aware that attorneys don't issue summons. As I stated a couple of times now, the attorney emailed me a copy of the summons in pdf. He didn't issue it. It is from an African court. I think once the summons was issued it became a public record. This attorney sent me a copy of it. This is the same attorney from the original thread. I'm pretty certain that he is legit since nobody could prove that he wasn't. In these circles that is proof enough for me. For those that think this is all to extract money from me, this is one hell of an effort on their part. It makes no sense for them to go this far.
As far as getting my IP address. I have probably changed it 7 or 8 times since Nov. 09 when this started. Sometimes I get an IP out of my county, sometimes it is as close as 10 miles to my actual residence. I never kept a record of IP's that I've had. The one that was posted in my county seats paper is for a town 20 miles from here. Since they posted my alias I used in this bait I believe it is more than just fishing. The bottom line for me is if they have my IP they know who my ISP is and all they have to do is give them the IP they have along with the date used and they get my real name and address.
If their court gets an order for my ISP to release this info maybe they will comply, maybe they won't.
Again, I'm not worried about it, just sharing because it's funny. I wish I would have used a more creative alias so the legal notice I cut out of the newspaper would be funnier framed than it is.

In the UK where I live, the court will send you a letter by mail, not an email.

In the country where I originated from, the police will knock your door.

No emails will be sent in both cases

no ideas about the US legal system though

Master Baiter Joined: 20 Apr 2009 Posts: 120 Location: USA

^
Again, the court didn't send me anything, a lawyer did. How would I get mail from the court when they don't know my address?

There wouldn't really be anything to redact on the document that hasn't already been posted in a newspaper already. I learned my lesson about making emails public here back in November. It was a lot of effort with no consensus on the validity. If you want me to post it so you can look for the typical errors made by scammers, they aren't there. Unless someone can find a way to access public records in an African court house like I can do here in the states? If so I will give you the document number so you can look it up yourself.
I think that's the only way to determine if it is real at this point.

Posted: Fri Apr 02, 2010 8:50 pm

Just a few notes if this is a legal action. I have learned a few things following some of the RIAA attacks on file sharers.

1 An IP address is not an individual. You have already stated you use a router. How many users use the router, and which one is the baiter?
2 If the router is wireless, who is leaching the connection from elsewhere?
3 The IP address is often given out on a "Lease" from a pool of addresses. The exact time and IP address must be tied to the registered modem at the exact time of the contact. What time zones are involved?
4 Google might not have the personal details of the Gmail account holder. They may be fake.
5 The ISP must be required to release the lease holder of the IP address at the time of the connection. This only reveals the registered account holder. It does not identfy the USER of the account, who may be several behind the router NAT (Name Address Translation) table. This ISP can only get the MAC of the modem or router, not the MAC address of the computer connected. If you have more than one computer, It may be a good idea to re-locate the one sued for the Gmail to another location for a while and use your other computers. There will then be no trace of the activity on any machine they pickup in a raid. This will help in the wireless hack defense. None of my machines accessed that account.. etc.

The fight against file sharers is located here. You can then see what steps is required to properly identify a John Doe file sharer.

The same applies to the Nigerian court. They can attempt to bypass the roadbocks by asking you to give them the info on a silver platter.

Offer to only send the email exchange printed out and sent certified post to the law firm. Do not use a return address. Keep the reciept for your records so you can track the sent letter and pick up the return recipt from the post office.

I hope this is some good info for you. They will need to file a John Doe to persocute you. Anything less will be for a deposition. Find out just what they want. Tell them you will only do a John Doe deposition. They will either accept or reject it. If they reject it, run, and hide.

The best info is when Media Sentry was questioned and provided this info on what was admissable and what was grasping at straws regarding IP addresses and identifying individuals.

http://www.ilrweb.com/viewILRPDF.asp?filename=bmg_doecanada_millindeposition

It is recommend reading on what they can and can't do with your IP address.

One last note. Do not delete any email at this point. If it goes to court and you have tampered with the email and they can prove it from an earlier copy from Google, the news is bad. Retain all email until this is over. It may be needed for evidence for or against you. Showing it was a scam and you are baiting, you should be OK if you didn't create any fake checks, government documents such as passport or driver's license, currency, etc. Please tell me you didn't create any fake government paperwork.

My bait email address was opened with an email address in another country.

Master of Master Baiters Joined: 26 Aug 2006 Posts: 577

drab wrote:

^
Again, the court didn't send me anything, a lawyer did. How would I get mail from the court when they don't know my address?

There wouldn't really be anything to redact on the document that hasn't already been posted in a newspaper already. I learned my lesson about making emails public here back in November. It was a lot of effort with no consensus on the validity. If you want me to post it so you can look for the typical errors made by scammers, they aren't there. Unless someone can find a way to access public records in an African court house like I can do here in the states? If so I will give you the document number so you can look it up yourself.
I think that's the only way to determine if it is real at this point.

Got it Drab. I'm done. Good luck.

Posted: Fri Apr 02, 2010 10:26 pm

Although others who have posted here have much more legal and technical insight into this matter I am overwhelmed by the irony of a Nigerian court coming after a Westerner in a fraud action. I also don't believe that's what's happening here, but if this is an actual lawyer trying to reduce his client's sentence by proving you weren't a real victim, just ignoring these a-holes seems like the best strategy. At the end of the day the only reason you came into contact with this individual is because he was attempting to steal from you.

I am troubled by the idea of your ISP releasing your identity to any Nigerian lawyer or court official. Given the overwhelming corruption in that society this seems little different than them ratting out a witness to a mobster.

Posted: Fri Apr 02, 2010 10:43 pm

Note, it was gmail, not the ISP that released the false information. The ISP customer record has not been exposed yet. There is no John Doe case to acquire it to my knowledge. This is a phishing attempt to get the Gmail user to give up the information bypassing the legal process.

It is best to remain hidden at this point and claim it's a scam as a defence. You truly believe it is a scam at this point. You only use that account for baiting scammers. It's up to them to prove otherwise.

It may be a wise move to advise the ISP involved so they know there is a phishing attempt on the user. Many ISP's will do wonders if it is not a local lawsuit.

Think about how hard it is to find the real scammer there by pulling ISP records. The reverse is true for them finding us. Only if the local law enforcement is involved with real evidence of wrongdoing will this go anywhere.

Assume it is a scam.

It is your defense.

Master of Master Baiters Joined: 26 Aug 2006 Posts: 577

^^^^

You guys seem to like to make up facts as you go along and insert lots of extraneous information.

-no one said false information was released.
-there is no john doe
- the OP has ignored requests to post the supposed summons
- phish this

Not quite a Newb Joined: 05 Mar 2010 Posts: 26

Have you contacted your ISP and see if someone has requested to have your IP/info released to them? if they have no problem giving that info to an attorney (over the phone or email, yeah, right.) they should have no problem giving YOU some info about what happened to your account.

I work for an ISP, and if anybody, just ANYBODY that is not an authorized user on an account asks any information that can be used to identify an account holder in any way, (even an IP), we decline it. No ifs. No ands. No buts. Any request to release that info has to be done in written, and through official channels. Meaning, not even an attorney issuing a subpoena has the right to demand that info from us. It has to come from the court or a police.

I call bluffing there.

Master Baiter Joined: 20 Apr 2009 Posts: 120 Location: USA

@ philo
I didn't ignore your request. It seems you have ignored my response. The summons exists. You seem to think you can determine if it is real or not. I know from past experiences, specifically, me posting the emails from this attorney back in November, that it isn't possible. I'm sorry if I haven't satisfied your curiosity. No need to try and cast aspersions on what is going on because I haven't bowed to your request. You said you were done with this anyway Rolling Eyes

Baiting Guru Joined: 03 Mar 2006 Posts: 7103 Location: Yes

What are we seeking to do here?

Establish whether it is real or not?

How to respond?

If your ISP is going to have you arrested?

The answer to these questions and many more is found through consulting a lawyer or perhaps the State Department.

All I will say on the matter is that real lawyers don't serve people by publication unless it's a class action (with thousands of potential claimants) or if all other efforts have failed, and then, in both cases, only per court order.

As you haven't displayed the alleged court documents, it's tough to offer much in the way of substantive help, even if we could.

Master Baiter Joined: 20 Apr 2009 Posts: 120 Location: USA

As I've already stated, I'm not worried about it, just sharing.....
Why would I think scambaiters could give me legal advice?

Let me run and ask the state dept if my ISP is going to have me arrested. Haha

Baiting Guru Joined: 03 Mar 2006 Posts: 7103 Location: Yes

Okay, thanks for sharing.

Posted: Sat Apr 03, 2010 6:09 am

Welcome to #1 on google, drab!

That's gotta suck.

Anywho, congratulations, you're famous.

As for this... lawyer....

I can shoot him an email as your lawyer if you want.. or anyotherpersons lawyer and ask for details on the case. Smile

Posted: Sat Apr 03, 2010 4:24 pm

I seriously doubt you'd get arrested over it, simply because scambaiting isn't a crime. (Though I bet there's a lot of scammers who wish it was, lol Rolling Eyes

)

The only problem I can see with this is that your real life information probably wouldn't be too safe over there if you have indeed dropped one of these lads into some serious legal trouble.
I'm not trying to put down Nigeria as a country here, I know there are a lot of good people over there. But it's a simple fact that anywhere information is recorded, be it paper media, electronic, magnetic, whatever, there is always the possibility that the wrong sort of person can get hold of it.

By the way, I dunno if this works anymore, but I've heard of a case of a file sharer who got caught downloading stuff. But his defence claimed that because he had the Tor network client installed on his machine and had it set up to run as an end-point server for the network, then it could actually have been anyone in the world who downloaded files through his machine. No way to prove otherwise as long as no evidence was found on his PC, he could simply say "It wasn't me!"
Just a thought really. I'm not a lawyer, so maybe someone else will know more.

Not quite a Newb Joined: 14 Jul 2005 Posts: 41

Quote:

I'm not a lawyer

This thread amuses me.

The few folks that actually are lawyers and opined here were mostly told their opinons weren't needed.

Moving to general, where the OP can share and the rest can opine, freely.

Posted: Mon May 17, 2010 6:12 pm

I'm glad you mini-necroed this as I missed it the first time.

This was priceless.

drab wrote:

Why would I think scambaiters could give me legal advice?

Errr... there were some lawyers posting in this thread. Laughing

Not quite a Newb Joined: 14 Jul 2005 Posts: 41

^^^I didn't necro - there was a recent post in there that I was replying to.

Honest. It showed up on my refresh and everything. Embarassed

Posted: Mon May 17, 2010 6:20 pm

I kinda had this picture in my mind.....

Posted: Mon May 17, 2010 6:21 pm

Those rat finks at Gmail. They can say goodbye to my free business. Evil or Very Mad

Not quite a Newb Joined: 14 Jul 2005 Posts: 41

Posted: Mon May 17, 2010 6:56 pm

drab, first and foremost, you need never worry about extradition from the US, we don't give up citizens. I don't think what ever they are trying to coerce you into is legal and proper anywhere but in Nigeria (or the country your scammer is from). You have nothing to worry about other than this may be an attempt at locating you. So Google actually gave up your IP? Who says that's the one you have to acknowledge. Someone else could have used it before you. They have nothing on you (criminally), all you did was put a lad in jail. As long as you were being ethical and not cash baiting or anything that could put you in a bad light...

I think it a great idea to start up an account and pose as your "attorney". Be very serious with the demeanor and feel out what this lad is trying to pull. I think it is a hoax, I can't see a real barrister fronting for a lad in lockup who probably is 2nd rate with little or no cash in hand. It isn't realistic for a business minded person to waste money ddealing with internet providers, foreign newspapers and a lot of time and money for someone who take his money from fruad victims. If anything he is probably just as rotten. Mad

Posted: Mon May 17, 2010 10:46 pm

I am thinking we really let drab down. We all should have set up separate lawyer gmail accounts and responded with demands for depositions and other legal devices to help defend the baiter.

I for one am sorry I did not step up to the plate for the OP. Sad

Welcome to General Chat drab! Smile

Posted: Tue May 18, 2010 3:23 am

Not a bad idea, Paranoid! What would a flase barrister do if he were suddenly innudated with multiple writs of haebeus corpus delecti! Oh drab, I think some of us might want to help you out! Very Happy

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