Room Mate Ad Scam....Advice please

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Hello I'm New here! Joined: 02 Mar 2007 Posts: 2

Hi there. I posted an ad on Roommates.com and Rent.com to get a room mate in my condo with me. Immediately, I received a response from a Belinda Smart, a humanitarian biologist working for WHO and Lagrange Organization in South Africa. "She" stated that she would be starting her next assignment in my city and was interested in being my room mate. I bit the "bait", and unfortunately sent my home address. My realtor told me it was probably a scam, so I removed all the ads, and responded to "her" latest email telling her there was no way I would rent the room to her without first meeting her.

Well, of course, she hasn't responded, but I got a relay operator message from "Belinda" yesterday on my cell phone asking me to please email her. I emailed her and told her if she showed up at my home or continued to contact me I would of course get the local police and my lawyer involved. No more contact, but this morning I received a UPS overnight package with a check for $4800 made out to me....obviously a LOT more than what I was asking for rent, and yes, she had asked me to take the check, cash it, and then send her the excess.

Obviously, I am NOT going to cash the check, and i've blocked her from emailing me (tagged her as spam on my account) and removed all the room mate ads.

What should I do with the check? Should I just rip it up, or should I take it to my local police department? Do they care?

Do one of you guys want the email address so you can play with this guy?

Here it is, I'm not interested in baiting....I'm a little scared by what happened to me. Please have fun with this one, and the advice for what to do with the check is needed and appreciated....

Email address to bait:
[email protected]
She has ads on room mate .com and rent.com. Just send an email saying you've got a place to rent in LA. Let me know what happens.

THanks in advance!!!!!

Hello I'm New here! Joined: 02 Mar 2007 Posts: 2

So I just called my local police department and they said, sure, bring the check over....but that it's definitely bogus.

Then I looked up the bank for the check, First Interstate Bank in Montana.
I went to their website. Called their 877 number....and the guy I spoke with new exactly who the "Remitter" would be (Timothy Wyland) and said it is happening to them non-stop, that the checks are coming out of Nigeria by way of Ontario, Canada, and just to tear up the check because the police can't do anything and I haven't lost any money.

So scary!!!!

But, on the UPS envelope they entered their UPS account number.
3397FX

Surely the cops can do something with that to track these guys. Or maybe one of you can start sending things over using this guy's UPS number. That would at least make me feel better!

Posted: Fri Mar 02, 2007 5:59 pm

The UPS account is most likely paid for with phished (victim) CC details. As for the cheque, of course its bogus. You can rip it up, or turn it over to your local LEO, but they really can't do anything with it.

Ignoring the scammer (which seems to be your plan) is your best course of action. When he realizes that you don't intend to send the money, he (it is mostly likely a "he" not a "she") will give up and leave you alone. In the meantime, you might want to let your cell go to voicemail if you don't recognize a caller's number. The less available you are, the faster the scammer will stop trying to contact you.

Posted: Fri Mar 02, 2007 6:06 pm

Thank you for posting igotscammed and welcome to the eater.

I mess with room 4 let scammers a lot

Let me guess ....

You advertised your room for rent on a on-line site like Craigslist?

Your roomie to be, lived out of state or overseas and was going to pay you by check from someone else ????

All you needed to do was to send the rest back to the scammer and keep 10% for your trouble ????

Fake check scam ..it's a good job you didn't cash the check or the bank would be after you for the full amount and may have had you arrested as an accomplice to fraud.

Well done to you for checking it out

Posted: Fri Mar 02, 2007 6:15 pm

@igotscammed

You have a personal message ...... check for your messages ...top right hand corner of the screen

Posted: Sun Mar 11, 2007 11:53 pm

Don't be scared. These guys are all talk. Even if you cashed his chequed, insulted his mother and told him point blank that you spent his money on booze and hookers all you would get would be a stream of profanity and threats. It's actually quite amusing. These guys live on their anonymity and won't do you anything.

Hello I'm New here! Joined: 24 Mar 2007 Posts: 1

I just got the same email story from the same person...I got a weird feeling when I read it so I did some searching on Google and found this forum. I didn't even bother to respond to him/her. Also, whoever wrote it said they were an American citizen but couldn't even write in correct English grammar so that seemed odd to me... but whoever it was used the same name/story.

Here's a copy of the email:

Hello,
Thanks for your response and i do appreciate your email. I am Belinda Smart and i am 27 years old, i am a US citizen but grew up in Northern Ireland,UK. I am a Pathologist as a profession.I presently work for Le Grange Organisation under the inspect of the W.H.O/UNICEF, as a microbiologist/Researcher. I will rather say i do more of humanitarian work that is out of my real profession and i just finished a project here in africa for the treatments of drinking water and to educate most villagers on intensive health care. The project was initiated by UNICEF in conjuction with L.G.O and i led the troop to actualise the conclusion of the project . My next appointment is the united states and will have to move in by first week of March, i had to make the posting to get a room urgently so that i can be able to move in. I have some things to bring in such as my Desktop computer, bedroom furnitures,Toyota Corolla car,2006 model, i wouldnt know if there will be space for this things and some of my antiques which i cherished alot.
I received alot of acknowledgement that i am friendly, i love kids, laid back, dont go out at nights, love reading novels and listening to the CNN news.I will be spending over 12 months there and my supervisor will come in to visit once in a while to ask about my duties there to me. A letter of appointment will be sent to me on where i will start working over there by my supervisor as soon as i move in and will probably be working in schools, Laboratories and Hospitals to be precise. The cost of the room is quite okay by me and i will appreciate if you can please tell me more about my roomate/s and if you can provide a scan picture of the room. Thanks and waiting to hear back from you, i will email you with my picture in my next email as i ought to have been there before now.
Thanks
Belinda Smart

Hello I'm New here! Joined: 14 Apr 2007 Posts: 1

I posted a room on roommates.com and got the same story from a Julia Morgan. Blonde good looking photo included. What do I do?

Posted: Sat Apr 14, 2007 11:24 pm

scammedandmad wrote:

What do I do?

Exactly what SlayerFaith and GeneralAbacha have said above ^^^^

Hello I'm New here! Joined: 28 May 2007 Posts: 2

I got 2 of those checks today...4800$$ each of them. I googled the names...Here I am. I have not send any information to rent a room, but I maybe gave my adress for another that I can't recall. I had no explanations,..no emails..just 2 checks..how sweet this is!!??..

What if I cash them??
Who are they??
What are they gonna ask me??

9600$$ is fine for me, but I don't wan't to hear from them at all. I know this is bullshit obviously, but what can I expect??
Thanks.

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

Quote:

What if I cash them??

Eventually they'll bounce and your bank will expect you to pay back the money and any overdraft charges. For added, extra fun, you could even be prosecuted for fraud and pay even more money to a lawyer for explaining that you didn't intentionally pass bogus checks....even though after reading this thread, if you do deposit them, you did.

Posted: Mon May 28, 2007 9:40 pm

Do NOT cash the cheques - they are fake and the bank will not only demand that you repay the money but they could also prosecute you because depositing and cashing forged checks is illegal. If you want confirmation then ask the bank to have a look at them and they will tell you they are fake.

If the scammer has your real name and address or any other personal details then just stop all contact with him immediately. He will probably hassle you with emails or maybe phone calls if he has your number but just ignore them all and he will go away. You can hand the checks in to the police, although I should warn you now that they probably won't be able to do much about catching the scammer, or you can keep one as a 'souvenir' of how you nearly got scammed.

If you receive emails from a stranger promising you 'easy money', no matter how tempting or convincing it sounds then you can safely assume it's scam.

Hello I'm New here! Joined: 28 May 2007 Posts: 2

Got it!! I won't cash anything. But to tell you the truth, I don't have any contact with him or them for the moment...I wonder where they took my information but I'll be vigilant!!

Thanks!

Not quite a Newb Joined: 24 Sep 2004 Posts: 52

igotscammed wrote:

But, on the UPS envelope they entered their UPS account number.
3397FX

Surely the cops can do something with that to track these guys. Or maybe one of you can start sending things over using this guy's UPS number. That would at least make me feel better!

I wouldn't count on tracking the person responsible by using the UPS account number. The office where I work (local office of an international insurance company) has had both our Fedex and DHL account numbers used by scammers, and we were not aware until the monthly billings came in.

We ship out hundreds of overnight letters each month, and the scammers probably thought we wouldn't notice. However, accounting verifies each line item on the monthly billings. All legitimate overnight mail we send references an in house case/claim number on the slip and the cost of shipping is charged to each individual case/claim number. Of course, the scam mail had no case/claim numbers referenced on the monthly statements.

The scammers (or their accomplices) simply "steal" the account number and use it as their own. The labels we use are pre-printed with our account number and come direct from Fedex and DHL. The scammers probably obtain the account numbers from the carbon copy of a legitimate overight letter.

Posted: Tue May 29, 2007 4:30 pm

You may want to scan your computer to make sure you don't have a trojan virus on it that is sending out your personal information to them. It can happen to the best of us.

My suggestion about what to do with the checks - frame them! Why not collect them as trophies. Start a scrapbook with them. If you really want to tick the Lads off get on a webcam and burn them while they are watching you. I ended up with a three page email of unmentionalble words and acts they were going to do to me when I did that. What a fun day that was. Laughing

Hello I'm New here! Joined: 13 Oct 2010 Posts: 1

I've recently posted to Roommates.com searching for renters and received the almost the same email.

When he asked who his roommates would be, I responded that it would be a police officer and FBI agent Smile

. Haven't heard back since. Here's a copy of the email.

Hello,
Thanks for your response and i do appreciate your email.I am Victor Brown and i am 40 years old male ,i am a US citizen but grew up in Northern Ireland,UK. I am a Pathologist as a profession.I presently work for Le Grange Organization under the inspect of the W.H.O/UNICEF,as a microbiologist/Researcher.I will rather say i do more of humanitarian work that is out of my real profession and i just finished a project here in Malaysia for the treatments of drinking water and to educate most villagers on intensive health care.The project was initiated by UNICEF in conjunction with L.G.O and i led the troop to actualize the conclusion of the project .My next appointment is the united states and will have to move in by the Oct 28 I have some things to bring in such as my Desktop computer,bedroom furniture's,Toyota Corolla car,2009 model,i wouldn't know if there will be space for this things and some of my antiques which i cherished a lot.I received a lot of acknowledgment that i am friendly,i love kids,laid back,don't go out at nights,love reading novels and listening to the CNN news.I will be spending over 12 months there and my supervisor will come in to visit once in a while to ask about my duties there to me.A letter of appointment will be sent to me on where i will start working over there by my supervisor as soon as i move in and will probably be working in schools,Laboratories and Hospitals to be precise.
Yes am interested in the place and i will like to know the cost of the room and i will appreciate if you can please tell me more about my roommates.Thanks and waiting to hear back from you. Thanks
[email protected]
phone....408-459-5546

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