I'm confused. Any ideas?

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Posted: Thu Aug 26, 2010 10:55 pm

OK today we got some forged Amex cheques sent to us.

The lad is using AOL and his IP points to Pretoria in South Africa.
The cheques were posted from Croydon in London.
He wants the money sent via WU to East Northport, New York.

We know some lads can collect money from any WU so sending his payment to New York is not an issue.

He is asking me to cash the cheques, rather than paying them into my bank, so it is clear that he is using me as a mule to cash them. That way when I get done for passing forged cheques, there is no link to him.

However we can't figure out why the cheques came from Croydon in London.

Either he has gang members in Croydon and he has contacted them and told them to send me the cheques, or he sent the cheques himself to someone in Croydon to then forward them to me, but if that is the case, I can't see why he would do that.

What do you think?

Thanks.

Posted: Thu Aug 26, 2010 11:39 pm

Quote:

we got some forged Amex cheques sent to us

I hope he doesn't have your real address Exclamation

Anyway he does it, or has it done, he gets his money. They can make use of a printer and a mule that actually sends them to what he believes legitimate contacts of a company. The trouble is that when he has the WU MTCN number he can collect anywhere on this earth and there is no trace.

Have fun, but play it SAFE

EDIT:
Best play it safe and send the money by snail mail to the London address Twisted Evil

He will be delighted Laughing

Master of Master Baiters Joined: 25 Sep 2008 Posts: 785

In my opinion the lad only orchestrates things. He will advertise for a check mule that has a printer and check printing software or have the people he pays for fake checks make the fake checks or money orders to send to the mule in bulk.

If the lad pays for the checks, he sends a bulk amount to the mule for distribution to the victims.

Meanwhile, the lad is advertising elswhere for people to cash the checks. These people will receive fake checks or money orders from the mule not the scammer.

If you are located in the UK, your check was sent to you by a mule in Croydon in London.

Posted: Fri Aug 27, 2010 3:35 am

As Buccaneer said, it's not uncommon for the check printer to be another mule, sometimes another unknowing victim.

The general scenario:

Lad is running 2 separate job scams.

job scam 1: the victim is supposedly an administrative assistant or a payroll clerk. Lad instructs him on what to buy, gives him account info and amounts, possibly even phished UPS or fedex account info to send the checks. Victim believes he is sending out payroll checks or accounts payable.

job scam 2: typical cash checks/WU money scam.

Lad's role: Buy the stolen account numbers, coordinate printing/sending/cashing, then walk away with the cash.

Posted: Fri Aug 27, 2010 9:08 am

bill2 wrote:

I hope he doesn't have your real address

No, we have a mate with an empty house and he has allowed me to have things like this sent there.

Once he rents it out though I will have to get myself a PO box.

Posted: Fri Aug 27, 2010 9:16 am

So does that mean that the person in London, who sent me the cheques, (which were in US Dollars), could actually be a victim too?

If that is the case then I could inform him/her because there was a return address on the envelope, in case it was undeliverable.

I didn't think about that actually when I told my police friend that I had got more cheques.
Maybe he could get in touch with Croydon police and they could deal with it?

Oh, in case you are interested, the bait for this is number 24 on my site. Scans of the cheques are at bottom of page.

Posted: Fri Aug 27, 2010 1:55 pm

The other possibility is that your lad has a lad friend in England....it happens.

Master of Master Baiters Joined: 25 Sep 2008 Posts: 785

It is not likely that the mule is using his/her own address. The lad will normally instruct the mule to send the fake check with instructions such as a letter to include with the fake check. The lad will also dictate to the mule the return address to be used on the mail. I doubt the return address will help for warning or arrest of the mule. There is a good read about stolen post / fed ex accounts here : http://forum.419eater.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=188753&highlight=sheboppe Having a fake check delivered to you is not something the lad pays for as well.

Master of Master Baiters Joined: 10 Jan 2010 Posts: 503

Croydon is not in London it is in Surrey. Did the postmark state Croydon, London because if so then they did not come from the real Croydon area but somewhere else.

Posted: Sat Aug 28, 2010 11:21 am

Rick Shaw wrote:

Croydon is not in London it is in Surrey. Did the postmark state Croydon, London because if so then they did not come from the real Croydon area but somewhere else.

Yeah I know, I used to live in South Croydon.

But it also comes under Greater London because it's inside the M25. Do a Google map search for Croydon and you will see.

So although it is in Surrey, the postage mark has London on it.

Posted: Sat Aug 28, 2010 7:55 pm

Hey hey M&L,

The Croydon connection could be a mule, or it could be a confederate - perhaps a mod can take the address details as you know them and issue a warning (or alternatively take it to the Met?)

Posted: Sat Aug 28, 2010 8:40 pm

manbiteslion wrote:

Hey hey M&L,

The Croydon connection could be a mule, or it could be a confederate - perhaps a mod can take the address details as you know them and issue a warning (or alternatively take it to the Met?)

Hey Paddy.

I have now given the Croydon address to my mate in the Police.

He agrees that the address must have some significance in this scam, else it wouldn't be on the envelope as a return address.
Whoever lives at the address must know that some cheques would be sent back to there if it was undelivered for some reason.

That person will either be an inocent victim or a knowing participant.

I would assume that the address is actually the person that sent the cheques in the first place.

Either way, Croydon Met can deal with that part.
In the mean time I'm going to send the lad to Security Shield lol