My soulmate

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Hello I'm New here! Joined: 14 Oct 2015 Posts: 15

I have been emailing with this guy for a little over a month. He is looking for his soul mate. I have in no way pretended to be someone I'm not, other than inventing a 14 year old son, Joey.

He is very affectionate...honey, dear, babe, my love..and talks about when we will be together. I don't return any of this. The most I give him is 'have a nice day', and don't do that very often. Thought I'd lost him a couple of times, but he keeps coming back.

He has informed me that 'our' son's birthday is coming up, because he knows I would like to get him something nice. I made it clear that I had one son, Joey, but I would get his son something nice.

His son's wish list...an IPad, air max shoes and chocolate. Since he had already told me he was in Florida, I really didn't think he'd give me his address, but he did.

He is in Ghana.

I've told him there would be no IPad or shoes, but I am seriously considering sending him some chocolate. I know he is a scammer, but I did tell him I would send something, plus I can only imagine the delight a couple of Hershey bars would bring to someone in Ghana.

Is there any harm in doing this?

Posted: Fri Nov 06, 2015 3:50 pm

Why waste even a single cent on a scammer? There is no son, so why send anything to a lazy low life piece of shit?

And you are baiting safely aren't you? No connection to RL in emails, social media profiles, etc.

Posted: Fri Nov 06, 2015 4:28 pm

Quote:

I know he is a scammer

Why would you even consider wasting money by rewarding him? I think there is definitely harm in doing this.

By sending something, you are (imo) encouraging him to up his scamming. If he gets something trivial from you, then maybe he will assume he can do better with another victim.

Posted: Fri Nov 06, 2015 5:52 pm

The harm in sending this cretin anything is you would be participating in a scam. The whole point of baiting is to make the criminal think he is scamming someone when, in fact, he is not. BTW, if you are stringing this schmuck along from an email account tied to your real life, you need to break it off yesterday. Oh, and welcome to 419eater!

Posted: Fri Nov 06, 2015 6:03 pm

edwards504281 wrote:

I have in no way pretended to be someone I'm not, other than inventing a 14 year old son, Joey.

If I am reading this correctly you are telling the truth about your identity. You should immediately drop correspondence with this scammer, it is not advisable to bait these criminals using any connection to your real identity.

And even if you were baiting him totally anonymously, don't send him anything, even a Hershey bar (which my european correspondents tell me tastes like sick. I grew up eating the things so they taste fine to me). Doing so serves no obvious purpose, and can only encourage him.

Hello I'm New here! Joined: 14 Oct 2015 Posts: 15

I've never intentionally baited anyone. I get them occasionally on a gmail account I use for what I suspect to be junk websites...a free IPad for filling out never ending surveys, stuff like that. I assume that's where they get the address.

I do generally respond to them, but rarely hear anything back. I pin them down on where they got their information. Sometimes I ask them to lend me some money right off. That never goes over well.

This one didn't give up and I decided to see how long I could string him along. From his requests, I've wondered if he's actually a teenager. I was expecting a request for money.

I said that I would send him something and I have a hard time going back on my word to anyone, and I know those people in Ghana don't have much of anything...but I've decided that you all are right. Especially if he is young...you don't reward bad behavior.

He knows nothing of my identity. All he's got is that email address, which is worthless.

Thanks

Posted: Sat Nov 07, 2015 6:24 am

edwards504281 wrote:

I said that I would send him something and I have a hard time going back on my word to anyone,

Baiting probably isn't for you then and you would be better off just deleting the mails in future before you become a victim

edwards504281 wrote:

and I know those people in Ghana don't have much of anything...

A common misconception. He could well be university educated and from a well off family.

Master Baiter Joined: 05 Sep 2014 Posts: 139

take the advise of the experts on this cite. I was a victim of a scammer and the longer you communicate with this person, the more you will feel like you need to comply with the requests.

Hello I'm New here! Joined: 04 Nov 2015 Posts: 5

Not only is sending him something a safety risk, if you won't think of yourself and the lies you feel he is telling you, think about others he may be scamming.

Do not allow him to be rewarded for his behavior.
Do not give him the confidence to say "This works for me as a way of life." because he got something from someone.
Do not give him a taste of "success".
Do not allow him to build his skills and repertoire so he can go further with other women.

Today a small birthday gift for a son you have no proof exists, tomorrow an emergency involving the same son that costs you much more.

Hello I'm New here! Joined: 14 Oct 2015 Posts: 15

I am completely convinced not to send anything.

I've never had any doubt that no son existed. In fact, I think it's a young inexperienced person that I've been talking to. He says things sometimes that don't make sense. He doesn't keep his stories straight very well. Other than calling me honey or dear, and talking about when we will be together, he hasn't been at all romantic...until today.

The email received today was absolutely beautiful. Very romantic and beautifully written.

There is no way this is the same guy I've been chatting with for the last month. Either that, or he's getting pointers from somebody.

Posted: Sun Nov 08, 2015 2:46 pm

Romance scammers use a mixture of their own messages and stolen poems and love letters. The barely literate short messages are their own work (or scam scripts) and the long romantic poems are stolen from legitimate sites on the web.

Posted: Sun Nov 08, 2015 4:40 pm

B8er is right-communications are generally scripted with short pieces written by the scammer-usually in poor english or text speak. You can google his last email and I bet you'll find it in a dozen places on web. After all, he's probably sending the same stuff to a dozen victims at a time. That's why the "Dear" and "honey"-they don't keep track of names.

Posted: Sun Nov 08, 2015 4:58 pm

Quote:

My Dear Sweetie,

I want you to know that since the day we met, I've fallen deeply in love with you. There are no words to express the gratitude I feel in my heart that you came into my life, and how you make every day so special. You are my life, my heart, my soul. You are my best friend, my one true love, my one and only. I love you more today than I did yesterday, and I'll love you more tomorrow than I do today.

I've been trying to find a way to express my feelings for you. I’ve always wanted to create something unique to show you just how much I love you. Now I’ve found the right place, and I’m going to tell the entire WORLD that I LOVE YOU!. It may sound crazy and corny, but I want to tell the whole universe about the true and sincere affection I have for you. I can't tell you exactly how I feel, but I hope that you feel the warmth of my love when we are finally together. I will be right beside you any time you need me, and I will be with you until I breathe my last breath. I promise to share my life with you no matter what tomorrow may bring. I want you to know that you will never loose me, my visit to you in brazil, i will stay with you for about one month, if you want to follow me to the USA, i will be very happy, we can go back to my country together, i will find you a very good job if you like to work here in USA, i need you in my life my love, i know your heart is full of love and that is what i want. Joseph likes you and he is eager to know and meet you.

I know that when we are finally together, we'll bring out the best out of each other. Stay in love honey, and keep that tender, sweet smile on your face, i love the way you smile, it mkaes you look more beautiful to me. Know that I will love you forever!!!.

Joseph is saying Hello!!! to you his new mother. He also likes your photos.

My heart is yours forever my love. 29th is the day i'm travelling, and when i arrive West Africa, i will email you to let you know, i will try my best to always write you, and please my love, always try and reply my message.

Quote:

I'm so in love; I get this warm sensual feeling every time I think of you. When I sleep at night, all I can dream about is you. I wish I could hold you in my arms right now. I dream of the day when I could kiss you passionately on your soft sweet lips and listen to your heart beating, because it's sweet music to my ears. All I can say is let me be the one you will always love; let me be the one whose love you will always need.

Before we even met, my love, there's this special love that I have deep within my heart. That love is only just for you now. It is far greater than what you can ever imagine. I wish I could show you how much you really mean to me. If I could let you feel how much I do really love you in a kiss or hug, you would only feel the surface of the love that I have for you. The only time when I can show you how much I do really love you is when we are Married. For then you will see and taste how much I love you. You can hear the language of my love for you by listening to my heart; it will speak to you. You can taste the sweetest of it in a kiss and you can feel it in a hug. When you look deep into my eyes, you will see how great my love for you is. You will also know and see that it's no lie!

If I could describe the love that I have for you, I would try and use lyrics of love songs and even the sonnets of Shakespeare and it would be impossible, because the love that I love for you is real, unconditional, everlasting and indescribable. You've had my heart and love from the day we met and you will have it forever. As time goes by, my heart and love for you will keep on growing stronger, brighter and bigger.

Call me your love, lover, boyfriend and future husband you deserve to be loved by me. You are all mine, as I am all yours. Although we have two different bodies, minds and souls, we have one and the same beautiful heart. This is my unconditional love for you, from me to you.

I love you, my Buttercup, with all my heart, body, mind and soul. I will never stop loving you. You are my life, my world and my everything. Distance may keep us apart for now, but you will always and forever be embedded deep within my heart until we are finally together.

Your loving Husband.

Just two of many scripts posted here.

Hello I'm New here! Joined: 04 Nov 2015 Posts: 5

I am glad you have chosen not to send anything.

He could have easily sent the chocolates to another victim as proof of his sincerity and to make it seem like an equal relationship. ("I sent him money last week...but he sends me gifts too!")

As for you getting two different men...I can see his Oga thinking you were ripe for the plucking but needed a more experienced lad to really draw you in.

Posted: Sun Nov 08, 2015 6:37 pm

@ Edwards, Please go to our sister site Scam Warners and report as many details about the scammer as possible. There is a link to the site at the top of the page. Any information you can post at SW can help keep someone else from becoming a victim to the scammer. If you have any questions you can PM any Mod there for help.

Master Baiter Joined: 05 Sep 2014 Posts: 139

The love note you just posted is almost identical to the one I received. The one difference is that the scammer had two sons who went to Nigeria with him because there was no one to take of them. I suspected that he was working with a group who took turns writing responses to me. The tone of many of the messages were very different. I highly recommend Scam Warners. They helped me get through the worst time in my life.

*** BANNED *** Joined: 26 Jul 2012 Posts: 1116

edwards504281 wrote:

He knows nothing of my identity. All he's got is that email address, which is worthless.

Unless your name is really Edward and you happen to be a snowed in IT expert on the soviet block, netflix and chilling with your boy Putin over a bottle of vodka........ are you sure about that? Laughing

You would be shocked what someone can pull up with a personal email address these days. I've scared many a person with just their personal email address in fact. All baiters here use aliases and email addresses specifically created for what we do. Using your personal email address or any other personal details is not only foolish, it shows there may be some personal level of investment in the scam. If the latter is the case I would suggest you go to scamwarners.com, post any information you have on the scam, and become emotionally divested from your scam before you even think about baiting. Emotionally compromised people do not make for the best baiters and it is far from baiting safely.

Master Baiter Joined: 05 Sep 2014 Posts: 139

I totally agree. Baiting your scammer will only keep you from healing. When I was first scammed, that is the first thing I wanted to do but realized I would be baiting for the wrong reasons. My opinion is that to be a good baiter, one should not be connected emotionally with the person they are baiting. If I am wrong about this, please someone correct me. Not everyone is suited for baiting and I am one of those persons. I urge you to report this on scamwarners. Warning other potential victims is the best way you can help.

Hello I'm New here! Joined: 14 Oct 2015 Posts: 15

After taking another look at the email, it is definitely a poem from somewhere. He is back to his normal self today.

Does anyone know how young they get started in this? He said his son is 11 years old. Is it possible that I am dealing with an 11 year old?

I looked at some of the scammers on Scam Warners. This guy is nowhere near as good as those.

I can see someone falling for one of those guys. I don't see anyone falling for this guy...except maybe for some chocolate.

Posted: Tue Nov 10, 2015 6:04 pm

edwards504281, you seem to have an emotional attachment to this lad. That is in no way a positive thing in baiting, especially with romance scammers. Some of the best romance baiters I know work in teams. It takes solid friendships, advice, and the ability to turn your heart into a tiny lump of coal to deal with these criminals. Romance baiting is certainly not for everyone. It's vicious and dirty. Much like a victim that can be convinced by a lad, even when they know they are a scammer, inexperienced baiters can be sucked into the words. Drop this bait. It's not worth it. To anyone.

Even if you only use that gmail address to sign up to sites, etc., it's tied to you. Baiter accounts are kept separate from anything connected to who we really are.

From here:

Quote:

Safe Baiting

First and foremost, remember that the people we are dealing with are criminals. They may seem ignorant to us, but in the end these are con artists who happily (and all too often successfully) steal money from anyone they can, including their own countrymen. There are no depths to which a lad will not sink to steal money. Therefore:

Don't use your real name. You may think it's common enough, but when combined with only a few pieces of information your lad may be able to track you down.

Don't use your real address, or that of anyone else. While it's pretty obvious not to use your real address, be aware of using other locations. Giving out the address of your local strip club may seem funny, but at the same time you're violating Innocent Third Party rules.

Don't use your real phone number, or that of anyone else. Take advantage of the numerous free phone transfer services such as K7, or use a pre-paid phone which you've made sure doesn't have any links to your real life persona. You may wish to turn it off at night though.

Don't use any real Credit Card, bank or other personal information. Lads generally know what they're doing when it comes to money transfers, and they'll jump on any little piece of information that comes their way.

Be aware of attachments you send. In the 'properties' part of documents we send to lads, it is entirely likely that your real name will come up as the author of this work. Photos may contain personal details in the exif data.

Also: be cautious about attachments you receive from a lad! Often Internet cafe computers send malware, with or without the lad's knowledge.

Don't meet your lad in real life. While a few brave baiters have taken photos/videos of their lads in the past and shared them all for our enjoyment, it must be stressed that there is a big risk involved in such activity. Your lad is likely to have other people supporting them and it may be VERY dangerous to come into personal contact with them.

Most importantly, remember your lad is a criminal. You don't need to get paranoid, just follow a few simple rules and you'll be fine.

Security

Think about whether anything you send could link to you. Often people sign up here under a username that with Google and 30 seconds to spare leads to address, name, phone number and sexual preferences of said member. People have sent faxes from their office machine. People have accidentally replied to lads from the wrong email account sending all their real life info in the footer. People have received fake checks at their home address. People have posted their baits on their personal websites registered with all their real info and linked to those sites from 419eater. People host images they post here on their personal webpages, or frequently on sites like imageshack along with pics from their friends and family. People have posted enough personal info about themselves here on this very website that can easily be pieced together in a minute by a sharp-minded lad using the search function. Be aware.

Master Baiter Joined: 05 Sep 2014 Posts: 139

back off and don't think about baiting your scammer. leave it to the experts. you won't be able to get on with your life until you can put this behind you.

Hello I'm New here! Joined: 14 Oct 2015 Posts: 15

gardenlady...I have never been scammed. The attempt has been made a few times..but I don't trust people in person, much less for over the internet and I find them annoying.

This one caught my eye because he was different than the rest and I decided to play with him for a while. I have been emailing with him over a month. I am not attached to him at all, but I am rather curious about him...as he is clearly not very good at this.

My theory is that this is a kid who wants an IPad, Air-Max shoes and some chocolate. He has seen this work for his parents and is giving it his best shot. They start somewhere.

I suppose I am looking for some insight. Perhaps I am on the wrong site for that. I thank you for your time.

Master Baiter Joined: 05 Sep 2014 Posts: 139

You might try logging on to Scamwarners. They can give you good advice. Sorry I misunderstood you. I thought you were a victim of a scam. You are wise to be cautious. Take care

Posted: Wed Nov 11, 2015 6:49 pm

I really doubt it is a child e-mailing you. It seems like you want believe that it is a child messaging you rather than an adult.

I don't understand why you are continuing to bait him since several extremely well versed people have told you that you should probably drop this.

*** BANNED *** Joined: 26 Jul 2012 Posts: 1116

edwards504281 wrote:

I have been emailing with him over a month. I am not attached to him at all, but I am rather curious about him...as he is clearly not very good at this.

.......

They start somewhere.

They definitely start somewhere and you are right, most do not start off at the top of the proverbial food chain with this. So they try hard like you say and people like you are nothing more than the practice round. From there they learn that they need to get better with their language skills and their approach and their methodology on how they use an alias. Sometimes they even change their target audience and begin going for people whose primary language is not English. That last bit should be why you head over to scamwarners.com and post any and all information (formats, etc) you have on him. Also if this is just his practice round, for not being attached I would say he is doing a pretty good job on you.

First off you actually entertained the notion of sending him something, even if it is just chocolate. Whenever two parties enter discourse and one party is known to be dishonest there are two ways the other party typically handles it. They either walk away or they lead the dishonest party down the garden path to either figure out their game or get ahead of them in some way (all is fair in love and war). It is not a natural or wise response to reward the dishonest party simply for the fact that it is of no benefit to you and it definitely encourages their behavior (a disadvantage to future parties dealing with the dishonest party).

Second off, baiting him with an email you use for personal life (even if it is your junk account) shows a level of personal commitment. If your scammer has personal details on you and this doesn't bother you, you're halfway to becoming a victim in that you are starting to either buy in or you're just that much closer to giving him what he might need for identity theft. Before I hear "lads are not smart enough for ID theft, *cough BS cough*. I once dealt with a victim of a scammer where the lad assumed this person's identity and set up charities in their name because this person was disabled. Once the lad figured he had nothing more to gain monetarily from the person, the person's identity became worth something. Like we've said many times in this thread, drop the bait if the lad has anything close to personal details on you. Continuing to bait them like this only invests you further into becoming an actual victim.

Third and last here, the fact that you don't want to post up details on this scammer's game shows that you are still invested in that you are protecting him. Like I said, you might find his formats and his game silly, someone who is not a primary English speaker might fall for it though. Post up his formats for others to find through google and divest, don't remain invested in protecting him. He's done nothing to deserve such actions on your part due to his dishonesty.