joewein.net   joewein.de LLC
fighting spam and scams on the Internet
Try our spam filter!
Free trial for 30 days
  jwSpamSpy

Home
About Us
Spam
419/Nigeria
Fraud
Contact

"419" Scam – Advance Fee / Fake Lottery Scam

The so-called "419" scam is a type of fraud dominated by criminals from Nigeria and other countries in Africa. Victims of the scam are promised a large amount of money, such as a lottery prize, inheritance, money sitting in some bank account, etc.

Victims never receive this non-existent fortune but are tricked into sending their money to the criminals, who remain anonymous. They hide their real identity and location by using fake names and fake postal addresses as well as communicating via anonymous free email accounts and mobile phones.

Keep in mind that scammers DO NOT use their real names when defrauding people.
The criminals either abuse names of real people or companies or invent names or addresses.
Any real people or companies mentioned below have NO CONNECTION to the scammers!

Read more about such scams here or in our 419 FAQ. Use the Scam-O-Matic to verify suspect emails.

Click here to report a problem with this page.

 

 

Fraud email example:

From: "monica mabikwe" <mrsmabikwe6@hotmail.com>
Date: Wed, 16 Mar 2005 15:59:57 +0200
Subject: BUSINESS PROPOSAL AND INVESTMENT

FROM MRS. MONICA MABIKWE
C/O MR. MARTIN MABIKWE
JOHANNESBURG, SOUTH AFRICA
Phone + 27.73.58.170.11

ATTN: SIR / MADAM,

BUSINESS PROPOSAL AND INVESTMENT

You may be surprised to receive a message of this nature from me. First, I
wish to introduce myself as Mrs. Monica Mabikwe, the wife of the late Chief
Francis Mabikwe of the Republic of Zimbabwe, Southern Africa. On behalf of
my family, I am looking for a foreigner to help my family receive a certain
sum of money abroad for investment purpose. Due to the obvious circumstances
of my family, it is not our itnention to have someone that knows our family
already to help us in this matter.

My late husband was a known farmer in Zimbabwe. A few years ago, the
President of Zimbabwe, Mr. Robert Mugabe introduced some land use reforms
which seek to redistribute ownership of farm lands from the white farmers to
the black people of Zimbabwe. This new land use policy has brought severe
political and economic consequences in Zimbabwe as many white farmers have
died in the course of this struggle, many have been illegally dispossed of
their farm lands while many others have fled the country to other
neighbouring Southern African countries. As a result of this, two of my
husband’s white farmer friends handed over the ownership and custody of
their farm lands to my husband because they were afraid to lose them to the
government. Unfortunately, these white farmer friends of my husband were
killed in this struggle. My husband was one of the many Zimbabweans to
strongly condemn the government’s new land use policy. Due to this, a group
of assailants loyal to the government attacked and assassinated my husband
in cold blood. The government also confiscated all possessions of my family.

However, before my husband’s death, he suspected that the government agents
would take over the farm lands which my husband’s friends handed over to
him. Therefore he was wise enough to sell these farm lands including his
own. He secretly sent and lodged the proceeds from the sale of the farm
lands (US$7.5m) in the custody of a security company in Johannesburg, South
Africa, which is a sister country to Zimbabwe. Now, this is the only thing
left for my family. My husband secured this money in a DEPOSIT BOX which he
kept in the custody of the security company. For your information, the
security company does not know the exact content of the deposit box as my
husband declared the contents as FAMILY VALUABLES. Therefore, I am looking
for a foreigner who does not already know my family to help me receive this
sum of money (US$7.5m) in an account abroad. My family intents to travel
over to the country where the money is received so that we can settle there
and carry out suitable investments with the money.

At the moment, my son, MR. MARTIN MABIKWE has been in Johannesburg, South
Africa since the death of my husband. I sent him there to co-ordinate the
process of transfer of the money out of South Africa of course, with the
help of my family’s adviser who was my husband’s close friend. Our said
family adviser in South Africa has already drawn up a good transfer plan in
conjuction with my son. If you are available and have the facilities to help
my family in this regard, I urge you to contact my son immediately in South
Africa at telephone number: 27.73.58.170.11 and e-mail:
martinmabikwe@mail.com He will give you the details attending the transfer
process. My family is prepared to offer you 20% of the principal investment
funds as your commission for helping us receive the said funds in your
account.

While I look forward to receiving earliest confirmation of your acceptance
to help us with this matter, I pray that God give you the wisdom and courage
to do so.

Thank you so much and God bless you,

MRS. MONICA MABIKWE

_________________________________________________________________
Join Hotmail Plus and get a 2 GB inbox!
http://join.msn.com/?pgmarket=en-xe&DI=1054&XAPID=1816

Anti-fraud resources: