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"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.

 

 

Some comments by the Scam-O-Matic about the following email:

Fraud email example:

From: Mrs Mary James <mrs.maryjames10@yahoo.co.uk>
Reply-To: maryjames1913@hotmail.com
Date: Sun, 3 May 2009 04:38:26 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: Dear Friend,


Dear Friend,
 
My name is Mrs. Mary James.  I am 69yrs old.  I live in New York City, USA. .I am a good merchant.
 
I have several industrial companies and good shares in various banks in the world. I spent all my life on investment and coporate business. Along the way, I lost my husband and two beautiful kids in a fatal accident that occoured on November 5, 2007.  After the incident that took away my husband and two beautiful kids,  people ran away from me and now I realize that it's because of my greed. 
 
 I didn’t care about people before. Later in the year 2008, I was sent a letter of medical check up from the United King don. My personal Doctor testified that I have a lung cancer, which can easily take off my life soon.
 
 I found it uneasy to survive myself, because a lot of investments cannot be run and managed by me again. Presently I am in United Kingdom for treatment because I dont know how long I am going to stay again. I quickly called up a pastor/prophet to give me positive thinking on this solution.
 
He advised and ministered to me to share my properties and wealth with motherless baby/orphanage homes and people that need money to survive and for future raising. So I made up my mind to follow the instruction from God.
 
 I am writing this letter to people who really need help to contact me urgently. I have made available preparation to share the funds in various banks in the world especially the Orphanage, Homeless and divorced women. 
 
Please contact me and stop weeping.  Probably the little you can get from me will improve your living and God will be happy with me and forgive me for not being kind to people before.
 
Let me know what you really need the money for, and if you can still help me to distribute money to nearest orhanage homes, feel free to contact me or give me their contact information so that I can reach them.
 
Now I am so much with God. May you be blessed, as you reach me. Please let me remind you that I don’t belong to any scammers or any fraudulent enterprises on the internet.
 
I will give more information to you as I await your response immediately.
Best Regards,
 
Mrs. Mary James.



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