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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.

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

Fraud email example:

From: "Mrs. Shirley Godwin" (may be fake)
Reply-To: <ShirleyGodwin@qq.com>
Date: Mon, 2 Dec 2013 12:53:59 +0200
Subject: GET BACK TO ME ;'

>From Mrs. Shirley Godwin
#20 Melrose Road c127 floor 4
Harare Zimbabwe
Email: gmrs.shirley@yahoo.es
Dear friend   
My name is Mrs. Shirley Godwin the wife of Joseph Nana Godwin from Zimbabwe . I got your email address from the Online search {O.S} when I was desperately looking for a trust-worthy person to assist my son who is currently residing in South Africa , so I decided to contact you.
During the current war against the farmers in Zimbabwe from the supporters of our President Robert Mugabe to claim all the white-owned farms to his party members and his followers, he ordered all the white farmers to surrender their farms to his party members.
My husband was one of the best farmer in our country that have 18 white people as workers and export directors that export FOOD STUFF to SOUTH AFRICA, ZIMBIA,DRC CONGO,ANGOLA AND KENYA this is why my husband did not support Mugabe’s ideas, so Mugabe’s supporters invaded my husband farm and burnt everything in the farm, killing my husband and made away with a lot of items in my husband farm.
but Before his death, my husband has concluded arrangement to buy 12,000 hacters of land in South Africa and many heavy duty machinery to start a new farm that year. All the arrangement for payment for the land was concluded but the bank in Zimbabwe was instructed by our President Robert Mugabe to stop oversea transfer of fund, he did this because many white people are transferring there hard earn money out of the country. because of this my husband contacted a security company in south Africa that have a branch in Zimbabwe to move the money to south Africa as a family treasury in my name.The amount of the money deposited with the Security Company in Johannesburg , South Africa is as a family treasury {US$17.3M} (Seventeen-Million Three hundred thousand United States Dollars) in clean cash. But the security company did not no the real content of the box. After the death of my husband, my son {NELSON} decided to move out of our country to South Africa to look for person that w ill help him but i ask him to sto
Please why I am contacting you is to assist my son to move this money out of South Africa . We have agreed to offer you 30% of the total sum for your assistance, while 70% will be for my family investment in your country. I believe that with your help we will invest it in a good business.
All I want you to do now is to me if you are ready to help my son then i will give you his contact details in south africa so that you can conclude this business with him in south africa.
Waiting for your urgent response.
Best Regards.
Mrs. Shirley Godwin
For the Family
 

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