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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: "Kelvin William" (may be fake)
Reply-To: <betterjoy329@mail.com>
Date: Wed, 21 Jun 2017 11:49:40 -0000
Subject: Partnership Proposal.

Hello sir, I hope you are doing fine and well. I came across your contact from an abandoned diary that I found this morning and I hope you would take your time to read my proposal. When I saw this I got faith and imagine that you are a very responsible person because my religion teach me to have faith as little as a muster-seed and I would move mountain. I would like to trust you and disclose this situation to you. I got a feeling that you are reliable and you would be capable to assist me. My mother was an American and my father was a Ghanaian. I am the only child of a late entrepreneur here in Ghana who died some months ago, it has been over a months after the burial of my late father.

My father's WILL & TESTAMENT was read just two weeks after his final burial, and because I was the only child of my father, my father willed all his properties and accounts to me. But ever since then, my father's younger brother has been trying to get rid of me in so many way and at the moment, I am trying all I can to stay on hiding. This is why I even stop working and relocated. Ever since I lost my father, I have been alone and because my uncle is willing to do anything to find me and kill me, I am force to live a secret life all the time.

I have reported my uncle to the police many time, but they always let my uncle go free, because there have not been any evidence so far. Because my uncle is also a wealthy man, he has found a way to bribe my late father's lawyer. And now I cannot get my inheritance because my late father's lawyer is now working with my uncle.

Some time ago, I seek the advice of another lawyer, and he advised me that I need to find somebody I can trust to help me handle this. The lawyer advised that I should seek for a good beneficiary to work with him to complete the inheritance process and most importantly, that person should be able to relocate me and my inheritance out of this country, so that I can be freed from my uncle's range. This is why I have decided to disclose this to you and hope that you can help work with this new lawyer to reclaim my inheritance legally and move my inheritance to your country, so that I can join you and start a new life. I want to trust you, so that I can count on you to help me.
I look forward to your reply.
Thanks,
Kelvin Williams.

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