NIGERIAN SCAM HITS HOME - YET AGAIN

This week we received a distress call from a new victim on the Nigerian Scam. The victim was local so we had the opportunity to talk directly with the victim.

The victim had fallen for the classic Nigerian scam and had used a bank transfer to send everything they had to obtain the huge returns promised by the criminals. Needless to say the money disappeared.

We interviewed the victim who brought family members for support. The victim was in tears. The family distressed.

The victim kept asking why our government allowed these scams to occur. At KinghtsBridge Castle we have no answer to this question.

Many of us know of this scam and its variants, and some are surprised when a victim appears. “Everyone knows about this scam. Why did she fall for it,” commented one of the staff. The answer is that everyone does not know. And in a moment of weakness any one of us may be tested by a scam where the returns are too good to be true.

Unfortunately this scam had the traditional additional elements that made the crime more horrific.

The Nigerian criminals pressured the victim to come to Nigeria and deliver the money. The victim wisely declined. People traveling to Nigeria responding to this scam have been killed or kidnapped.

The criminals attempted to perpetrate a second scam by offering to fix the problem for additional payments.

And lastly they began threatening the victim with violence if the victim did not pay more.

At the time we met the victim had not contacted the police, FBI, or Secret Service.

After examining her documents we immediately contacted the authorities. The Secret Service has jurisdiction over this matter and they took critical banking information and are trying to trace the flow of the funds. Local police have been contacted as well. Banking authorities were also notified.

The threats of violence should end with the police reports and notification. The criminals are relying on shame and fear to keep extorting money from the victims.

This scam and its variants are real. We have seen two victims and stopped several people from becoming victims. Not everyone knows about the Nigerian scam and now we have another victim of what the Financial Times of London calls an $800,000,000 crime wave.