FBI following leads in lottery scam

Jan 9, 2008, 12:20 pm (6 comments)

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A Monroe, New York, man became the unwitting middleman in a sweepstakes-style international lottery scam that had the potential of bilking tens of thousands of dollars from its victims, police said.

Monroe police Detective Jim Frankild worked with Warminster, Pa., police to investigate the scam, which, according to Frankild, went like this: A con man calls an elderly Warminster woman and tells her that she's the second-place winner of the Canadian lottery, even though she never played. The victim is asked to send cash by Federal Express to a Monroe post office box as a fee on taxes for the $400,000 prize.

She did.

When the woman called the con artist with the tracking number, he then told her the first-place lottery winner had been deported as an illegal immigrant. As a result, the grand prize of $800,000 also would go to the woman. The con man asks her to send $8,000 more to cover the fees for taxes.

She did.

But a FedEx employee, who apparently asked the woman about the packages, grew suspicious when she told him the story. The employee called Warminster police, who asked Monroe police to investigate the post office box.

Monroe officers did and recovered another five FedEx envelopes containing $36,890 in cash. The packages came from multiple locations and as far away as California. Police also recovered the $12,000 sent by the Warminster woman.

Detectives traced the registration of the post office box to a 52-year-old man, who claimed to have been fooled by a friend. The man told police that he was asked by the friend to open the post office box and to forward the packages - which he believed to be documents - to an international charity abroad. The man, who was not charged with a crime, is helping detectives.

The investigation traced all the initial phone calls and the final forwarding addresses in the scam to locations outside of the United States. The FBI is still tracking them for leads.

Meanwhile, Monroe police warn all seniors to be aware. The con men try to discourage victims from telling anyone else that they have been contacted, said Frankild.

"It is important that if someone falls for these scams, that they immediately contact their local police," he said.

Times Herald-Record

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Comments

JettaMan

Hmm, how can people be duped like this? Anytime you HAVE to send money...then the red flag should go up... If I had $12K to send to a stranger, then I'd either insane in the head or insane with greed...Dupe Alert

spy153's avatarspy153

I really hate evil people.  Cussing Face  Why can't they just get a job?

tntea's avatartntea

Yeah... either get a job, or sign up for public assistance..  Taxpayers should be supporting them so they don't have to steal from others illegally.

dvdiva's avatardvdiva

As long as people don't think this type of scam will continue. If you want to win the Canadian lottery (like 6/49 or Super 7) then go to Canada and get tickets. Odds are the winner will be from Ontario or Quebec and not you but that's life. If you didn't get tickets you can't win. Even if you get tickets you can't win.

Ok, you might win $3 or so if your lucky.

The other big red flag is the $400,000 prize for second place. Unless you play the extra (depends on the province) you can't win that much for the second place prize. I never get the extra since the odds stink.

LckyLary

I am part Canadian so these people running these scams are insulting my ethnicity! That being said, what's wrong with the Lottery in one's own State or at least a neighboring State? Who wants to hassle getting a passport and freezing their just to play the Lottery? For the cost to go there it would be better to buy 100 Powerball tickets or something. Maybe that's the person only skillz, either running a scam or flipping burgers. I learned a long time ago that if I didn't play it, don't believe it, even if they don't ask for money but especially if!

PS- is it legal to do that, to buy tickets in another country and bring them across the U.S. border? What if someone wins and they're from here, would they forfeit the prize, or worse, put in a Canadian prison?

dvdiva's avatardvdiva

It's legal to buy tickets for yourself. If you win the Canadian lottery then you get the check after 60-90 days like any other lottery. Depending on how it pays out you would have to send a check to the IRS since the Canadian lottery isn't going to withhold anything. Prizes in Canada are paid in cash and are tax-free for people that have governments smart enough not to tax state run jackpots.

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