Nigerian Scammers

For a very long time, the Nigerian scammers pretended to be African bank officials, government bureaucrats, or widows and orphans of recently ousted dictators. Lately, they have been pretending to be British bank officials or government bureaucrats--where the British English that they can almost write sounds half plausible.

In the last year or so, the Nigerian scammers are pretending to be American soldiers who have come into a windfall, and need our help smuggling the money back to the U.S. Of course, even the most polished of these letters are still obviously written not by Americans, but by people who learned British English. Here's an example that I received this morning:

Good Day

How are you and your family? Hope all is well.

My name is Staff Sgt. Shelby Cross; I am an American soldier, serving inthe military with the army’s 3rd infantry division. With a very desperateneed for assistance, I have summed up courage to contact you.

I found your contact particulars in an address journal. I am seeking yourkind assistance to move the sum of US$8m (eight million United States dollars)to you in United States; as far as I can be assured that my share will be safein your care until I complete my service here.

Source of money:

Some money in US dollars were discovered in dog kennels at a farm house andguest houses in an estate near one of Saddam’s old palaces in Baghdad, Iraqduring an operation, and it was agreed by Staff Sgt. Kenneth Buff, Sgt. 1stClass Daniel Van Ess and I that some part of this money be shared amongst us before informing anybody about it.

Since both of them saw the money first, they did the informing, while I played the outsider to protect our interest.This was quite an illegal thing to do, but I tell you what? No compensationcan make up for the risk we have taken with our lives in this hell hole, in which my brother in-law was killed by a road side bomb last time.
You will find the story of this money on the web addresses below;

Http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/a35080-2003apr24

http://www.right-thoughts.us/index.php/weblog/comments/the_first_thing_you_know_ol_saddams_a_millionaire/

http://www.jonathanforeman.com/military/nyp_iraq/04192003_chest.html

The above figure was given to me as my share, and to conceal this kind of money became a problem for me, even after the initial probe of all soldiers of our command which I was cleared from; so with the help of a British contact working here and his office enjoy some immunity, I was able to get the package out to a safe location entirely out of trouble spot. He does not know the real contents of the package,
and believes that it belongs to a British/American medical doctor who died in a raid here in Iraq, and before giving up, trusted me to hand over the package to his family in United States. I have now founda much secured way of getting the package out of Iraq to your country for you to pick up, and I will discuss this with you
when I am sure that you are willing to assist me, and I believe that my money will be well secured in your hand because you have the fear of God.

I want you to tell me how much you will take from this money for the assistance you will give to me. One passionate appeal I will make to you is not to discuss this matter with anybody, should you have reasons to reject this offer, please and please destroy this message as any leakage of this information will be too bad for us soldier’s here in Iraq and tarnish the reputation of other services men. I do not know how long we will remain here, and I have been shot, wounded and survived two
suicide bomb attacks by the special grace of God, this and other reasons I will mention later has prompted me to reach out for help, I honestly want this matter to be resolved immediately, please contact me as soon as possible with my private e-mail address ssgshelby147@yahoo.ca which is for now my only way of communication until I specify otherwise.

God bless you and your family.

Ssg. Shelby Cross

I'm not going to pick out all the signs of having learned British English, not American English, but it is obvious that this guy is a fraud. And yet there Americans who get taken in by these frauds all the time!