Another crime watch story (romance scam)
By Porcospino
@Porcospino (31366)
Denmark
August 27, 2012 1:25pm CST
Some time ago I shared a story about a woman who became a drugmule without knowing it. This is another story from Crime Watch.
A woman from Singapore met a man on an online dating site. The men told her that he was an American diplomat living in London. They exchanged emails and talked on the phone and the woman thought that she had found the love of her life.
One day the man asked the woman to transfer some money for him. She had to open a bank account in the UK. In order to open the account in the UK she had to wire some money through Western Union and she did that, and then she tried to transfer the money from her account in the UK to her account in Singapore, but she couldn't.
A woman from the bank in the UK told her that she had to pay a fee. She paid the fee but she still couldn't transfer the money and she was told that she needed to pay another fee. After some time she finally managed to transfer the money and a few days later she checked her account, but the money didn't show up in her account.
She had to pay more fees, but the money still didn't show up and eventually she decided to call the bank in the UK and check if the woman she had been sending money actually worked there.
The bank had never heard of her and she realized that something was wrong. She reported it to the police and the police discovered that her "American diplomat" was a Nigerian man and he and the woman from the bank (who didn't actually work in the bank) had planned the scam together. The woman lost a lot of money and she even borrowed money from her friends to pay all of the fees.
What do you think about the story? Do you think that the woman was naive? Or do you think that she was so in love with her online boyfriend that she didn't see the warning signs?
2 people like this
12 responses
@deazil (4723)
• United States
27 Aug 12
I think it was a little of both. In spite of all the warnings and talk about these scams, they would not still be around if they weren't working on somebody. And people fall in love and are blinded. The expression "love is blind" is based in fact. Have you ever seen those investigative shows on TV where a person (usually a woman) of wealth meets, falls in love with and marries someone, only to be bilked of some or all of their money? Same thing. Although it's hard to believe she didn't catch on sooner. Paying an unusual amount of fees like that. What's that very old saying? "There's a sucker born every minute". It may be true.
3 people like this
@Porcospino (31366)
• Denmark
27 Aug 12
I also think that it is a little stange that she didn't find the many fees suspicious. Her "boyfriend" and the woman from the bank kept on making up new stories about the fees that she had to pay in order to transfer the money, and she kept on sending them money because she believed that her boyfriend had told her the truth. I believe that love really is blind in some cases, and it must have been a terrible shock for her to discover the truth about her "boyfriend". She really believed that she had found the love of her life.
1 person likes this
@ladygator (3465)
• United States
27 Aug 12
I feel sad that she got caught in one of those scams. A big red flag that is raised when money needs to be wired from another account that is out of the USA The banks that are in other countries can not get in any trouble for all of the things that they do to steal our money. just be sure to tell your friend to never give out her account information, nor listen to someone that saus you will need to pay money to get the money that you have been promised. Also ALWAYS check the valididity of the account and what tranfers would entail.
2 people like this
@Porcospino (31366)
• Denmark
27 Aug 12
Good advice 
We should be very careful in that kind of situations. This woman didn't notice that she was getting scammed and she kept on wiring money to the scammers because she thought that she was helping her boyfriend. I agree with you, we should never pay money to get the money that we have been promised, because that is one of the methods that the scammers use to get money from us. Unfortunately romance scams have quite common today.
We should be very careful in that kind of situations. This woman didn't notice that she was getting scammed and she kept on wiring money to the scammers because she thought that she was helping her boyfriend. I agree with you, we should never pay money to get the money that we have been promised, because that is one of the methods that the scammers use to get money from us. Unfortunately romance scams have quite common today.1 person likes this
@maximax8 (31053)
• United Kingdom
28 Aug 12
These days some ladies do look for love on-line and believe what they are told. On British television I saw a documentary called 409 and it was about scam artists from Nigeria. One of the Nigerian pen pretended to be a man from the Netherlands. He managed to get lots of money from an American lady. One British lady was okay when she found out her love was Nigerian. They went to a vacation together to South Africa.
Thinking about the lady in Singapore thinking she was on-line dating an American diplomat. If he sent a photo of him it would have been fake. I am so sorry that she sent money. The only things she should have sent was emails. Money should never be given to a stranger that the person feels in love with. The lady should have met the man to see it he was true. It was wicked the lady in the bank was a criminal that had planned the scam with the Nigerian man.
Nigeria is not a country on my travel wish list for the future. So many scam artists are from there. One man asked tourists if they could give him a note for his foreign money collection. He spent all these bank notes given by the tourists.
1 person likes this
@Porcospino (31366)
• Denmark
29 Aug 12
I wathced a documentary about this topic. I also also remember one woman, who was also okay with the fact that her boyfriend. He scammed her, but she was in love with him and she forgave him and they actually became a couple. I was very surpriced to hear that, I don't think that I would have been able to forget about the scam and date the man who tried to scam me. I agree, the woman from Singapore shouldn't have sent the man money. She was in love with him and she thought that she could trust him, but he took advantage of her and just wanted her money. Her boyfriend was never in live with her, he just pretended to be in love in order to scam her.
@Hatley (163781)
• Garden Grove, California
28 Aug 12
hi Porcospino after awhile you would think the woman would get
really suspicious and decide to find out what the hell was going on and feel she was caught in a scam,Nigerian
is the going one now days.why in hell did she not check that the woman actually worked in the bank? I would have been really suspicious the first time.yes i guess she is naive or stupid
or both.She really got taken how shocking and she was naive
and perhaps a bit dumb too.they say some wome are made stupid
by love but I think thats a cop out for utter stupidity
myself.
1 person likes this
@Porcospino (31366)
• Denmark
28 Aug 12
I when I heard the story I thought about the same thing. Why didn't she double check the name of that woman in the bank BEFORE she started sending her money? Eventually she did call the bank about the woman, but that time it was too late, because she had already sent the scammers lots of money. I would have checked the name before I sent them any money. Another thing that I thought about was the fact the she was asked to wire the money through Western Union instead of transfering it to the bank directly. They would have made me suspicious, because a lot of scammers ask their victims to use Western Union. It said in the video that her friends tried to warn her and tell her that she had been scammed, but she didn't listen and she still believed that her "boyfriend" was in love with her 
@Juliyan23 (600)
• Indonesia
28 Aug 12
Ah I have just realized I've read enough all your discussion along with all the responses. lol ...
Well, I know maybe she was naive and stupid. But There are some other kinds of scams like that and aren't including the romance scene scams ones :D - and still some of them fell for it. (-_-')('-_-)
1 person likes this
@katrinapaz (2436)
• Philippines
29 Aug 12
these scammers are using love and friendship just to get what they want and that is money. and money that are not worked hard is flows out very easily from the pocket so I know that they will never really be rich because they will greed for more. I sure hope that they be caught.
1 person likes this
@Porcospino (31366)
• Denmark
29 Aug 12
I also hope that they will get caught and punished for their crime, but I don't know how often they are actually caught. It is true that they use love and friendship to get money. The victim thinks that she has found the love of her life but the person who pretends to be her boyfriend is only in love with her wallet and he is just uses her to get money. This girl really trusted "her boyfriend" and she thought that he was real, so it was a shock for her to discover the truth.
@vidhyaprakash_2 (7116)
• India
28 Aug 12
Hi friend, sad to hear about this story, i feel pity for that women, surely she is in real love with her online friend and believe him blindly, it made her to face this kind of issues in her life. It is really hard to find a genuine love in this days, since she was scammed by an online person, shame on him. Women's must be very careful to avoid this kind of issues
1 person likes this
@Porcospino (31366)
• Denmark
29 Aug 12
Yes, the woman was really in love with the man that she had met on the internet and she believed all of his lies 
It is possible to find true love on the internet, I know that because I have met my husband on the internet, but we have to be careful when we met people we don't know, because people aren't always who they say that they are like this woman experienced. I haven't been scammed by a online boyfriend, but I have met men who had a very different personality offline, so you have to be careful.
It is possible to find true love on the internet, I know that because I have met my husband on the internet, but we have to be careful when we met people we don't know, because people aren't always who they say that they are like this woman experienced. I haven't been scammed by a online boyfriend, but I have met men who had a very different personality offline, so you have to be careful.
@laniekins (4579)
• Philippines
28 Aug 12
She was scammed and believed that she found the right man. I was nearly scam before but not with a lover, instead with a propose job at UK. Thank God that I didn't bit the offer, we are fixing the contract and VISA when we had misunderstanding on getting VISA. He's asking for half amount of VISA that his traveling agency asking.
Thank God that I'm poor and I don't have money to send to him. I escape being scam, the buttomline is do not give money to people you don't personally know.
1 person likes this
@Porcospino (31366)
• Denmark
29 Aug 12
I am happy to hear that you were able to avoid the scam. It was very lucky that you didn't have the money to send him. I have heard heard about job scams before, but I don't have any personal experience with that kind of scams. We should avoid giving money to people that we don't know personally, that is true. Some people want to take advantage of us and they don't have good intentions. The woman was Singapore was scammed and she thought that she had found the man that she was going to spend the rest of her life with me, but he lied about being in the love with her and he was only interested in her money.
@jellsiguenza (147)
• Philippines
28 Aug 12
I think the woman was stupid. Even if she loved the man, why would she do what she did? If at the first transfer, nothing happened, then she should have stopped sending more. For the culprits, I don't know how can they still sleep at night? If they have children, how can they feed their children with the money they did not earn in a decent way.
@Porcospino (31366)
• Denmark
29 Aug 12
After the first transfer the woman received a password, but when the tried to transfer the money with that that password she was told that she needed one more more password and she had to pay for the second password as well. After the second the password, she needed a third password etc and she kept on paying the money for the passwords. I don't understand why she kept on paying for the passwords, but I think that her "boyfriend" managed to convince her that it wasn't a scam and that she needed to pay those fees to transfer the money. He kept on telling her that he would come to Singapore when the money was through and she really wanted to see him. Of course he never intended to come, he just wanted to talk her into paying for the fees and him and his friends kept the money 
@snookms (53)
• United States
28 Aug 12
Some people have been wanting love so long that they fall in love very easily, These same people are very trusting toward the people that they fall so easily in love with. Normally these are the people who tend to get tricked into losing their life savings and such. This woman may be a little naive and definitely she is too trusting of a person she has never met in person.
1 person likes this
@Porcospino (31366)
• Denmark
29 Aug 12
I think that is the thing that happened in this case. She had been looking for love for a long time without success and when she finally found someone who sounded like the perfect boyfriend she fell in love with him and trusted him too much. She probably wanted to believe in him and didn't see the warning signs. It must have been a terrible shock for her when she discovered the truth. Not only did she lose her money, she also discovered that every loving word was a lie designed to scam her. In a way the romance scams are worse than the other Nigerian scams because they play with people's emotions.
@amritha3009 (70)
• India
28 Aug 12
people like this woman who are mentally so weak and go on beleivng others. cheaters always cheat people who get cheatd. so it completely lies in our hands wether we are cheated or not.
its the complete mistake of the woman . how can she beleiv a man so blindly that she gives every information of her to him without any guarantee. he just used her and this is what is happening. every where people are shouting that internet and online is full of scams but still i dont know why people are maintaining online relationships without knowing any person actually or withou any proof of their excistence.
people are foolish and this has become an advantage for scammers to take a chance and hav fun. she might hav been in true love with him but thats not at all true its just her innate feeling all that is attraction a male n female development. this is al total nonsense. true love might come online through chatting but not without seeing each other or atleast knowing everything right prooved. and al the other is flirting and attraction.
1 person likes this
@Porcospino (31366)
• Denmark
29 Aug 12
Yes, she believed the man blindly. They had never met in person, but she believed the lies that he told her and she kept on sending money for the fees. He kept telling her that he would come and visit her in Singapore when the money had been transfered and she was in love with him and wanted to meet him so she paid the fees and hoped that they would soon be able to meet. I agree with the things that you wrote about love. I think that you need to meet in person to develop true love. Of course you can get attracted to someone you meet online, but sometimes things are very different when you meet in real life and I think that a face-to-face meeting is neccesary, because you need to find out if your online love is really the person that they claims to be.
@KateMary (23)
• Romania
28 Aug 12
Oh God .That`s a very sad story.I guess that women really trusted this man ,how in the world could you give so much money to someone that you didnt` know ? I guess love is blind sometimes but .. how can you do such things ?To be honest I was nearly a victim of those scammers too .I don`t know how they figured out about my yahoo adress , but they still send me mails thru what they keep telling me that I won a large amount of money and they request my name ,my adress , but if I want to take those money they send to me I need to pay a fee .At first it was only 60 $ and now increased at 185 $.I don`t trust these scammers ,luckily for me that i`ve made a quick search on the net and discovered that are scammers , otherwise `I could have been tricked as this women .
You have to be very carefull on this ,,friends" from the inthernet . Not everyone is your friend !
@Porcospino (31366)
• Denmark
29 Aug 12
I have received the same kinds of emails. In the emails it says that I have won a large amount of money, but unfortunately I didn't actually win any money, it is just a scam. I am happy that you discovered the truth and didn't end up in the same situation as the woman from Singapore. The woman trusted the man and kept on sending money for the fees because she believed that he was telling her the truth, but he lied to her all the time and he was never in love with her. I don't understand why she kept on sending the scammers money, I think that she should have discovered earlier that something was wrong, but she didn't notice anything.
@anix101 (44)
•
28 Aug 12
Maybe im not understanding enough, but the woman sounds stupid. Okay, so I can understand her thinking she had to pay the first fee, but why would she continue paying so called fees? why wouldn't she have spoken to her bank at an earlier stage, and why, if she was only asked to do a transfer did she not just do it bank to bank which is easier than going through western union. It sounds as if the scam artists didn't even have to try very hard to sound all that plausible. I don't feel she deserved it as no one deserves to be taken advantage of in any way, but i think if she had engaged her brain just a little more she could have saved herself some money.
1 person likes this
@Porcospino (31366)
• Denmark
29 Aug 12
I also think that she could have saved some money if she had thought carefully about the situation before she sent the scammers all that money. She trusted her "boyfriend" and thought that he was telling her the truth.
When I heard the story I thought about the same things as you. Why didn't she talk to the bank before she started sending them money? I would have done that in her situation and I would have made sure that the woman I was sending money was actually an employee at the bank. When she finally called the bank she was told that the woman didn't work there and that several people had called and asked about the same thing. The second thing is the way that she sent the money. I think that it was peculiar that she had to send the money through Western Union, why couldn't she just transfer the money directly to bank? Many scammers use Western Union so that would have made me suspicious.
