Monday, November 28, 2011

Shame on You!

I got a weird email this morning from a woman I know. It screamed of "scam", but it had her name signed at the bottom, so I decided to check it out. Other people I talked to said they had seen this one before, but I hadn't seen it before. This is what the email said:

"I'm writing this with tears in my eyes,My family and I came down here to Spain Madrid for a short vacation unfortunately we were mugged at the park of the hotel where we stayed. All cash,credit card cell were stolen off me but luckily for us we still have our lives and passport safe.

I've been to the embassy and the Police here but they're not helping issues at all,They asked us to wait for 3weeks which we can not.Our flight leaves in less than few hours from now but we are having problems settling the hotel bills and the hotel manager won't let me leave until i settle the bills.I need your help

I'm freaked out at the moment. (signed her name)"

I decided to call her, but she didn't answer the phone, so part of me thought, "hmm...maybe she really is on a trip. She does geneology, so maybe she went on a fact finding vacation." So I decided to message her on Facebook. I said, "Is this for real?" I soon got the response, "OMG, This is me for real and i do really need your help.. I can always explain things to you when i get back home. Let me know if you can be of help with some $$ to settle the hotel bills and have my way home. Pls do this me cos i dont want to miss the flight." I still didn't believe it was really her, but thought there was always a possibility, since she was answering my messages on facebook. So I decided to ask her which Ward (congregation) she attends. I just said, "Which ward are you in?" There was no response. I wrote again, "If you tell me which ward you are in, it would help me to help you." Then I got a response, telling me correctly which ward she was in. That's when I began to think it was really her. I never would send her money, but I thought maybe her bishop could help her out. So I said, "Who is your bishop." She correctly told me the name of her bishop. I asked her for a contact number, but she didn't give me one.

Then I decided to call her bishop. I didn't get ahold of him, but his wife called me back and said that she had just seen this woman in church yesterday, so knew it was a scam. That was the confirmation I was looking for. Just as I got off the phone with her, the woman who was hacked called me. She told me she has definitely been hacked. I tried to help her figure out how to report it to facebook. It's a complicated process. But I told her that I think the person who hacked her account is someone she knows. There was nothing on her profile that would tell the person which ward she belonged to, or who her bishop was. So the thief has to be someone she knows, and has to be LDS. So here is the message I sent back to them through her facebook page:

"Okay, well, I just talked to someone who saw (this woman) in church yesterday. So now I know this is a scam. But the really sad thing is that whoever this is has to be lds. So shame on you for being dishonest."

I hope their conscience isn't past feeling. I hope they feel guilty about this for a long time. And I hope they get caught.

4 comments:

Inklings said...

It's pretty sad that there are people in this world who resort to those kinds of actions, isn't it?

Grannymar said...

Alas these scammers come in many guises. I am glad you didn't fall for their games.

Nene said...

Wow, I'm glad you went to the extent you did to verify it! It's unbelievable what some people will do. Thank goodness the Spirit made you feel uncomfortable about it enough that you kept trying to find out if it was really her. I'm also glad you wrote the email back to the Scammer. :0)

Rummuser said...

You did the right thing. Scammers are getting smarter all the time.