Scammers on CL

[Craig D Peltier]

I have seen several post in this forum about scammers on Craigslist. I personally have been tried for a scam hundreds of times. Always bad spelling and responses to several ads with the same thing etc. So I was on there reading about flagging and it had a link to best of CL. This one I pasted below was a real funny lead. I hope it was true.
Makes me happy.:)


Dear Mr. Scammer
I owe you a few apologies:
• I am sorry for responding and saying sure I am happy to engage in a bizarre business deal with you knowing full well it isn’t real.
• I am sorry you wasted time to print a horrible fake check.
• I am sorry you spent $4.90 UPS’ing it to me overnight.
• I am sorry for taking a few days to get back to you after I got the check and ask you for your phone number which you can’t give me. I knew that and still I emailed you for the phone number.
• I am sorry that I lied to you and said I could not find a western union office near me, making you look them up, emailing me a list and me telling you those two liquor stores are shut down.
• I am sorry that I lied to you about getting pissed at the western union office because they wanted $1.75 to cut a check and that I said that’s robbery and left in a huff. The truth is I never went there in the first place. Sorry for wasting your time that day.
• I’m sorry I lied the next day after you threaten to call the FBI and local police on me because I cashed your check and would not pay you. I knew you would not, but I wrote you an email begging you not to call the police and that I would pay you tomorrow after I cashed the check.
• I’m sorry that I lied the next day and said the western union office girl was rude to me so I left in anger, again delaying your money by another day.
• Im sorry I lied about sending the money to western union in your name vs the shipper so you could not pick it up. I realize this cost you a day or so.
• I am really sorry that I lied and said that the money order was at your western union, but off by 1 zip code making you drive 30 minutes to find out I am a liar.
• Your last email to me was justified. Obviously from your language you were pissed. The fact that as you "YELLED” and your grasp of the English language seemed to fade away like my Mom’s when she is livid showed me what a bad person I am.
• Your phone call from Africa? was upsetting because as you were trying to explain to me how to go down to western union and pay the $1.75 and you would pick up the fee, I realized how frustrated you were getting. I also lied about being hard of hearing and asking you to yell. Sorry.
All in all, I am sorry for sucking up your bandwidth. I realize that my actions probably sucked up 6-10 hours of your time and kept you from fleecing some gullible person in America.
Please forgive me. Go ahead and send me another forged check and I will send you my cash to your shipper. Please try me again. Even though I lied you to about 15 times I won’t do it again.
Your friendly computer person.

[Russ Filtz]

Make him forward a UPS call sticker and then ship a box of manure with it! If only everyone would reverse scam these idiots it would stop. Hopefully. On a good note, I read where a Nigerian scammer had been tried and convicted in his home country. He must have really ticked off someone in authority for that to happen.

[Mark Placek]

Several months ago I was selling a truck on the CL.
I received many inquiries, the best one was from a woman in Chicago wanting to buy the truck for a friend of hers in need of a vehicle.
She told me that she would arrange the shipping and send me a "certified bank check."

I know this type scam very well and would never agree to conduct business with a person who wasn't willing to call me or pay for the transaction in cash.
I did play along with what she wanted for a few days to get more details and information. I forwarded her emails to the FTC.

I never heard from her again, hopefully the FTC was able to track her down.

[John Fricke]

I helped a computer illiterate buddy of mine post a CL add to sell a car. The very next afternoon he got a call from Texas (we're in Michigan) from a lady wanting to buy the car for her daughter who lived locally. Deal needed to be done that day as daughter was in danger of losing her job due to lack of transportation. Lady said she would wire the money to Walmart...could he meet the daughter there to finalize the deal? He called asked what I thought.....I was sure it was a scam....told him not to accept anything but greenbacks. He met the gal at walmart, she loved the car, paid him cash, he drove her to Secretary of state to transfer title, all went well. I was amazed.

[Richard M. Wolfe]

Been looking for a skidsteer on CL. Found one in the listings of a (fairly) close city. My friend mailed the guy who said it was in Forida and for xxxx dollars would send it via insured car carrier. I hunted around and found the identical listing on eBay that the guy had copied and pasted. Just for grins when I found another 'too good to be true' ad I checked eBay again and...yep.

[Chris Padilla]

Cash in the hand is worth two in the bush? ;)