What WILL they think of next?

Those naughty boys from The Continent Which Must Be Named have found a new variation on their Un-namable Letter. They are still attempting to share a multi-million dollar legacy with you (if only you will allow them to process the funds through your private checking account ... as if that wouldn't be noticed by your bank!), but this the catch is that the 'solicitor' cannot access the funds directly because he is "under-aged". But still, they have a "business deal" which sounds just entirely too good to be true.

And of course, it is.

I rarely get these kinds of letters, and probably lyou don't either. For your edification and amusement, here is the unsolicited letter I received this week from my would-be benefactor, Mr. Gred Jacomet:

I am really interested to do business with you, actually I have strong plans to relocating to Europe in Three (3) weeks time for some business and also to invest there, this is a business proposal which I want us to be in partnership, we will execute this business then you will get your own percentage share and I get mine.

With trust and gratitude I faithfully contact you knowing that this letter will definitely come to you as a huge surprise, but I implore you to take your time to go through this mail carefully as the decision you make will go a long way to determine my future and continued existence.

I will make my proposal well known if I am given the opportunity and I would like to introduce myself to you. I am Mr. Gred Jacomet, 17 years old, a Liberian schooling in England, My (late) father Dr. George Jacomet was the Managing Director of Gold and Diamond Mining company in Monrovia-Liberia in west Africa, but he was wickedly poisoned to death by his business associates on one of their outing in Oversea.

Consequently, after his death, I managed to escape with a very important document of (?8.5m) Eight Million, Five Hundred Thousand Great Britain Pounds deposited by my late father in a Bank, which I am the Next of Kin. Meanwhile I am saddled with the problem of securing a trust worthy foreign personality to help me transfer the money over to Europe in your custody and await my arrival to come and meet you for Investment purposes. I am willing to give you 15% of this amount if you can stand in for me and retrieve the money from the bank because I am under-aged to handle this transaction. The amount was deposited as bond and I can write the bank a letter, introducing you as my relative, this way the bank will deal with you directly on the transfer modalities and when the money is transferred to you, I will meet with you. Furthermore, you can contact the bank for more confirmation and I will issue a letter of authorization in your name, that will enable the Bank to deal with you
on my behalf. I am giving you this offers as mentioned with every confidence on your acceptance to assist me and take me as your brother or as your son and manage the money. Conclusively, I wish you send me a reply immediately as soon as you receive this proposal.

For confidential purposes, your urgent reply will be highly appreciated. Please do send me your full information, so that I will send it to the bank in London if you are interested:

1. Your Full Names:
2. Your Address:
3. Your Sex:
4. Your Age:
5. Your Marital Status:
6. Your Occupation:
7. Your Direct Phone Number:
8. Your Resident City:
9. Your Resident State:
10. Your Country:

With best regards,

Gred Jacomet

A nice Irish boy like this would not try to harm you, would he?

Please note that I have "sanitized" this text by passing it through a text editor. There are no hidden links.

Here are a few clues about how to recognize the falsity of this kind of solicitation:

• It's unsolicited
• Bad grammer, awkward sentence structure, poor spelling, other indicators of semi-illiteracy.
• NOT addressed to you personally
• No "real" contact information
• A corresponding demand for YOUR detailed contact information and "other" personal information.
• The circumstances of (a good business partner) don't seem to describe you, so you wonder ... "why the heck is this stranger writing to me?"

Of course it's just a blind pig. A random marketing ploy, a mass-mailing to hundreds of thousands of email addresses collected all over the world, with the hope that only a handful of recipients will respond.

And if you respond ... your email address is immediately noted as "currently active", they have just marked you as a potential "cash cow", and they will take you as far down the road to poverty as you will permit them.

Laughable? Of course it is. Still, every year there literally BILLIONS of dollars lost to this sort of vicious opportunism.

I wish I could send this email to my mother, bless her heart, because I worry that someday she may be so soft-hearted that she can be taken by this or a similar lament.

On the other hand, she has no more disposable income than do I, so we're mostly safe from these guys.

Sometimes it's good to be poor; but as this letter shows, everybody is worth milking, because the only investment the originator has is their time.