Fabio Fossil Hunter is Fake

Here's some new names and phone numbers for the phony fossil hunter:

We can start the lease at your earliest convenient time and we will be effecting a one year lease although, we will be arriving on 24th of Nov 2009 .You can prepare the lease in me and my wife name' Prof Alfredo Fabio./Mrs Clara Fabio. Once again, thank for the measurements that you sent to me, it will indeed be of great help to determine the Seize of Furniture's that my furniture's company will supply to the unit...As regards my furniture, am planning on having them delivered to the house before our arrival so that we can settle in comfortably, you can understand that transporting furniture across Atlantic is not easy, so we are making arrangement with the furniture company there in State to deliver the furniture before our arrival after the rent and security deposit has been fully paid to you by my Trustee. I want to seek your indulgence and favor. Can we rely on you to take delivery of those furniture for us when they are delivered? We will instruct the furniture company to contact you to schedule a delivery date and time that will be convenient for you to receive those furniture for us.As you will be handling the delivery of those furnitures for us,we may ask our Trustee to include the costs of our furnitures with the rent and deposit to be sent to you so that you can help us to make the payment when it is delivered. We will really appreciate if you can do this for us and promise to compensate you adequately for your time and efforts on our arrival in your place.Please let me know if this will be okay with you so that i can instruct our Trustee to go ahead with the payment.

Let us know how to move ahead as we intend to complete this deal before we move in by 24th of Nov 2009,we will let you know the exact date as soon as we get a booking on a flight to the states. I want a less risk, fair,transparent and a hitch free transaction so i attached the pictures of my family so that you can have an ideal of who you are dealing with.If you require any specific information, pls let me know or you cancel me on my cell phone, please dial as presented for international calls . {+39 3424 017 688 or +2348025322646}

For Payment, Get back with the below details

1- Name to be written on the certified American check
2- Mailing address , No p.o.box
3- Phone Number
4- City
5- Zip Code
6- State

Thank you for your understanding and co-operation.

Prof Alfredo Fabio

The Blog that Started it All -- How the Craigslist Scammer Blog Started

I've received tens of thousands of blog hits on this Web site, all emanating from the following original posting on my business Web site. Enjoy this blast from the past as this site nears its second full year:

Wednesday, April 23, 2008
Integrated Scam -- Craigslist Proves Fertile for Con Man
Let me start by saying I
have a white couch for sale. You can see it here.

Now, let me say that this blog entry is a departure from my normal fare, but is written in the public interest. I am writing this blog so that any one else searching the Internet about any of the factoids listed below will draw up my post and not suffer from a scam artist. Luckily I didn't suffer either, but some people have.

Shortly after I posted the listing on April 16 I was contacted by Williams Perron, or dr.billy101@gmail.com who said he wanted the sofa and would be sending $500 immediately and arrange for movers to pick it up. First red flag -- no dickering over price, no need to see it.

Then "Williams" needed my mailing address so he could send "certified" check to me. I gave my address. Then, today, I received this note from "Williams":

Hello Joe,
How are you doing?I want you to understand that the deal as my secretary as posted the payment already, but there was a slight error i guess we can handle
with care, instead of the actual amount $500,she made out the check for $4500 she claim that was what i requested but she didn't get that straight.So once you have the check please cash it and deduct the money for your goods plus $100 for your run around expenses. The excess fund should please be sent to my mover via western union, this fund will be use in offsetting the cost of the shipment he as undertaken for me recently. **Please email at once to let me know that i can trust to have the excess funds sent to my mover**.
Bill

Of course at first I thought, no problem. I didn't see anything wrong with this. And then a bulb turned on. He wanted me to wire money to his mover? Wire? Who wires
anything these days? A check would have sufficed -- when I saw the mover taking
the couch out of my house.

At about the same time I was viewing the email I heard the FedEx guy drop a package off. I went outside and there was an overnight delivery, with $4,500 check. Looked pretty good too, drawn off of Tim and Terry's Music and More. Which brought up more red flags. Why would a person in Austin be drawing off an account of a music store (purported) in Florida? What's the connection? That was when I received another email from Williams Perron:

Hello Joe, I received your email while at the middle of a meeting. I need you to have this taken care of for me. My shipping company are really getting bad cause i was suppose to have paid my bills for a while now. tey have been moving my stuffs for me as i will be relocating to you location soonest. The remaining item to be shipped is the White Sofa with you. Please i need you to have the check cashed and have the excess funds wired to my mover. It wa a great mistake made by my secretary and which had led to her been sacked. Please let me count on you to have this done for me today. Here is my mover information to have the funds wired to via western union money trasfer, moneygramm is also good okay.

Name...........Madhuri chigurupati

City ..............Iselin NJ
Zip Code.........08830

That all you needed to have the funds wired to my mover. Do not forget you're to have the transfer charges deducted from the excess funds and another $100 for you runnings around . Also will need a scanned photocopy of the transfer details. Let e know te best time for the pickup??? I await your soonest response.
Warmest Regards.
Bill.

Which then turned me to the internet and Google, where I searched for scams and Western Union and Craigslist and turned up a New York Daily News story about a college woman who was scammed in like fashion. The check is false, but you are liable for the money you wire to the person. The check doesn't clear after a couple of days but the bank holds you responsible. See a Smart Money article on the subject here.

Once I realized it was a scam I told "Williams" to "F___Off." Sorry to be foul here but a scammer gets no sympathy from me.

Here's a few more details that the scammer used. Hopefully by listing them someone else can search Google and find them here.

Name: Williams Perron
Email address: dr.billy101@gmail.com
Name
of mover: Madhuri chigurupati
City: Iselin NJ
Zip Code: 08830
Check
originator: Tim & Terry's Music &More
322 N.W. 10th Street
Gainesville, FL 32601

Drawn on:
Florida Citizen's Bank
3919
W. Newberry Rd.
Gainesville, FL 32607

Shipped by FedEx from:
Origin ID: MSVA (801) 928-3928
Thomas Lowen
7 North Washington
Avenue
Bergenfield, NJ 07621

The check looks very real, but it lacks either an account number or routing number, though I suppose it's meant to look like a money order or cashier's check, though it doesn't say that. Anyway, please report this Jerk if he attempts to scam you. I'm going after him, reporting him to the place where Google suggests, the Internet Crime Complaint Center.

By the way Williams, if you're ever in Austin please look me up. I have a little Texas justice I'd like to demonstrate for you.

Fanmail Keeps Coming

Here's the latest from a reader to me:

Thank You so much for your alert on the Craig's List scam. My Father received a letter almost exactly like the one posted on your site. He has a condo for rent on Craig's List. Here is the info that my father received:

The "Professor" from Netherlands Fossil Hunters Imperial Dinosaur Fossil Research Middle Sex Netherlands was using the name Professor Randy Felix and Mrs Florence Felix. email used: larryfelix10@yahoo.com phone numbers given 447024021187 or 447031954397. A picture was sent of an Arab-looking man, his blonde wife and an older gentleman at a Christmas party (one was wearing a Santa hat).

Thank You so much for your alert!

Barbara

Dinosaur Hunter Gets an Email Lashing

This is a funny response from a reader to the Craigslist scammer:

Dear whoever you are - Pastor James Jerry, Professor Willian Phillips, Jeff Smith or ???:

After receiving your email, I went to Google and did some research. My cursory reading of many postings was quite amusing and I quickly learned that you have been promoting your "dinosaur hunter" scam for a long time. It was rather intriguing that on a periodic basis, your story or the approach changed and you became a christian missionary doing lord's work in Africa. It was also interesting that you have been using many different names. So who are you? What are you after? I will pray for you and hope that the lord will forgive you for your preying on innocent people!!!

I am looking forward to your response and doing my own posting so that we can shed further light on your pioneering research on dinosaurs and collaborating projects you are doing with unnamed museums in the US. I do look forward to hearing from you...if nothing else, you can help by responding so that some of us can have a good laugh.

By copy to Joey Gimenez, I am informing him of your new identity and our exchange.

Sam

PS - I got to admit - your being a dinosaur hunter and trading of dinosaur fossils with museums certainly sounds much better than countless scams originating from Nigeria when the fellow always claims to have millions sitting in that country and wants to share his fortune but needs little help in transferring it to the US!!!

New Scammer Names and Email Addresses

They keep coming in, the new names and email addresses of Craigslist scammers, courtesy of readers like you. Please keep sending them and I'll keep posting them. They change everyday so keeping up with them is an everyday affair.

Calvin Gaither -- jjiejf093@gmail.com
Akkdie Figjej -- bran.jas14@gmail.com
John Rose -- RoseJohn72@gmail.com
BrownMaz.Maz@gmail.com
Roland Jack -- rolandjack79@gmail.com 191 Swan Lane, cv2 4ge Coventry 44 702 406 4987
Professor Alex and Mrs. Sandra Mack AlexMarc66@googlemail.com 44 70301986 575 British Fossil Hunter BB11 5SG United Kingdom
Professor Luis Mila -- luismila091@yahoo.com and luismila090@yahoo.com -- Netherlands 44 702 401 7688 or 2348022755648
Adam Thiry -- thadamiry@gmail.com
Kelvin Larry -- Kelvinlarry636@gmail.com
Melissa Sindela -- msindela303@gmail.com and msindela313@gmail.com
David Harfner -- davesharfner@gmail.com
Hanks William --
George Marsh, 38 Dalton St., Boston, MA 02131
Helen -- helenjns090@gmail.com
Alex Campbell - alex20080602@gmail.com
Don Chris -- donchris200050@sify.com
Richard Criswell -- richardcriswell01@gmail.com