Nigerian Scam

[Donnie]

I found it very amusing reading about the links between the Scams and the Thurso Chemist. Very funny indeed!

[Bill Fernie]

Apparently a rented flat with nothing more than a telephone.
Take alook at the place above the chemist shop here - http://www.caithness.org/atoz/thurso/photogallery/photos.htm?4?39

[Donnie]

Wow - Who knew that was the home to a £30 billion bank!

[George Brims]

Where does one read this amusing tale?

[Bill Fernie]

The Independent Newspaper - 17 December 2003
Scottish pharmacy embroiled in suspected investment scam
By Paul Kelbie Scotland Correspondent
17 December 2003


A tiny chemist's shop in the far north of Scotland has been unwittingly embroiled in an alleged multimillion pound fraud by Nigerian conmen.

Staff at Sutherland's the Chemist in Thurso, Caithness, have been inundated with phone calls and visits from unsuspecting victims who had been promised they would inherit a multimillion-pound oil company in return for a fee of thousands of pounds.

CTB Private Bank, which also trades as Continental Trust Bank, claims to hold more than £30bn on behalf of some 70,000 clients worldwide, making it the 10th biggest bank in the UK.

The address given for the bank, which falsely claims to be regulated by the Financial Services Authority, is that of the chemist's.

As officers from Northern Constabulary continued to investigate the bank, one victim, Arlen Hughes from Wyoming in the United States, said that he had been fooled into thinking that he would inherit $41m (£23.5m) if he paid $57,000.

"I received a telephone call form a fella in Nigeria saying that I had inherited an oil company," he told BBC Radio 4's Today programme. He added: "They were very professional. I found a registered number in Scotland and so the researches I had found led me to believe they were on the uppity-up.

"So when I began to deal with them I believed they were legitimate."

Although CTB is registered with Companies House, and lists as its headquarters the address of a house in the village of Castletown five miles east of Thurso, it has never filed accounts and is set to be dissolved and struck off the register within weeks.

A spokesman for Northern Constabulary said: "We are working with a number of other forces and agencies within the UK in an effort to establish the identity of the people behind this company."

The force had received complaints from as far a field as Norway, New Zealand and the United States, the spokesman added.

Or See
Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,3604,1108506,00.html
BBC
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/3323639.stm
National Post - Canada
http://www.canada.com/national/nationalpost/news/story.html?id=8eb360be-65e9-44d1-a223-83a091eb5889
The Star
http://www.thestar.co.za/index.php?fSectionId=132&fArticleId=310180
The Dilziger Board
http://pub159.ezboard.com/fdiligizerduediligence.showMessage?topicID=14943.t opic

[Bill Fernie]

I have been running a page with a few links about he Nigerian type scams for about three years and there are many sites doing the same so either all the people bieng duped have never heard about the scams or are new to the Internet, do not read newspapers or are just plain greedy. Often the whole scam revolves around getting something for nothing and possibly at another person or business or county's expense. A con trick as old as the hills if you watch films/movies, read newspapers or even put your brain into gear for a few minutes.
Sure anyone can be conned if the set up is one you have not come across before but if it involves getting something for nothing then don't even make an enquiry just hit delete if it is by email or if by phone say no thanks you and if by fax get a large waste basket.
We recemtl;y had a scam hitting usin the UK from a Canadian source and the poilce alerted the newspapers here once they had over £million of fraud being reported. It was quite simple - the best cons probably are - "You have won a prize or lottery of $mega £squillions" All you need to do is send £1600 to cover administration.
You do not have to be quite as cynical or sceptial as an ex taxman to think that there is something dodgy about these offers.
In my experince something for nothing only ever comes when a well knonw and chackable firm of solicitors makes enquiries about your being someones relative and you have ben left something in a will. There are no fees or charges to you as the benficiary as that is paid for out of the executry expenses.
Prizes from the Lottery are usually surrounded with offers of publicity that no conman would ever offer. You may decline the offers of publicity wihth the lottery if it is for real and they make zrero charges to winners.
I am afraid its back to not buying anything you did not request whether it is goods or supposed windfalls. I have stuck by what my mother told me when very young and it has done well by me all my life and i have adapted the same philosophy to the telpehone, fax and email as it had all come along. "Never buy anything from anypone at the door if you did not request it" My mother told me it was always cheaper in the shops, might be stolen, might be shoddy, might be a huge range of things andnot what you wanted. If you begin to think it looks a bargains definitley go back to the start and ask yourself "Did I ask for this person to come along" And if not say "NO Thanks".
SCAMS mainly only work and are encouraged if enough people join in. Unfortunately on the Internet the scamsters only need a few folk worldwide to say YES and we are plagued more and more hoping they will find the one or tw and it looks like many who think today is the day they make their fortune.

[webmannie]

I find it strange that a search on Arlen Hughes on google comes up with the 2nd entry

http://soswy.state.wy.us/securiti/cv-03b.pdf

This link refers to a permanent injunction on an ARLEN HUGHES as the perpetrator of a few lucrative fraudulent Nigerian scams.

Surely this document must have been considered by the press prior to interviewing the ARLEN HUGHES in question recently. (What about the Police?) Or are they incapable of using the Internet? (maybe locally they are inept?)

Seems to me that this person is worth investigating further, he may be the root cause of the evil known as the 419 scam!!

I suppose also the question needs to be asked, "why hasn't the publics interest not been served", the press bang on about publishing information in the publics interest, seems this one is harder to investigate eh?

rgrds
WM

[George Brims]

If the Arlen Hughes in the injunction had only got himself involved in one of the scams, the one leading him to Thurso (albeit with other people's money!) I might have regarded him as just a daft loser. However they list quite a number of different scams he's been involved with, so I am taking a less charitable view (disclaimer: I am not in any way legally qualified and so my interpretation may be in error). He does give off an aura of daftness since he continued withthis stuff even after the local sheriff warned him in writing that he was involved with Nigerian scams.

[Gizmo]

Anyone stupid enough to fall for these kind of scams deserves everything coming to them.....and being old and dottled is no excuse for falling for it either, old age makes you old...not stupid!!