The price of being scammed
Part 1 of a two-part series
By Michelle Knight knight@theacorn.com
While Senior Dep. Bob Maclean sat in the Camarillo woman's home, trying to convince her that she was indeed the victim of a lottery scam, her phone rang.

On the other end was the scam artist who had already bilked the elderly woman out of $30,000, Maclean said.

The man on the phone prom

sed the woman she would receive hundreds of thousands in lottery winnings if she sent more money to cover yet another fee.

When Maclean spoke to the scam artist on the phone, the police officer was told the deal was none of his business. The caller artist hung up. There was little Maclean could do.

The deputy later heard from detectives that the woman wired the caller another $10,000 and apparently never received the promised windfall.

"There's no way to get it back," said Maclean of the money the woman lost last summer. "Once you wire it, it's gone."

Few people know that sending money via a wire service is like handing over cash: It usually can't be traced once the recipient picks up the money.

Law enforcement agencies around the country are warning the public about the widespread problem of bogus lottery wins and fake-check scams.

Although anyone could be susceptible, scammers typically target the elderly in the belief they are more trusting.

The scams vary in detail but generally work this way: The victim receives a check and letter that look authentic, telling them they've won a lottery in a foreign country.

Before collecting the winnings, however, the victim must pay taxes, fees or other charges. The enclosed check more than covers the fee amount, and the letter asks the targeted person to wire back the difference. Often they do.

Meanwhile, it takes several days for the bank to discover the check is fraudulent and by that time the thieves have disappeared with the money.

In the recent case of an elderly Thousand Oaks man, foreign lottery scammers weren't satisfied with cleaning out his bank account. They wanted more.

The man had already sent money to pay for one surcharge after another to receive the jackpot the letter said he'd won. Suspecting the operation was a fraud, the man filed a police report, but the perpetrators were relentless and very convincing.

Once they learned the man's bank account was empty, they mailed him a check for the delayed "winnings" and promised an even larger windfall if he sent in another transaction fee.

Although police warned him not to, the man wired more money.

"These guys are good at what they do," Thousand Oaks Detective Eric Buschow said. "They say all the right things."

When the elderly are the target of fraud, police try to notify their family. In the case of the Thousand Oaks man, the police were unable to locate any relatives, and now the man, who lives on a fixed income, owes the bank thousands of dollars, Buschow said.

Victims can feel the effects of a scam for years afterward. Banks have sued people unable to pay back the money from a bogus check; others have been blacklisted from opening bank accounts.

When the innocent

become scammers

Police said that Christine Gage innocently answered an email offer to work at home but soon learned her new homebased business was a front for a Nigerian money scheme that eventually landed her in jail.

On Tuesday, the Oxnard woman was charged with six felony counts of forgery in connection with a scheme police say helped a criminal enterprise to siphon money out of the United States.

A Thousand Oaks man reported to police he'd been defrauded of money he'd wired to Gage. Police traced her to an Oxnard motel room, where they found more than 3,000 fake checks, totaling some $500,000, Buschow said.

According to police, Gage's Nigerian "employer" had provided her with bank account numbers and an established UPS shipping account, lending the operation an air of legitimacy.

Gage allegedly figured out that the operation was illegal but didn't stop writing the checks; becoming a criminal at that point, Buschow said.

He said Gage probably continued because she had invested so much time and had received little compensation. Most of her "salary" went to buy printing supplies, he said.

"The big motivator in all of this is greed, and it's on the part of the victim too," Buschow said, referring to Gage.

But she is simply in the middle, expendable and easily replaced, police say. The masterminds are much more difficult to catch and, in cases that originate outside the U.S., nearly impossible to bring to justice.

Next week, the Acorn looks at how the Internet age allows scam artists to remain hidden from police and what's being done to stop them.