While it is a scam, I do disagree with the advice about destroying the check. Instead, contact the bank that it is drawn on. Generally they will want it as their fraud departments will actively pursue the case. I had email contact with a lady wanting me to photograph her wedding. The first hint that it was a scam was the wedding was going to be in an industrial area--no churches anywhere around. Hint number two was when she asked me to pay her wedding consultant from the extra money she was sending me. Hint number three, the check didn't arrive until two days before the "wedding".
The Post Office didn't want to follow up on it, neither did the local police. I called the bank, asked for the fraud department, and hit the jackpot. Not only was I able to give them the check, I was also able to give them the emails with headers, and the Post Office tracking number. About three months later I got a letter from the bank asking for a deposition, and I found out the perps ended up in jail.
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Have PV-500 & willing to travel.
"Answers are easy. It's asking the right questions which is hard." (The Fourth Doctor, The Face of Evil, 1977)
"Somedays you're the pigeon, somedays you're the statue.” J. Andrew Taylor
"I have never met a man so ignorant that I couldn't learn something from him." Galileo Galilei