Yup. The AG is one place to report. Consumer Fraud has a toll-free number. You can report suspected shipping or mailing fraud to the shipper, if you actually suspect fraud and can get information to them regarding the iPhone and how it was sent.
We are there and are nearing the one-year anniversary. Hubby is retired and vulnerable. He told me about his situation about ten months ago. Amazingly, I was informed. I reported the situation as soon as I found about it. There has been hell to pay. Hubby is irascible and becoming worse because he has been challenged by me and others. What a great tactic to try to throw off us poor, deluded, suspicious souls. Bludgeon us with bombastic bulllshiit! But it does not work.
Along the way, hubby went from bank to bank. He left because he thought bad people were freezing his accounts due to suspected criminal activities involving his little fiancee. He yelled at bankers who were only explaining their process of addressing suspected and actual fraud. He closed several accounts and banks closed several accounts. He claims that anyone (or at least his rich little fiancee who wants to marry him and enrich him for helping with likely fraudulent schemes) should be able to have a bank account and manipulate a bank even if they never disclose their identity, list a true address that reflects where they live, or provide legitimate funds. For now, hubby is vacillating between roaring that she is okay and her money is good and I am mean and do not care about anyone but myself and agreeing that her nonsensical story (a set of stories for which probing or follow-up questions are ignored) is a crock.
As far as I know, our similar tales of woe almost certainly involve romance or sweetheart fraud. Note the emotional manipulation, the timing of the pressures for money or goods (if your friend said too much, the fraudsters know exactly when he will have money), and the guilt trips for delays or inability to comply with demands. There might be shipping fraud and phone account fraud. If possible, you might try to find out who is paying the bills for that iPhone. Fortuitously. someone at a major cell service provider caught hubby before he was roped into paying for someone else's phone bills incurred from a phone that he sent or will send. Hopefully, your friend will not be stuck with bills for a phone that someone else uses. (And, how are they using these phones? Potentially, yikes.)
For hubby, the "inheritance" was the hook. It seemed so unreasonable that this unmarried (available, with possibilities, eh?) woman could not inherit all the designated money unless she were married. Oh! That was archaic! Sexist! Draconian! Enter hubby, who should ditch me because I am the ((&*^#@$%@#$^ who reported this to authorities and then marry the rich heiress. And then the story evolved into a litany of sob stories as to why she needed money. She lost a job and a career due to stolen equipment (unlikely), needing gift cards for a kid (who, according to her account of her life, is neglected for at least sixteen hours per day, every day), and money or accounts for assorted other relatives. It is endless. There even seems to be a bit of 'authentic American culture' in the background. In a few months, there should be a demand for money for school supplies for the [probably nonexistent] elementary school kid. For other victims and the provided scenarios, there might be demands for money for college, graduation expenses, prom, or a first car. I do not know exactly how many variations on the theme are out there, waiting for a victim to believe the nonsense.
I have not decided whether I believe the poorly written inheritance papers that hubby received are designed to gain compliance via sympathy for the hapless link in the information chain who was not yet fluent in English but at least made an effort to communicate, or to make the reader feel superior and therefore well able and obliged to comply because... well... only a lowlife scumbag would not want to help the poor souls with their plight. (Yeah. More manipulation.)
There is a lot of information here. Too much. ! OTOH, something in the long post might resonate with someone who suspects fraud or other crime.
@wrosie wrote:
Where do you report internet fraud? I have a friend who is sending money to his "fiancee" and her family. This is because she needs it to finalize the "inheritance" she is supposedly getting. He met her on Facebook.
He won't listen to me or his daughter that this is fraud. He even sent an iPhone to his "fiancee's" father in the Philippines.
He's on a fixed income, disabled and a little off his rocker. He's shown me the inheritance papers which are written in broken English. Really a sad situation.
Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished. - Lao-Tzu
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/04/2021 01:16AM by Shop-et-al.