Possible US Army Soldier Impersonalization?

Welcome to Scamwarners phillip1968,

It is 100% a scam. There are no US Soldiers in Libya.

US Soldiers get free leave and retirement it is part of their service package. They do not need anyone to pay for it. When they are deployed the also get free phone calls and internet. They also have access to their money and get free medical services. Also no one communicates with his superior but him. The military will not talk to wives, mothers or internet girlfriends.

The scammer can not give you a mil account because he does not have one.

Could you provide the link to army for looking up soldier's

This should be a sticky. This is all SO VERY WELL SAID AND WELL EXPLAINED. KUDOS AND THANKS

Hello NTBH, I am sorry you have to go through this. I had almost same scam just last


month.
A good lawyer told me this , hope this can help you.
" This is a military scam. What will happen if you agree to accept the package is that you'll then get an email telling you that it got stuck at customs and you'll be expected to wire your money via Western Union or Moneygram to release it. We see this con game all of the time here.

The fact that your "soldier" is asking you to do this means he's a scammer.

The minute a so-called US soldier asks you for money he is scamming you. The minute a US soldier involves you in any enteprise having to do with Mailing and/or receiving packages he is scamming you.

US soldiers can mail their own packages via military mail, (they don't pay for it and don't use a courier service). They can use telephones, use the internet and get to their bank and credit card accounts no matter where in the world they are. US servicemen don't have to pay for their leave, which they earn from time spent in the military and which is nothing an outsider can apply for on his behalf, nor do they have to pay for their discharge papers. US servicemen don't need strangers to pay their travel expenses -- they get most of it free -- and the last thing they are is all alone in the world. They have an enviable support network in the US government. Any suggestion to the contrary is pure nonsense, a figment of the imagination of West African scammers who have no idea how our military works. US officers make a very fine living.

Here's how you can tell for sure if he is really in the US military:

1) Ask him for his official military email address. This is not classified information. A real US soldier may have a classified email address as well, but he also has a regular military email address with which he can write to his friends and family. Every soldier does. When he gives his email address to you, it should end in .mil It will NOT end in .com To the right of the @ sign, it should end in army.mil and not, for example, gmail.com.

If it doesn't end in .mil, he is a fake. Only US servicemen can get a .mil email address, and if he can't produce one that you can email him back and forth with, he's scamming you.

Scammers can fake that on the sending end and make it look like you are getting email from a .mil address, but it can't be faked on the receiving end.. So if he does give you a .mil address, to make sure his is for real, don't just hit reply and send it back, start a new letter and type in the army.mil address yourself manually. Then write a message and send it. If it doesn't bounce back as undeliverable and he actually answers it, then and only then, is he the real thing.

2) Get his name, social security number and date of birth and enter it here on the Army's website. This too, is not classified information and, in fact, would be information he'd have to disclose if he were ever captured. The site I have linked you to should tell you if he is a soldier and then where he is and who his commanding officer is. If he won't tell you, then you know he's a scammer. He has no reason to refuse to give it to you. If he does but the site doesn't recognize him, that tells you he's a scammer too.

3) Look up his picture or ask about him on the "Wall of Shame" on this site. The blogger is a soldier who was upset to find that someone had used his photo as part of a military scam. He has created the blog to warn others, and he tries to keep these up to date as people report military scammers to him.

Cease all contact with this guy. You don't need to explain anything. Just walk away. Do not send him any money and do not give him a chance to further manipulate you. He is not who, what or where you think he is. He's a West African sitting at an internet cafe with a bunch of his pals, all sweet-talking too trusting, goodhearted men and women such as yourself out of their life savings. If you have sent him money already, report the fraud to your local police and to the FBI, online at their Internet Crime Complaint center, at IC3.gov. Add his name to the military blog to warn others."

NTBH, you can check out my post " does any one can help me out this scam ? " on 20 April.
I had post the photo which he stolen and fake certificates.



* When people want your money via Western Union, that is scam. *

Please read the bottom quote. I do not know of any site to look up military personnel or DOD personnel.

Welcome

I do want to address some points about the explanation above. While there is some very good information there, some is misleading as well.

Get his name, social security number and date of birth and enter it here on the Army's website. This too, is not classified information.

It's a better test of whether he is an idiot than whether he is a soldier. Nobody with any knowledge of basic security would hand their social security/DOB combo to a random stranger on the internet. They enable someone to access your credit information and are the key pieces of information needed for identity theft. If an internet romance asked me for my social security number without a darn good reason, it would make HIM a likely scammer, not me. Failure to share social security with you is NOT an indication of a scammer.

Look up his picture or ask about him on the "Wall of Shame" on this site. The blogger is a soldier who was upset to find that someone had used his photo as part of a military scam. He has created the blog to warn others, and he tries to keep these up to date as people report military scammers to him.

Every time someone gives advice like that it makes me cringe a bit. The reason? The talk of keeping the list up to date will lead some victims to believe that there is a comprehensive list of scammers out there that they can just check for their person. Unfortunately, this can lead to the erroneous belief that if they don't find their love posted there, he/she must be real.
That particular blog is one of MANY sites displaying photos that have been used by scammers. It is by no means a comprehensive list. If you find photos of the soldier posted on ANY anti-scam site, then it is extremely likely you are not dealing with a real soldier. And if you don't find them posted on any anti-scam site, it does NOT rule out scamming-it can simply mean that nobody has reported them yet, no great surprise when you consider that a large percentage of these scams are never reported.

And while Moneygram and WU are most definitely signs of a scam, they are not the only methods scammers use.

Basically, the bottom line is simple: You do not need to pay for a real relationship. If you have met someone online, and before you even meet him/her face-to-face you are asked to send money or valuable items to ANYONE, no matter what the method (money transfer, prepaid card, bank-to-bank, etc.) then don't walk, RUN away.

i wanted to let everyone know of another scam as the person is posing as Sgt Daniel Jones
pic link here:

Removed you posted a link to all your real life photos. (BW)

Head's up everyone
I've been informed Sgt Jones pics are popular in Africa and right now someone is using his identity
Email is [email protected]

hi
I have recently encounter with this so called soldier online and I am actually trying to find out who Sgt jones is and if that is his real email i would love to talk to him if possible please.

Thanks
xxxxxxx

[AlanJones]

^^^ All of the emails posted here belong to scammers and we will not help you in trying to find the real soldier as he very likely has no interest in hearing from you. The real soldier is very likely in a relationship, married (or may even be deceased) and if you do manage to find him (you are more likely to end up communicating with another scammer using his photos), then experience says that he or his family will not be welcoming of you and could actually report you for trying to scam them or stalking.

I would urge you to put this behind you and get on with you life as continuing your search for the soldier is only likely to end badly..

I speak from my own experience that these devious scammers will manipulate until you have no money at all if you let them. The best thing to do is cease conversations with them as they will try to convince you they are the "real person" from the picture. Walk away and don't turn back. The real soldiers in the pictures most likely know about their pictures being exploited and would rather stay out of it unless they are needed from FBI or other investigative sources. The more we respond with nothing the better off we are and will continue to win this battle. I know of many sources who investigate this daily and receive hundreds of emails because of what these heartless, inhumane idiots do daily to bleed innocent people dry of their money, but don't let them make you another victim

I'm currently speaking with someone who has a similar story. He claims his name is Jeffrey Hilligoss, a sergeant in the army and currently on duty in Kabul. He has sent me multiple photos, and they're all of the same person with the name Hilligoss embossed on his uniform, and it looks like they were taken at a base in the desert. He said he just finished his last mission and will be going home soon to retire (he says he's 51).

We've been speaking for about three weeks, and although I was very cautious at first, he got me to drop my guard. He, like other scammers, said he had come into possession of some gold, but in this case, it was given to him by a community leader in a city in northern Afghanistan as a gift for saving their gold mine and city from the Taliban. Yesterday, he told me that he had to leave his base and move to another one for safety reasons because the Taliban were coming to attack as revenge for thwarting their plans in this city where the gold is. Since he's done his last mission and retiring, they didn't want him to be involved so he's being shipped out. As a result of this, he said that he could not take the gold and other important documents with him, supposedly because he couldn't completely trust the soldiers at the new base, which I thought was very odd, and asked if he could send them to me for safekeeping until he returned. I protested this and said I did not want to be involved, but he kept going on and on about how he was desperate and begged me to help him, and that I should trust him because he loves me, blah blah blah. I eventually caved because I have developed feelings for him and really wanted to trust what he was saying. Of course, now I regret it and woke up in a cold sweat in the middle of the night thinking about all of this. That's when I started to do some digging and that's how I ended up on this site.

First off, he is not from West Africa, like some people say these scammers are from. He's from the southern U.S. (he said he lives in Kentucky, originally from Arkansas). I actually spoke with him briefly on the phone, and he does have a southern accent. Secondly, the number he called from is a scam number (there's a website that lists them). Thirdly, he knows a lot about the military, talked about gun battles and missions in detail, and about going on patrol everyday. He talked about wanting to leave the "shit hole" and go back home to start a new life, with me and his son. Two of the pics he sent are with who he claims to be his son.

The first red flag I should've looked into more was that he said he wants to retire in Toronto, where I'm from, and it's such a great city, etc., although he's never been here. He came on really strong from early on and I told him to cool it down, and he did, but things eventually heated up as I started to speak with more regularly and he was all flattery.

Unfortunately, this is the second time I've come across this type of man. The first time, I actually had a full relationship with a guy who claimed to be a retired U.S. Navy Seal, and throughout our one-year relationship, I started to question many things about who he was and eventually hired a PI and had a conversation with someone in the military about him, and it turned out the guy was a fraud and had numerous criminal records throughout the U.S., mostly for credit card fraud. So, I was being cautious with Jeffrey, but not cautious enough. I really am starting to think I'm a magnet for these jerks!!! Of course, I also need to learn to listen to my instincts. There are way too many of these people out there, and I'm seriously considering going public with all of this to try to take some of them down.

I should also point out that I did not meet this guy on a dating site. He found me on Meetup.com, a site where you get together with others who have similar interests for various activities and excursions, among other things.