James Greety - winery business owner - couples counseling

This one is fresh - I have been exchanging emails with him until my gut feeling took me on an internet search about him. All my colleagues are receiving these emails. We are in Canada - please spread the word. What can be done to trace him? Not much? I am contacting associations and colleagues to let them know - in less than a day 4 returned my message with same email. The guy is working hard on that one.

James Greety

On October 18, 2015 at 11:19:11, James Greety ([email protected]) wrote:


...
Hi,

I got your contact while searching for a counselor through google directories. I and my wife will like to come for couples counselling, it will be appreciated if you can tell us your rate per session/hour, so i can get back to you with the details of what we need.

If you are a Couple counselor please reply as soon as you can.

Thanks

---

On Oct 23, 2015, at 9:37 AM, James Greety <[email protected]> wrote:

Greetings!

I'm sorry for my late response, i was attending a conference. Thank you so much for your response to my message. I would have love to call you to brief you but, i'm not comfortable with that because it's a sensitive matter and our time difference will not make it comfortable for me, but I'll try to be detailed enough in this message. My name is James Greety, I'm 54 years old and my wife's name is Pamela Greety, she is 51 years old, we are British.

We always celebrate our wedding anniversary on vacation every year, which is in different cities here in United Kingdom or sometimes in other countries, for the past 24 years of our marriage. We chose Canada for this year 24th anniversary vacation. Let me brief you about the cause of the problem between me and my wife. It happened that i fathered a child with another woman 2 years before i got married to her, but i kept it secret just for things workout between both of us, and everything has been excellently great between both of us until she found out 3 years ago and i have been trying to cope with it and believing that time will wipe away the whole issue, but instead it grows as time pass by. She really want to work things out with me but it's kinda hard for her. I seek for my father's advice and he advised us to seek for a professional help which is a counselor. he said counselling is the best way to repair this broken relationship. I and my wife have decided to seek for a counsellor's help while on Vacation in Canada. This is a calmed matter and both want to work things out, but we believe it will be more helpful if we seek for professional help, that's why we have to talk about it, but because of our personality, we want to protect our integrity by having our counselling while on vacation.

I and my wife own a Winery business, we produce wines for restaurants and hotels, our work season is mainly in summer, so we are going to be in Canada from 12th of November to 17th of December 2015, we want 10 counseling sessions within 5 weeks of our stay in the Canada. We can have the sessions twice a week if it is convenient for you, for the period of 5 weeks and any time of the day or night is perfectly okay with us, as our schedule will be flexible once we arrive in Canada on the 12th of November. Please calculate the cost and let me know the total amount and also I want you to please setup the schedule that works best for you.

Again, I want you to understand that our time/programs will be flexible during our stay over there, so you can fit the sessions into schedules that will be convenient for you, either Morning, Afternoon or Evening sessions will be fine by us and also the location won't be a problem as we are coming to your city for our vacation, we can come to any location of your choice for our counselling session.

Waiting for your response.

Thank you so much.

---

On October 27, 2015 at 10:02:08, James Greety ([email protected]) wrote:

Hello,

Perfect. I have just sorted out the details with my wife and we have both agreed to have the sessions with you. We are going to book an hotel very close to your location so it will be easier to come for our sessions. We are ready to make deposit payment in other to secure the sessions, so I need your name and address for 50% deposit payment to be mailed to you on time, inform of a money order, bank draft or certified cheque.

It's very important to us to pay your deposit in order to have rest of mind that our booking arrangment with you is solid and 100% reliable, so a certified cheque, bank draft or money order will be the best method of payment and it will be by express mail, so you will receive it within 2 to 3 working days.

I'll be waiting for your info in other to start making arrangement for the deposit.

Thank you.

Welcome to Scamwarners,

In this scam the scammer wants to send you a fake check. Have you deposit it. He then will inform you of an over payment and instruct you to wire money to a third party.

Days or weeks later your bank will notify you of the fraud. You will have to pay the money back. Your bank may even report you to Law Enforcement for bank fraud.

This same scam works with stolen credit card information.

Thank you for your response.

Who would deposit the cheque if the amount is wrong? Who would wire money back? I hope no one falls for that. So silly, but the guy is busy this week. I contacted RCMP fraud prevention program.

If the scam did not work scammers would not do it.

Well it happened to me over the past number of days. I did receive the email from a supposed couple from the UK... James Greety is the name and sadly I did not know it was a fraud until I saw an email from the CCPA (Canadian Counselling and Psychotherapy Association) advising of the fraud. The CCPA was warning of a spam email to look out for..... this is not spam... this is an attempt at fraud!

Also sadly I did give them my address for them to "send me a certified cheque" that they wanted to pay in advance for 10 sessions while here on vacation in Canada. I have called the police and will call the anti fraud center 1888 495-8501.
I am quite shaken up and disappointing in myself that I ignored my instincts to never give out any personal information and I normally only take e transfer of funds or paypal which is safe for my international clients. But James seemed so sincere in his need for counselling and I felt that they were not very computer savvy so I gave into the cheque idea against my better judgement. They now have my home address to "send the certified cheque to" since I don't receive mail at my office and they also have my office address which they said they needed to book a hotel close to my office which they said would be easier for them.
I am sick to my stomach knowing they have this information.
I was wondering if I am in any physical danger?
Any feedback is appreciated.

I obviously will not deposit the check should it arrive.
Just concerned for my safety now that he has my address.

Do not accept delivery of the package. Refuse it and tell the delivery person it is a scam and a fake check is inside. You can show them the emails you received.

Your safety is not a concern. The scammer is most likely located in West Africa.

You may receive more scam emails though.

Paypal and E transfers are not 100% safe. Scammers will use hacked account to do the same scam. They will even sometimes flash an account.

The key is to not wire money to anyone.

My problem is that I am not home during the day and the concierge accepts the packages. I can tell him to not accept any packages from the UK this week since he said he would send it in the next 2 to 3 business days. Although you say they are in West Africa. If check arrives I will them to refuse any packages from the UK or from Africa for the next week.
As soon as I found out about this I called the police and they advised me to politely tell them (so as not to tip them off) that I have changed my mind as I am too busy and can no longer accommodate them and to please not send the check. I did this, this evening and not heard back from him as yet.
Perhaps that was a mistake?

The police gave you great advice. Stop all contact with the scammer. Do not tell him anything. Make him wonder why you disappeared.

The package will not be delivered from Africa. It could come from anywhere. The person's printing the check and mailing it is more than likely a victim of the same scammer. This person believes that they have an online job.

The mailing label is from a hacked mail account. This victim is unaware that their mail account has been hacked.

Since you are in contact with the police. Give them the package unopened. In most cases the scammer will send you a tracking number.

You should also report it here http://www.antifraudcentre-centreantifr ... ex-eng.htm you can do an online report.

Will do!
Thanks again Byron for your assistance here. I am a bit less rattled due to your sage information.
I will post again here as it progresses if it does.
Warm regards

He's now began the same scam with wedding photographers. Word for word as original but photography instead of counselling.

Wanted price before telling what he wanted, not possible so knew it was a scam.

Now he is trying to scam wedding photographers. Please be aware. Here is his response to the initial email:

Hi,

I'm sorry for my late reply, your message went into my junk folder, i was lucky to have found it today. Thank you for your response to my message. I would have loved to call you, but I need an international calling card to do so and time different is another obstacle, but I will be detailed enough in this message. My name is James Greety, I and my wife Parma Greety are parents of the Bride, we are Canadians from Canada.

I and my wife worked and lived in London for 13 years, we returned to Canada in 2013 but we still visit UK from time to time, like twice a year, Uk is our second home. Our daughter is getting married to her longtime boyfriend/fiancée they met about 8 years ago when we were still living in the UK and both of them relocated to Canada a year after we relocated to Canada, the Groom is a British, so it was our daughter and her fiancée decision to have their wedding in the UK, so friends and family can be present.

I and my wife wan to make this a surprise secrete gift for them by providing photography with a unique wedding package for their big day, We believe photographs is the most important part of wedding ceremony for long lasting memory, so we are the one paying for your service. The wedding ceremony and reception will be taking place at our house in London, we have enough space for the ceremony and reception.

Groom Name: Harri John Edward
Bride Name: Jolina Greety
Event Date: 8th of August 2016
Number of people expected: Between 60 to 80
Ceremony and Reception Location: Litchfield Way, London NW11 6NJ, UK
Don't worry about the distance/traveling, we are willing to cover whatever cost for your transportation, so distance/traveling cost shouldn't be your concern to cover, just let us know the cost.

We don't need pre-wedding shots, What we need from you are;

Full day of 8 or up to 12 hours
Bridal preparation
First dance
Cutting of the Wedding Cake
Reception
Speeches
Family shots
And add whatever more you can add to make it the best and unique package you can possibly put together.

We also want an extra leather album of 30 or up to 60 pages. As i said above don't worry about the distance/traveling, we are willing to cover whatever cost for your transportation, so distance/traveling cost shouldn't be your concern to cover, just let us know the cost.

Please it is very important to let us know the total COST for the entire SHOOTING, ALBUM and your TRANSPORTATION as soon as possible, so i can arrange for the deposit on time in order to secure the date.

Waiting to hear from you soon.

Regards

Thank you for the update. Is he still using the same email address?

First post on this forum. Im another photographer that James Greety is trying it on with. Very similar email with a couple of bloopers which made me curious. The x-originating IP on his email (17.237.163.201) is allocated to a service provider in Mexico which is blacklisted on a reputation site (Surrogate reputation network) and which looks like it blocks incoming trace route pings, so if you have an IP mapper attached to your website it will not show up.

Deffo a scammer

See his email below - posted from [email protected]

Hi,

I'm sorry for my late reply, your message went into my junk folder, i was lucky to have found it today. Thank you for your response to my message. I would have loved to call you, but I need an international calling card to do so and time different is another obstacle, but I will be detailed enough in this message. My name is James Greety, I and my wife Parma Greety are parents of the Bride, we are Canadians from Canada.

I and my wife worked and lived in London for 13 years, we returned to Canada in 2013 but we still visit UK from time to time, like twice a year, Uk is our second home. Our daughter is getting married to her longtime boyfriend/fiancée they met about 8 years ago when we were still living in the UK and both of them relocated to Canada a year after we relocated to Canada, the Groom is a British, so it was our daughter and her fiancée decision to have their wedding in the UK, so friends and family can be present.

I and my wife wan to make this a surprise secrete gift for them by providing photography with a unique wedding package for their big day, We believe photographs is the most important part of wedding ceremony for long lasting memory, so we are the one paying for your service. The wedding ceremony and reception will be taking place at our house in London, we have enough space for the ceremony and reception.

Groom Name: Harri John Edward
Bride Name: Jolina Greety
Event Date: 8th of August 2016
Number of people expected: Between 60 to 80
Ceremony and Reception Location: Litchfield Way, London NW11 6NJ, UK
Don't worry about the distance/traveling, we are willing to cover whatever cost for your transportation, so distance/traveling cost shouldn't be your concern to cover, just let us know the cost.

We don't need pre-wedding shots, What we need from you are;

Full day of 8 or up to 12 hours
Bridal preparation
First dance
Cutting of the Wedding Cake
Reception
Speeches
Family shots
And add whatever more you can add to make it the best and unique package you can possibly put together.

We also want an extra leather album of 30 or up to 60 pages. As i said above don't worry about the distance/traveling, we are willing to cover whatever cost for your transportation, so distance/traveling cost shouldn't be your concern to cover, just let us know the cost.

Please it is very important to let us know the total COST for the entire SHOOTING, ALBUM and your TRANSPORTATION as soon as possible, so i can arrange for the deposit on time in order to secure the date.

Waiting to hear from you soon.

Regards

I'm a wedding photographer and have just received the exact same email as above. It started off with a short email:

"Hi,

We need your service as our wedding photographer. Can you please tell me how much you charge for wedding? I mean i want to know about the packages you have for wedding and their prices?

Waiting for your answer about the prices, so i can give you more details.

Thanks"

Followed by the email about him and his wife planning a surprise for their daughter's wedding.
Sounded dodgy so I tried his name on Google. Glad to have found this site before wasting more time.
Hope no one falls for this!