Scam has just started, how can we catch them?

Hello everyone, my first post here.

I came to this site after googling the email address of the person who contacted me about the computer i'm selling. I replied to this persons email then googled it straight away, as im always cautious of scammers, having faced a few in the past.

This scammer is using the [email protected] email address and the usual "im overseas, will pay with paypal and send a delivery person to pick it up" scam.

I am yet to reply to their second email, so i think theres a chance these people can be caught. Recently my partner, who works in a telecommunications business, said their retail outlet were the victims of scammers who used similar tactics. These people would pay using stolen cards / numbers and have the items picked up by a courier / delivery person. Now what is very interesting is that they did in fact send one of their own people in to pick the goods up themselves. These people cam via train from Melbourne to Bendigo and walked into the shop and walked out with the good that were previously paid via credit card over the phone. Lets not even discuss how they managed to fall for that scam, as it was pretty bloody obvious. Anyway, live and learn.

Now im in the position where i can organize this laptop to be picked up by a scammer in person, and when they do i can have someone ready to pounce. The only problem is, who?

Are the local Police able to be contacted and shown the numerous google hits for scams this email address has received? Surely that would be enough to warrant them to be very interested in these people?

If its a real delivery company that picks it up, they will take it to the local depot, then send it to another of their depot's, at which point the goods will most likely be picked up by the scammer in person. This is how they tried to scam my partners work, but because the delivery company was fed up with their constant phone calls, they told them no, and they were forced to pick the goods up in person.

So if they pick them up in person, i can organize a public meeting place, and if they use a delivery service, i can contact them and organize for police to be waiting when they pick the goods up.

There's real potential here to catch these bastards, i hope you guys can offer some advice!

Thanks!

Another scammer has contacted me, but this time the email address came up with no hits on google, so this is possibly a new address for future scams.

[email protected]

If this email address contacts you, they are scammers, using the same method that kirsty.lunney used.
Saying they are overseas, pay with paypal, pick up by delivery / courier service.

Welcome to Scamwarners, newoldmate!
Generally, law enforcement is not interested in these crimes, but it would be worth your while to try and get some interest from your local police. Please check back and let us know what happens.

If a scammer has any of your real-life info, it's best to stop talking with him.

If you haven't sent any money to the scammer, the police won't be interested, and even if you have, it's really difficult to get the police in West Africa, where a lot of scammers are, interested. What you can do is post the scammer's emails (including headers) here, with a note that you'd like them "baited". We may be able to get his bank account shut down.

If it's a new address, definitely post the email here. That way other potential victims can find his name and know he's a scammer.

Hi, thanks for the replies.

Its so frustrating that no action is taken at such an early stage! I wonder how many more years this kind of ignorance towards online crime will continue until boiling point is reached and restrictions are placed on everyone on the internet, not just the criminals.

Its quite obvious that the authorities are not interested in taking action until a certain dollar value is reached, or pressure from above is put on them.

So what can we do a far as baiting them and getting their accounts closed?
I'm up for it!

Welcome to ScamWarners. Getting their account(s) closed does NO good because they just open another one within 5 minutes. Most scammers have many accounts already open and they just switch to one they already have set up. Please do not close accounts as it is the best "handle" we have on a scammer.

As for baiting, that is not something we do here. To learn to bait safely look to www.419eater.com . Be sure to be safe on the internet!

Free email accounts, we don't shut down. Bank accounts we do get shut down. If we find out what a scammer's bank account is, we alert someone who passes the info to the bank and law enforcement. It's possible that LE can find the scammer; it's likely that he'll have trouble opening more bank accounts.

Many of us (including me) are also at Eater and bait. It usually takes baiting for a while to get them to reveal their bank account.

Anyway, could you post the emails, with headers?