In which I correspond with a missionary from Cameroon (or is it Nigeria?) who has a free Bulldog (or is it Yorkie?) puppy

People are still falling for the Nigerian puppy scam:

From today’s Bismarck Tribune: Toni Miller, 23, now is out about $850 after trying to get two Yorkshire terrier puppies shipped to her from someone posing as a missionary in Nigeria.

I have corresponded with these scammers several times. This is the funniest one because he loses track of what scam he is running through the days this went on. It all started with a comment on one of my posts where he thought he was putting in a classified ad:

A new comment from "johnson" was received on the post "Real classified ads from real papers" of the weblog "The Poodle (and Dog) Blog".

Comment: -------- GET THESE VERY HEALTHY English bulldog PUPPIES AT YOUR HOMES FOR FREE.THEY ARE VERY HEALTHY AND CURRENT ON THEIR MOST RECENT SHOTS AND COME ALONGSIDE ALL THEIR HEALTH PAPERS.THEY ARE ALSO VERY FAMILIAR WITH OTHER ANImALS AND ARE WELL HOME TRAINED SO PLEASE CONTACT ME IF INTERESTED IN MAKING THEM PART OF YOUR FAMILY. THANKS

Johnson, I am interested in buying a Bulldog. Please send details about the puppies. jan

Hello Jan My puppies are very healthy.They have all their health papers,are A.K.C,and C.K.C registered.They are also D.N.A tested and are also micro chipped.They are well home band potty trained and are very familiar with other animals.They also do understand many languages for i travel with them to any countries.Right now for example i am with the in Africa on research basis and they will get used to most of the African languages. They are all 4weeks old and are very playful too.If there be any other infos, please let e know in your next ail. Thanks Johnson

 Johnson, I'm just curious about the price and do you have any pictures of them? jan

Jan I a not that kind of person who sells animals because they are all Beings and Gods creation like us so i feel like selling a human if selling an animal.I am giving the out absolutely for free because my job provides me with very limited time to spend with them thus i cannot take very good care of them.So all i am after is someone who can provide ore time to spend with them and a good home as well.all you have to do is pay for their transportation cost to you and nothing else.So can you do that for them? Just give me soe time to get their photos to you.Waiting Johnson

Johnson, My son really wants a Bulldog puppy. Transportation from where? Where are the puppies? Jan

JAN, I AM PRESENTLY IN WEST AFRICA, IN VICTORIA ISLAND,SOUTHERN CAMEROON. AND THAT IS WHERE THE PUPPY WILL BE SHIPPED FROM. And cost if $400. Thanks Johnson

Johnson, $400? That sounds really expensive.

Jan, Just give me a few minutes to call and find out how much it costs i am not sure it is that expensive. Well i have found out from the air port that it will cost 170dollars. Johnson

Johnson, That price sounds reasonable. Where will you be shipping her from and where can I pick her up? How soon can you send the puppy? Jan

Jan, Well i will be shipping her from Douala international Airport Cameroon Victoria and i will prefer the pup to be delivered right at your doorsteps following the address you will give us. I can post the puppy in the next available flight if you are ready for her already because all her papers are intact as you will see them.

Johnson, That sounds great. Would you prefer MasterCard or Visa for payment?

Hello Jan Cameroon has a very poor banking system especially when dealing internationally so the best and most flexible method of payment will be through the use of the WESTERN UNION and immediately the you send the money i will pick it up and pay for the puppy's flight immediately.Here are my payment details
NAMES...................GEBVALA HENRY DINGA
COUNTRY..............CAMEROON
ZIPCODE................0237
AMOUNT................$400.00
TEST QUESTION................WHO
ANSWER...........................JAN

So as soon as you wire the money let me know and send to me the MTCN control reference number so that i will get the money and pay for the flight. Thanks and have a great day. Johnson

Johnson, You said the shipping cost will be $170. Why is it now $400? And you never did send pictures. And who is Gebvala Henry Dinga? I thought they were your puppies. Jan

Jan, I am a good Christian busy with missionary work .I am giving the out absolutely for free because my job provides me with very limited time to spend with them. Dinga is family member who help me.The cost of shipping is $170 Here is picture of the puppy

Uh, Johnson, I don’t believe that is a Bulldog puppy. I am only interested in Bulldog
 puppies. Are you all out of Bulldog puppies? Jan

Jan, Here is picture of adorable bulldog puppies.All you have to do is pay for their transportation cost to you and nothing else. Tell me how many do you want of the puppies. Transportation is $170 I can post the puppy in the next available flight if you are ready for her.  

Johnson, I'm sure you wouldn't mind faxing copies of her AKC, CKC papers and the results of the DNA testing which you said she had so that I can verify them? Jan

Amazingly, I never heard from Johnson again.

Comments

[Patrick]

Haha! Good for you. I carried on a conversation with a Nigerian "official" after I won the lottery (for the fifth time, no less), but didn't carry it this far.

[jan's funny farm]

I have a friend who likes to play practical jokes on me so I wasn't surprised the time I received an email from him saying he was stuck in London and needed several hundred dollars to get home. Well, I knew he wasn't in London and he wouldn't be begging money from me if he was stuck there. So I shot off a sarcastic reply. I sometimes wish I could have seen the face of whoever read my reply. At least I never heard from him again. A few hours later I received a change of email address from my friend, as someone had used his email account to beg funds from his friends.

These scammers are terrible at grammar and spelling but they can be sneaky. And stupid. As proved by your correspondence with one.

[Jimmy]

Ya gotta love those scammers!!???
Here's an email from a little Russian scam artist who wanted me to pay some $900 to fly her over here!!!
I kept her ( could have been a guy for all I know?)going with the emails for weeks!!!!
You wouldn't belive the pics she sent me???? I kept telling her that I was old enough to be her father!!!

"Hello Jimmy!!! This is me again! I was so happy when I saw your e-mail in my mail box.

I really like you so much! Now I know that you are interested in me and I hope we will be able to meet soon when I will come to your area. Why I chose you? I found you at the site by chance. Telling from the beginning I know a
woman who is on a dating site. That profile wasn't mine, it was a profile of that woman, but she let me find
someone from the dating site from her profile. I don't know how to use the site, so I found you by chance and wrote you.
I think I should write you more things about me, I hope it will be interesting for you to know me better!
As I wrote you I`m 26 years old, My birthday is 29 of December 1981.
I'm 167 cm tall (5.5.) and 51 kg weight. I don't know exactly my bust-waist-hips measurements, I don't have a reason to measure it because I think it's OK and my body is proportionate )) I take care of my body, for truth its very easy for me, because I work as a dancer, so it helps me to keep feet!!!
I've never been married, don't have kids but I love them and they love me! I don't smoke, drink occasionally.
And I want to tell you that I always wanted to find an older man. I think older men are much more serious and they can take
care of me, they are more experienced in life and can teach me many things.
As for my family - I live with my mother and my brother. My mother is 48 years old, I love her very much, she works as a hairdresser in a beauty salon.
I have a sister, her name is Olga, she is already married and she lives with her husband.
I also have a younger brother, he is 13 years old, his name is Maksim.
He is very clever and he wants to be a naval officer like our father. My father was a great person, he was courageous and brave. He is an ideal man for me.
My father died in auto crash... My mum cried for several months but now she is ok, she will never meet another man because my father was the only man in her life and now her aim in life is to grow up our brother.
It was my mother's idea to try to work to another country.
She loves me very much and she thinks that its impossible to earn good money in russia working as a dancer or dance instructor. I teach ballroom dances. My mother read many stories about girls who found their happiness abroad and now she wants me to do the same.
As I wrote you I live in Russia, the name of my town is Karakulskoe it is situated in Chelyabinskaya Obl. (District).
It will be great if you also tell me some interesting facts about your city.
I don`t remeber if I told you or not but I graduated from Chelyabinsk University two years ago, Economy faculty but I don't work on my specialization because I can't find a good job here in economy sphere, my city is so small. I don`t use any translators and I can speak and write English well. I also have a certificate of aerobic's instructor.
I write my emails from Internet cafe, we have a computer but no Internet.
If you want I can call you when we get to know each other better it would be nice to talk to you. Today I'm going to tell my mother about you, I'm sure she will be happy I've met someone over there who can show me around!
I hope you are not getting bored to read my emails?
It's a pity there is no messenger here, so we can talk only using e-mails..
My address here is Russia, Karakulskoe, Lenina street 21, flat 13.
So now you have a representation of who I am....
I just can tell you I enjoy life and I try to live to the fullest, I like to try new things. I'm very tender, caring, artistic, faithful, decent person.
Sometimes I can be not well organized, I think everybody had it's own minuses and pluses.
I don't look any special qualities in a man. I just hope he will be faithful to me and ready to create a happy family with me and I will do everything to make him happy. I'm looking for a soulmate! Do you look for any special qualities?

Bye!

Anna

[Jerry]

My question is WHY? Why do people still fall for anything that comes from Nigeria. We're sorry for the girl, but really. How dumb do you have to be to know that Nigeria (and Cameroon)=scam.

[Sling]

..this probably explains why my 'free' Alpaca hasn't arrived yet.

[Khyra]

The khat in your house has tried to akhcess your PlayPaw akhkhount...

I'm afraid I will have to eat it topped with ACAI topsy turvy style whilst working from home and making 5k an hour!

Hugz&Khysses,
Khyra

[C]

WOW! That was pretty funny, but sad at the same time (sad as in pathetic). I cannot believe people would go through lengths like that to scam others. Why? *sigh* Well, I guess scammers will exist so long as people keep falling for crazy stories and scams.

I was impressed with your correspondence with the good Christian missionary! good for you for grilling him with all those questions :)

[rosemary]

Crap. I was hoping the first pictured puppy was available....if the bull dog was 400 then 170, I could get that one for maybe 50 bucks. I get Nigerian emails too but not about dogs......I get the you are the relative of a Nigerian Queen that died and left you all of her money and then there are the ones about Steve's poor manhood. I am looking for a puppy...but not a Nigerian West African Scam Hound.

[BunGirl]

I love that the scammer also used THE FIRST IMAGE RESULT you get when you google "cute bulldog puppies"... Gee, that's hard to verify.

The yorkie pic is first on the list for "yorkshire terrier puppy."

[Jan]

Good catch BunGirl

SCAMMERS, AT LEAST GO TO BREEDERS' SITES AND NOT TO GOOGLE IMAGE FOR YOUR PHONY PICTURES.

[jackie]

i can't understand how anyone can be so dumb to fall for that shit...you figure if they're that dumb..they deserve what they get..sigh*

[Serendipity]

LOL! You did a good one on him. It's sad that many are still falling for these scams. In fact, it was just a couple of weeks ago this girl fell for the same scam. It was for 2 maltese pups. It boggles the mind that people can buy the pups without seeing them physically and verifying.

[Tammy]

I don't understand the point of scams like this one. Do they actually pull in some money?! I had a co-worker who got pulled into one something like this - but thankfully even though she wasn't very savvy about internet scams, she felt something was weird and asked me before she did anything other than inquire.

[the 4 Bs]

i like the part when he says that the pups understand many different languages.

[Jan]

The Nigerian scams have pulled in millions of dollars from people looking for inexpensive purebred dogs, lottery wins, false inheritances and my favorite, "help me embezzle money from my company."

[cube]

You are nothing if not persistent. I would've just deleted the email and blocked the address.

[Jan]

Actually I enjoy myself thoroughly when I do these things. Besides, when the scammers are emailing me, they are doing no harm.

[FrogDogz]

I played with one of those guys last year - I managed to stretch it out into almost a dozen emails before he finally got pissed off at me.

Ours escalated from him selling me a puppy, to him wanting to marry me. It was awesome.

Enjoy -

Fun with Scammers - Part One

[gus, louie and callie]

There are just to many people out there trying to scam up. Sure glad you pissed him off. Sure hope the next person is as smart as you...

Big Sloppy Kisses
Gus, Louie and Callie

[Blogdog]

Unbelievable what these people think up! Worse, that some people get sucked in by such obvious scams.

[Tony]

I remember before we got Dixie, Michelle signed up with an Australian find a dog website in her FAILED quest for a Chinese Crested & she got lots of shonky sounding emails just like yours from quite a few overseas puppy sellers
It's also amazing that 4 week old puppies can understand many languages. He must be a brilliant trainer!!!

[Col]

Sad to think that some still fall for this stuff. Scammers and spammers... hate them both.

[Lynn Sinclair]

Amazing.

[buy viagra]

Ohh my, beautiful bulldog puppies.