Is this a Craigslist scammer?

(I would have posted this in Tiki Marketplace or Collecting Tiki, but the item that I'm selling isn't tiki).

Okay, I am trying to sell a sofa on Craigslist. I keep getting a strange response from what appears to be three separate people, but I believe in actuality that it is the same person - a scammer.

One of the e-mails sent to me says:

*Monday, June 16, 2008 10:34 AM
From: This sender is DomainKeys verified "Recia Schuil"
Hello,
I really appreciate your response to my previous mail. I'll like to buy this item, pls do me a favor of taking down the ad from CL so as to be rest assured that I'm in hold of the item, anyways I don't have time to come have a look cause of my Job transfer and shortness of time but you don't need to bother yourself with the shipment, I'll take care of that by engaging the services of a mover, hence I'll be sending a check and it will be delivered via United Parcel Service, so i'll need you to provide me with the following information to facilitate the mailing of the check.

1.Your full name
2.Your mailing address be it residential or postal address
3.Your cellphone number.
4.Final Price

I'll have my mover come over for the pick up as soon as you have cashed the check.
N.B UPS does not deliver to a P.O box addresses.. Have a wonderful day.*

Another e-mail response from a supposed other interested party says:

*Monday, June 16, 2008 7:17 PM
From: "TINA TINA"
Hello i really appreciate your response to my earlier mail.like i said i will like to buy this item so pls do withdraw the advert from Craigslist. I will also like you to know that i will be paying via check .I will need you to provide me with the following information to facilitate the mailing of the check.

1.Your full name
2.Your mailing residential address
3.Your phone number.

I will like you to know that you will not be responsible for shipping i will have my mover come over as soon as you have cashed the check
Have a nice day*

So, common sense to me says that this is the same person, especially when I received the following e-mail response from a supposed third person:

*From jeny jj Mon Jun 16 06:16:57 2008
Return-Path:
Authentication-Results: mta196.mail.mud.yahoo.com from=fresnomail.com; domainkeys=neutral (no sig)
Received: from 66.150.243.6 (EHLO mxo1s.craigslist.org) (66.150.243.6) by mta196.mail.mud.yahoo.com with SMTP; Sun, 15 Jun 2008 22:16:51 -0700
Received: from c0mailgw03.prontomail.com (c0mailgwalt.prontomail.com [207.183.238.110]) by mxi4s.craigslist.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 690AD6BC74 for ; Sun, 15 Jun 2008 22:16:50 -0700 (PDT)
Received: from c0web101 (c0mailgwalt.prontomail.com [207.183.238.110]) by c0mailgw03.prontomail.com (8.13.8(MC-AXH/MJD-001)/8.13.3) with SMTP id m5G5GkPg021553 for ; Sun, 15 Jun 2008 22:16:46 -0700
From: "jeny jj"
Message-Id:
Date: Mon, 16 Jun 2008 06:16:57 -0700
Reply-To: [email protected]

Am interested in your item and will like to know if still available.
Thanks*

Looking through the full headers, I noticed that this third e-mail appears to be from [email protected] but has a reply-to address of [email protected], the same sender one of the other e-mails listed above. So I went back and looked at the full headers of the other two e-mails. and discovered that they all have some something to do with fresnomail.com.

So, I'm not trying to establish a connection with Al-Quaeda or Saddam Hussein or weapons of mass destruction or anything. I'm just wondering what this person's angle is? Is it that they will send me a bad check that will bounce after I cash it, and then I'll be liable for covering those funds? And is that why the supposedly interested buyer keeps pressing me to remove the ad from Craigslist, as in if I remove the ad, and then cash their bogus check, then I'm totally liable or something? Or is it something entirely different? I'd love to hear from all you seasoned online seller types. Thanks!

Looks pretty darned fishy to me! I wouldn't trust any of them as far as I could throw them. Maybe reply saying you only accept Paypal or Money Order and see what they say.

S C A M ...do NOT even respond.

There shouldn't be any question in your mind. If a reply seems remotely fishy (phishy), ignore it.

I've been buying/selling on craigslist for many years now, no one has ever asked me to take down my ad. I wouldn't do it even if they are legit. If I don't have cash in my hand, it's still for sale.

Oh yeah, and checks are useless on craigslist. Cash or nothing.

[ Edited by: bamboo stu 2008-06-17 07:11 ]

They will come over with the truck, to your house when you are not home and brake in and take all your furniture and collectables and ....

Fresnomail dot com is the scammers new email service.

Typically this "seller" scam involves them sending a check to you for much more than the listed price of the item along with some excuse ("I'm out of the country and need some American cash, cannot get it here so will you please send some" or some such). When you get the check from them you then send them the excess as a wire transfer, and of course there is some extra in the check amount for your troubles. Everyone's happy, right? Needless to say they don't care about whatever the object is they're buying and the "freight company" never shows up to get it. Because our banking system sucks butt, it will be 2 or 3 weeks before the check they sent you bounces and you realize that you've been had.

Another VERY common scam on Craig's List is someone will post a car or motorcycle for sale that they don't actually own for a very good price. They will back it up with legit photos and a VIN number that they have stolen off of eBay auctions, so if you do a title search it will actually come up as clean. When you inquire they will state that they are out of the country and left the vehicle in the states. They will ship it as soon as they receive your payment and they usually offer a 100% money-back guarantee if you don't like it (ha!) They use a fake escrow service to make it appear that you're sending the money to an innocent 3rd party that won't give them your money until the vehicle is received by you, this makes you feel better about the transaction. In fact the escrow is part of the scam too. They usually take a real escrow service and slightly alter the name, so if you search on the 'net it appears the escrow is genuine. For example they'll tell you they're using "Quality Escrow" (I made that up) which you may find a legit web site for, but then they tell you to send the payment to "High Quality Escrow" (payment is usually done as a direct wire transfer). As soon as that money is sent they're never heard from again, and it'll quickly be discovered that the escrow company doesn't exist. It is AMAZING how many people fall for this even though a quick internet search will lead one to literally hundreds of stories about this and related scams. Unfortunately people are greedy and want to believe badly that a deal that is far too good to be true is indeed true. So the scammers continue to rake it in.

I just discovered that Craig's List has posted a warning page with a lot of this info:

http://www.craigslist.org/about/scams.html

This is the one they are likely trying to pull on you:

distant person offers a genuine-looking (but fake) cashier's check
you receive an email (examples below) offering to buy your item, or rent your apartment, sight unseen.
cashier's check is offered for your sale item, as a deposit for an apartment, or for just about anything else of value.
value of cashier's check often far exceeds your item - scammer offers to "trust" you, and asks you to wire the balance via money transfer service
banks will often cash these fake checks AND THEN HOLD YOU RESPONSIBLE WHEN THE CHECK FAILS TO CLEAR, including criminal prosecution in some cases!
scam often involves a 3rd party (shipping agent, business associate owing buyer money, etc)

Thanks for the feedback, guys. Yeah, I was 100% certain that this was a scammer when I posted this, due to the fresnomail.com e-mail addresses, and the similar, if not exact same wording in the e-mails sent to me (I received another couple of e-mails that I didn't post here, and they were different senders, but exactly the same wording). So no worries about me trying to do business with them.

But I was curious about what their angle was. I was wondering if I was going to get a "more than generous offer" for this sofa, but I never let it get to that stage. I did respond to one of the e-mails, firmly asking them to tell me if they were in the SF Bay Area or not, as I would only acceopt a local check. They responded by asking again for my address and phone number, like they were stuck on repeat. I then told them that the phone number was on the ad, so if they were serious about purchasing the item and they were local, then simply call the ad, otherwise I would assume that they were not serious about buying the sofa. I also said that if they responded again asking for my address and phone number when the number was listed in the ad, then I know that they weren't legit, so basically either call me or forget it. That seemed to do it!

But I wonder why they were so urgent and adamant about me removing the ad from Craigslist? Is it that if I remove the ad, and then they send me a bogus check or some other form of payment, then am I legally locked in to this transaction and the financial responsibility, because they could claim that there is no ad?

On 2008-06-17 15:37, Mai Tai wrote:
But I wonder why they were so urgent and adamant about me removing the ad from Craigslist? Is it that if I remove the ad, and then they send me a bogus check or some other form of payment, then am I legally locked in to this transaction and the financial responsibility, because they could claim that there is no ad?

There are lots of scammers out doing the same thing and they all have more or less the same pitch (depending what type of scam their into). If you leave your ad out there, it could be found by another scammer with the same pitch. When you see both offers (or several), then you'd know there was a pattern and would not trust any of them. If you withdraw the ad, other similar scammers would not be able to respond and give away their little secret. Scamming is a numbers game. They are continually stepping on each others toes. But they just move on. Pulling the ad just helps avoid stepping on each others' toes and giving the scam away.

Side benefits of getting you to pull your ad include:

1. Hopefully, making you think they really want what you're selling; and
2. Since you won't be getting any more offers unless you go through the trouble of placing another ad, you might be further motivated to continue with their scheme when their check arrives.

Similar Craigslist stuff mentioned at Scamwarners.com:
http://www.scamwarners.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=785

Notice that they want to send you the check, via U.P.S., not the U.S. Postal Service - they don't want the Feds interested in the case, because of mail fraud. As was mentioned, they'll want you to cash a check for way over the sofa price, so you'll have money to pay the movers, etc. Bet they end up hiring some pretty pricey movers!

On 2008-06-17 02:58, TIKI DAVID wrote:
S C A M ...do NOT even respond.

Wrong!

Yes DO respond, but get the proper authorities involved first. Fish out these scum bag scammers and bust their ass!

Here's your chance to wield some well deserved justice, don't let it slip away.

The motivations of the people running this may not be obvious but that makes it work. These are people that do this for a living and have resources and methods the rest of us could never imagine. I have been targeted for this stuff repeatedly for the last six months after my father passed away. Once his death certificate went to public records it was on! All these people need is just a scrap of personal information and its over. I wouldn't even respond to the emails. They are just warming you up to move on to the next part of the scam. Get the authorities involved!

I agree with getting the authorities involved. At the very least, let the craigslist people know.

On 2008-06-18 11:12, Haole'akamai wrote:
I agree with getting the authorities involved. At the very least, let the craigslist people know.

do you really think the craiges list people give a shit? i don'tthink they do.

On 2008-06-17 02:58, TIKI DAVID wrote:
S C A M ...do NOT even respond.

i am sticking to my statement,how much of your life do you want to devote(waste) to chaseing someone you will never catch?

On 2008-06-18 13:54, TIKI DAVID wrote:

On 2008-06-17 02:58, TIKI DAVID wrote:
S C A M ...do NOT even respond.

i am sticking to my statement,how much of your life do you want to devote(waste) to chaseing someone you will never catch?

“Evil happens when good people do nothing.”

-Victor Frankel

OK . fine ,go ahead .good luck. really! lets us know how that works out for ya.
i agree, something should be done. but i think if you do get through to anyone to complain,it will fall upon apathetic ears. read my signiture TD

Cool thing with our situation- We contacted the police and they referred us to our local FBI office. Turns out they were very interested in hearing the details. In their words they couldn't do anything if they didn't know about it. So I think it would be worth the effort to make some kind of complaint.

Besides I was so freaking PO'd it just felt good to do it.

[ Edited by: ahvyna 2008-06-18 16:34 ]

I'll contact the Craigslist people, and I guess my local law enforcement officials, and see if they want to pursue it any further (yeah, I've got a little bit of free time on my hands right now). At the very least the addresses and IP addresses will be recorded in case the scammers try to do this to anyone else - that alone is doing something on my part on fighting the forces of evil. At least I haven't been ripped off or anything, just inconvenienced and irritated a little.