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"419" Scam – Advance Fee / Fake Lottery Scam

The so-called "419" scam is a type of fraud dominated by criminals from Nigeria and other countries in Africa. Victims of the scam are promised a large amount of money, such as a lottery prize, inheritance, money sitting in some bank account, etc.

Victims never receive this non-existent fortune but are tricked into sending their money to the criminals, who remain anonymous. They hide their real identity and location by using fake names and fake postal addresses as well as communicating via anonymous free email accounts and mobile phones.

Keep in mind that scammers DO NOT use their real names when defrauding people.
The criminals either abuse names of real people or companies or invent names or addresses.
Any real people or companies mentioned below have NO CONNECTION to the scammers!

Read more about such scams here or in our 419 FAQ. Use the Scam-O-Matic to verify suspect emails.

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Some comments by the Scam-O-Matic about the following email:

Fraud email example:

From: "SANDRA MENDES" <sandra4mendes@yahoo.co.nz> (may be fake)
Reply-To: sandramendes@message.com
Date: Sun, 8 Jan 2006 18:02:55 +0000
Subject: You are entitled to accept or reject it...

Dear,
Good morning to you and how are you getting on?.I do hope that you are catching up with the goodies of the day in full.Mine here is very hot and like you know we are living in the refugee camp here in Dakar Senegal.
In this camp we are only allowed to go out only on Mondays and Friday's of the weeks. Its just like one staying in the prison and i hope by Gods grace i will come out here soon.We don't have any relatives now whom we can go to all our relatives ran away in the middle of the war the only person we have now is Rev Godwin Alfred who is the pastor of the (Christ The King Church) here in the camp he has been very nice to me since i came here but i am not living with him rather i am leaving in the women's hostel because the camp have two hostels one for men the other for women.
As a refugee here i don't have any right or privilege to any thing be it money or whatever because it is against the law of this country.I want to go back to my studies because i only attended my first year before the tragic incident that lead to my being in this situation now took place.Please listen to this,i have my late father's statement of account and death certificate here with me which i will send to you latter,because when he was alive he deposited some amount of money which he used my name as the next of kin,the amount in question is $3.5M(Three Million five Hundred Thousand Dollars).
So i will like you to help me transfer this money to your account and from it you can send some money for me to get my travelling documents and air ticket to come over to meet with you.I kept this secret to people in the camp here the only person that knows about it is the Reverend because he is like a father to me. So in the light of above i will like you to keep it to yourself and don't tell it to anyone for i am afraid of loosing my life and the money if people gets to know about it. Remember i am giving you all this information due to the trust i deposed on you.I like honest and understanding people,truthful and a man of vision,truth and hardworking. My favourite language is English but our language is french but i speak English very fluently.Reply me this email and I will give further details.
telephone urgent as soon you recive the massage for more
details and keep it confidetail sandra1mendes@pluno.com
my mother is sending her greetings to you and your family.call us urgent for
more detail sandra1mendes@inbox.com
Thanks yours son,
Miss.Sandra Mendes


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