Beware of Scammer African_Wildlife

Every once in awhile I surf through reptibid to see what kind of scammers have popped up next. Recently, I found one with numerous posts to different auctions q&a section. All of the ads questions are exact and from the same user name. Just wanted to give a heads up on this scammer to all who still dare to venture to that site with any real interest in buying. His user name is African_Wildlife. BEWARE OF THIS PERSON!! I have emailed him to inform him of the obvious need he has to get a job and quit stealing from honest people, although I know I wasted my time. I also informed him that I would be sending a copy of all his postings to the Secret Service. I would like to know what more can be done to rid us of the disease we call scammers. What a waste. Beware, again, of this user.



Nigerian Scam....and not even a very skilled one.

Those guys need to give up already.

Originally Posted by gmherps

Those guys need to give up already.

Every once in a while I am sure they find someone bone-headed enough to fall for one of their scams.

I think bone-headed is a strong word.. Maybe just ignorant?

Hopefully those who are in it for the right reasons do their homework first...

Originally Posted by connorrm

Every once in a while I am sure they find someone bone-headed enough to fall for one of their scams.

Inexperience sometimes leads to loss of $$$. It's unfortunate.


to all SCAMMERS!!!!! Foreign and Domestic.

Inexperience sometimes leads to loss of $$$.

Yes, I agree. Or if we look it the other way around, experience comes with a price. My first "learning experience" was before the era of the Nigerian scams. Although it was an expensive lesson for me, I’m sure it was also a very costly one for him, as he is no longer around selling reptiles. Nigerian scammers are harder to knock down; they have no animals for sale, no reputation to maintain and plenty of time. They just rely on the shear number of unaware victims that pop-up yearly. One would imagine evolution would have selected against the minnows that fall for the worm-like appendix luring them to the alligator snapper’s jaws. In spite of this the alligator snapper is still around, and new, inexperienced minnows hatch every season.

Regards

That link will be dead in a very short time, making this thread pretty much useless. You must post screen shots, per the rules.

Charles,
Although it is likely that 99.9% of the readers here are familiar with the Nigerian and similar scams, its not a statistic I take for granted, and do see warnings here as having value. I see where you mentioned that you were informing the Secret Service, but did you also inform the Repti-Bid folks ? While these scammers inevitably just reconstitute themselves, our best way of fighting them is not only the constant reminders of their existance, but also to at least have the ads removed. I do not think that I have ever seen such, but I would like to see a site such as Reptibid leave such ads up, but modify them with a large-printed label (like a big runner stamp) saying something akin to "THIS AD IS A SCAM". I feel that would be a greater deterent as an educational tool than just removing the ad. Before anyone gets into the legalities of it, I think certain safeguards could be followed which would insulate the site from such liabilities. One solution would be to suspend the ad for a week while site management runs a few cursory checks, then repost the ad as an in-your-face example on that page so that every innocent and naive viewer can see it. Or makes a bolder link at the top of every page, instead of just a fine-print disclaimer, directing people to actual examples of scam ads. As of right now, examples of Nigerian scams have to be hunted for, in places like the "Monkey Man" site, which only those with knowledge of the scams seek out anyway. Ultimately, I also agree that the final responsibilty is with "buyer beware".

Jim,
While that's a great idea, and one that I would like to see Reptibid adopt, in this particular case, it was not the ad that was perpetrating the scam. It was an individual in the question and answer section of the ad offering to purchase the animal.

Just clarifying this for the sake and reputation of the person who placed the ad.