SCAMA-RAMA LAMA DING DONG

“If it seems too good to be true it probably is.”

I knew that but I was loath to interrupt. The speaker was Maryanne from the New York State Attorney General’s Office of Consumer Fraud. She was a chatty Cathy and she seemed happy to have someone to talk to. I was content to listen.

My path to Maryanne began a few weeks earlier. Shelley’s beloved ’99 Cougar, after many years of exemplary service, finally bit the dust. We junked it for $100. We were left with only memories and four Blizzak snow tires mounted on steel wheels stored in our garage. I decided to try and sell them. I placed an ad on Craig’s list and waited for the offers to come pouring in.

I did get a coupla inquiries regarding the size of the tires, something I’d failed to include in the ad. Alas, no one wanted the size I had to offer. And then there was this, let’s politely call it “strange”, response:               

Hello, i will like to know if you still have this item for sale,  I will be at work till 10pm today... What area are you close to? or will be willing to meet? Cos i will like to buy it today or tommorow and pay you off but am going to church on Sunday..... 

Clearly an English as a second language correspondent. But this is Buffalo, a community of immigrants, and it wasn’t difficult to imagine a recently arrived Somalian, forewarned about ferocious winters, anxious to get his or her car ready.

I gave out my address. This response followed:

Thanks for returning my message...I'm Currently in Columbus am okay with the cost of the price, i will like to overnight the payment out to you asap, i will be paying with bank CASHIER CHECK/MONEY ORDER and I will wait for the PAYMENT  to clear before arranging for the pick up..i will also add $50 for keeping the item for me. I will be glad to have your  (i.e full name, mailing address, phone number and last asking price ) so payment can be mailed out immediately. I will also make arrangement for pick-up which will be after you must have received and cashed the payment.

 

Now it had gone beyond weird. Who is so desperate for used snow tires? And hey, wait a minute, this inquiry hadn’t even asked about the tire size. I could only conclude that I was being led on here. I was curious to see where this was all going and I couldn’t see how I could be hurt by going along. I replied, “OK”

 

                                             THE STING!

Here it is:

Am so happy to provide you the tracking number of the payment that was sent to you 1Z W0X 227 44 4160 8205 via www.ups.com,And the payment is about to deliver to you. All i want
you to do as soon as you get the payment is to get the rest of the funds sent to my shipper as soon as possible because the shipper are ready to come for the pick up tomorrow because i want the whole transaction done today before this weekend. So all i want you to do now
is just to get the rest funds wired via western union money transfer after you have deducted your item fund with $50 for running around more-so don't forget to deducted the western union charges and get back to me with the details that you used to send the money as soon as you
get the money sent, so the shipping agent can come for the pick-up as soon as possible too. This is the shipper's info you are to send the rest funds to: Jimmy Han, Bakersfield, CA 93313
Do get it done in no time and get back to me as soon as possible...Thanks

That email arrived on Friday. Here’s what arrived by UPS Next Day Air on Saturday:  

$1700!!! I gotta admit there was a brief moment when I felt way ahead of the game. But no. The scam was now revealed. So I decided to try and turn the tables. The return address on the envelope was a J P Morgan Chase branch in Ohio. I called them Monday morning asking them to authenticate the check. They couldn’t identify the account and passed me on to consumer service. They forwarded my call to their fraud department who advised me that the account against which this check was drawn was “compromised”. Sure enough, no payday for me.

Between the email telling me where to send my money and the UPS envelope in which the check arrived (surely there are surveillance cameras where it was posted) is sufficient evidence for the authorities to track down the miscreants. That’s how I ended up talking with cheery but not all that interested Maryanne.

“It’s a scam,” she said rattling off a catalog of similar such. “We haven’t the resources to chase them all. The best we can do is warn people…. If it seems too good to be true it probably is.”

 

 

 

 

Veterans Invade South Carolina

I’m in Garden City Beach, South Carolina, just down the coast from Myrtle Beach ensconced in a fabulous bayside villa. It’s late October. The season is over. The crowds are gone. The days are spectacularly beautiful; the moonlit evenings are as pleasant as can be.

I’m here to reunite once again with Bill, Joel and Frank. We four met over fifty years ago when we were all on active Army duty assigned to the same unit at Fort Benning, Georgia. And we all had the same fortune to be swept up in 1965 in what is known now as   “the buildup.” Twenty thousand of us in the newly redesignated 1^st Cavalry Airmobile loaded on ships, sailed through the Panama Cannel and disembarked in Viet Nam. And for the next year we worked together, eat together, slept together in support of that benighted incursion.

In the summer of 1966 our tour was over. Separately each of us headed home. In the first years afterwards Bill’s and my paths crossed a coupla times. And then we all went our, as it turned out, very separate ways.

Until one sunny Sunday afternoon when the phone rang. I answered.

Me: Hello

Texas Inflected Voice: Is this Jack Dumpert?

Me: Yes

TIV: Is this Jack Dumpert who went to Canisius College?

Me: Yes

TIV: Is this Jack Dumpert who was platoon leader of the second forward platoon?

Me: Who is this?

TIV: Who was platoon leader of the third forward platoon?

Me: Bill Hill?

TIV: Hey, buddy, how are you?

Bill was calling to arrange a reunion which subsequently took place in San Antonio. A second took place a few years later when we gathered at Bill’s home in Killeen Texas, traveled to Frank’s Carlsbad, New Mexico home and then on to El Paso, Texas to visit yet another of us. The trip to Joel’s home state, South Carolina, was our third reunion.

Upon arrival one of us gifted the others with shirts with our names embroidered on them. A First Calvary Patch was on one shoulder: a small American flag was velcroed to the other. And emblazoned on the back was the slogan “Viet Nam Veteran and damn proud of it.” Not exactly a sentiment I endorse. If I were forced to propose slogan it would be more like “Viet Nam Veteran, complicit in the death of thousands.”

When someone learns that you’re a veteran there’s a recent trend to thank you for your service. I’ve never been comfortable with that. I’d rather not get thanked for an episode in my life that, had I to do it over, I would have assiduously avoided. After some reflection I devised a reply to employ if it was ever said to me. Not that that’s likely. I don’t boast about it. Very few know about my time in the service and those that do have the courtesy not to bring it up. And besides there’s no way anyone could look at me and know. Unless I was somehow advertising it.

The next morning we all went out to breakfast. The uniform of the day was, of course, the shirt. A proponent of going along to get along, I pulled mine on.

While we were dining another patron came over to our table.

“Thank you for your service,” he said.

I was prepared for this.

“You’re welcome,” I replied, “but it was fucked up.”

If there were surveillance cameras in the restaurant they would have recorded the look of shock and consternation on his face. He stood seemingly stunned for a moment and then without another word he fled. Later when we asked for our check we were told that someone had picked up our tab. Likely, it was the very same dude.

Upon further reflection, I see now that my response was rude. That’s not something I aspire to. There’s no way I can excuse my behavior. At best I’m chagrined. Here I am a half century later still affected and not in any positive way. Clearly it won’t ever end.