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One common ploy found in many African scams is the dead contractor who left a fortune in a bank account that nobody knows about. Since the dead contractor has no relatives or next of kin, the bank employee who in this case is the director in charge of Auditing and Accounting at the International Commercial Bank in Ghana and also a Relationship Account Officer wants the scam victim to act as next of kin for the deceased. This way both the scam victim and the bank employee can profit from the false representation. Part of the ruse is to get the scam victim into a legal trap by having them illegally claim to be next of kin. By doing this the scammer gains a certain amount of leverage against the scam victim to use later if necessary. In the African scams, it is especially useful in case the victim realizes what is happening and refuses to cooperate any further. The scam victim can be threatened with punishment for fraud for signing off as next of kin.
From Mr.David Kwame. Attn: It is my pleasure to seek for your assistance, and you should consider it very important. This is an opportunity that I can not live to miss. I am Mr.David Kwame the director in charge of Auditing and Accounting section of International Commercial Bank Ltd here in Ghana, and also a Relationship Account Officer to Al Gupta Kassim, a Lebanese. He was a Seasoned Contractor with Ghana Cement Company in Ghana Republic, who unfortunately died in the plane crash of Union Transport Africans Flight Boeing 727 in Benin republic in December 25, 2003. You will read more stories about the crash on visiting this website:www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/africa/12/26/benin.crash/ Before his death on the 25th December 2003, Al Gupta Kassim, has a fixed deposit account with the bank and no other person knows about this account or any thing concerning it, the account has no other beneficiary and my investigation proved to me that his supposed next of kin died along with him in the crash. Since then I have made several inquiries to locate any of my clients extended relatives, this has also proved unsuccessful. After these several unsuccessful attempts, I decided to contact you. I contacted you to assist in repatriating the money left behind by my client before they get confiscated or declared unserviceable by the bank to the government. Consequently, Since I have been unsuccessful in locating the relatives for over 7 weeks now. I seek your consent to present you as the next of kin of the deceased so that the proceeds of this account valued at US$12.5 million can be paid to you and then you and me can share the money in proportion 70% to me and 30% to you. I sincerely request your honest co-operation to enable us see this transaction through. I guarantee that this will be executed under a legitimate arrangement that will protect you and me from any breach of the law. while it will take only 10 working days the funds will be in your nominated Bank account. you should forward the following information to me for a quicker communication. A. Your Full Name. B. Private telephone and fax number. C. Your Full location Address.
Yours Sincerely. The presence of a request for someone to pretend to be next of kin for a deceased person with a bank account in an African country is typical of African scams. A combination of an employee of a bank in Africa along with a large amount of money being mentioned is also a sure sign of a fraud attempt. To avoid becoming a scam victim of African scams, people who read their email should notice certain characteristics and features that make them recognizable such as the type of greeting, bad English and writing along with requests for information. Although many African scams such as this one come from Ghana, they also come from Nigeria, Benin and Cote D'Ivoire. Return to Phishing Internet Scams Home Page » Return to African Scams Home Page |