My 68 year old dad nearly got Nigerian scammed in Hollywood

[notherhalo]

Hes some old man whos a contractor, was walking out of a customers house and some 50ish year old African in fancy clothes with damaged hands tried to hand him $100.   My dad refused and asked why he even offered.  Pulls out some letter from "his rich uncle" stating that he cant bring this money back to Africa and must find two good reputable people who will give it away to the poor, and keep some for themselves, but they cant be poor, or else they will keep all of it.

He kind of tucks into the corner and flashes my dad some huge stack, says he has $80,000 on him and wants to perhaps give it to him and someone else.   My dad (super gullible) takes this dude in his sloppy work van to some 711, where he points out some other guy (my dad thinks hes persian, just guessing) and shows the guy the letter.   The guy is immediately interested.  He asks my dad to take him to the bank and follow this guy, but quietly asks him to drive a certain way to avoid the bank cameras (?), he didnt say this to my dad specifically but guided him in a strange pattern.  Other guy walks out of the bank, shows him and my dad like $5000 in cash, "to prove hes not poor", and the African says that he can have a share, but the letter asks him to find two people.

Now, he turns to my dad, and asks him to go to the bank and take out at least $5000 to prove hes not poor, so he wont steal ALL the money.  My dad actually doesnt have much in the bank (my moms account has most of it) and he said he was interested in getting a line of credit to show this guy, but didnt think he could pull it off in reasonable time.   He told the guy, not trying to be embarrassed, that its at home.   The African insisted that he show him the money he has at home.  My dad refused, and at that point, he got VERY upset.  

My quite gullible dad finally realized, something that if the guy was so rich, why was he so mad that my dad didnt have money?  As he was talking to the other guy outside, with the door open, my dad just slammed the accelerator and got the hell out of there.

Has ANYONE ever heard of something like this?   Im glad my dad didnt have a lot of money in the bank that day, Im afraid he would have lost it all somehow, and more saddened to know that there are other seniors probably being taken advantage of.

[Hot Damn!]

If I could change the color red to another color I think I’d change it to black. 

[Blarg]

Never heard of anything this brazen but you need to lecture your Dad about letting stupid greed override his basic intelligence. He could of ended up killed. 

[tdawg87]

Didn't read but that's an A+ title.

[AngelsLakersFan]

Of course Nother's dad would be gullible!

[ten ocho recon scout]

Ive never heard of nigerian stories here (other than via phone), but plenty of gypsy ripoffs similar to that.

[notherhalo]

10 hours ago, ten ocho recon scout said:

Ive never heard of nigerian stories here (other than via phone), but plenty of gypsy ripoffs similar to that.

so what happens next?  Does the guy ask to "hold" the suspects money for some reason?   

[ten ocho recon scout]

1 hour ago, notherhalo said:

so what happens next?  Does the guy ask to "hold" the suspects money for some reason?   

Theres a million different scenarios. In this one I would thing yes.

"Now deposit your money in this account, but keep the account number so you can withdraw your money after I put my share in. It should only take 5 minutes.

I just deposited my end. Ill be right back, im gonna go outside to use the bathroom."

 

[Vegas Halo Fan]

17 hours ago, ten ocho recon scout said:

Ive never heard of nigerian stories here (other than via phone), but plenty of gypsy ripoffs similar to that.

Mine have come via email. Nigeria and Burkina Faso seem to be the two main locations involved. They are so common that they are called 419 scams - referring to the section of the Nigerian criminal code that they violate. I have heard stories of people who actually travel to Nigeria to either try to cash in or to try to find their scammer and wind up dead.

[ten ocho recon scout]

Beware the trojans, and the horses they bring...

[Lou]

18 minutes ago, ten ocho recon scout said:

Beware the trojans, and the horses they bring...

I think you mean don't be like the stupid Trojans and fall for the wooden horse trick.

Idiots.

 

[Tank]

I took it to mean “it’s never safe to walk anywhere near the USC campus unless fully covered by Kevlar.”