SEVADom
Posts: 37
Joined: 2/3/2006
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OK, I was taken, I admit it. Those who will conclude I'm an unrealistic doofus ... yeah, ok. However, my reason for this post is not to whine or even ask for feedback, although I'll try to grin and bear it if I receive it.
Instead, I'm going to post a case study (which just happened to me) to perhaps lessen just a little bit the likelihood of this exact scam succeeding again in the future. I'll attempt to be sufficiently specific to be helpful, while sufficiently vague not to violate the TOS.
I'm not saying "look out for this person -- she's fake" because the beauty of this scam is that a real person could, for the most part, have exactly the same information. The point is that a really good scammer doesn't jump out at you (e.g., the broken English, etc., we all know and love) -- and, in this case, even on the phone can be completely convincing, in many subtle ways. My intent here is to try to show how convincing it can be. I thought I would be very difficult to fool. I wasn't.
One of the elements of a good scam is that the mark wants to believe. Even if s/he tries to be skeptical, that goes against one's own desire. It makes it very difficult in the "heat of the moment" to notice problems. So when you see the "obvious" BS in what you see below ... it wasn't so obvious at the time, although it now is in retrospect.
Key elements of this scammer's CM profile (since taken down, by the way):
Short profile, but longer than 3 sentences (7 sentences, actually) and very well-written -- complete sentences, consistent message, appropriate reserve, precise and cautious. Said "Relocatable," but confined it to the USA. Although I tend to be more verbose, if I were the type of person she purported to be, I would have been happy to have been able to write such a clear and concise profile.
Description: Submissive Female -- although in her profile and in communications she self-identified as a slave. Why the discrepancy? I don't know -- but my guess is that saying 'submissive' on the form results in showing up in more searches, but saying 'slave' might be more attractive to her 'target' audience.
Location: Northern California (and this is real, based on two supplied -- and used -- cell phone numbers in the Sacramento area code -- which is a rather small geography)
Pics: none in profile, but sent (unsolicited) in first response message. Two G-rated pics, not great quality, obviously taken with a web cam, but clear enough to show the person is stunning -- and about the same age as claimed by the scammer. Typical female fakes (in my opinion) often include at least one stunning pic in their profile. Not including such, and sending obviously non-professional pics, was much more convincing than fantastic pics would have been.
Sought: Dom Women, Dom Men, Dom/Dom Couples, or Joining a Poly Group. One occasional giveaway (to me) of a scammer is that they sometimes include a longer list -- e.g., they say they are a submissive, but also list submissives as being sought. This one did not make that mistake; the profile was internally consistent.
Initial interaction on CM:
I contacted her. Mine was a focused response of two good-sized paragraphs, not a generic one. She did not quickly try to move the conversation off CM, as so often happens (e.g., to Y!). She responded quickly and positively, although with only one sentence.
Her responses were very short (which provided less opportunity for her to misstep). Her stated priorities included safety, building trust, being real, and not spending months sending email. One reason she gave for short responses was that, since (she claimed to) live in a motel, her online time was via dialup at an outrageous cost per minute. A good element of plausibility there ...
Rather than telling me about herself, she preferred that I ask her questions. Her responses all were the ones I wanted to hear ... just possibly because she had read my profile?
She established a history of having had one Master already (for 2 years), one to whom she had gone cross-country after a very short period of contact (2 days). This set precedent for a willingness to come to me without a long discussion period -- and also suggested at least the possibility of enough experience that she wasn't basing her desires on only dreams.
She had a plausible reason for the ending of the previous relationship, one that didn't involve death or evildoing on either part.
Telephone contact:
I was the one to first offer to speak by telephone -- but she gave me a (cell) telephone number before asking for mine. Also, while she expressed a preference for my calling her, she did also call me a few times.
The first call lasted about an hour -- and this was the part that is most amazing to me. Not having previously interacted with a competent con artist (so far as I know), I had no idea of the subtlety that could be employed by someone so completely convincingly. We're talking nuanced here. Again, I wanted to believe -- but I've spotted several fraudsters in the past; this was in a different class.
She echoed a point that many legitimate CM users have written -- that short initial contact, and then in-person meetings, makes more sense than extended electronic interaction. I agree with that -- but in this case, it just helped to justify limiting the initial electronic contacts, since we'd "be meeting" soon.
She established that her current lifestyle was hand-to-mouth because her previous Master had left and she was only working part time for a temp agency. Why did this matter? Because later, her request for help with the cost of relocating would not be at all surprising.
Since she claimed to live in a motel, it was plausible that all her possessions could fit in her car. And the cost of getting her to me would actually only be about the cost of a discounted round-trip plane ticket. (That wasn't even discussed in conversation; I figured that out on my own.) She felt that a visit wouldn't be more useful than a "trial period." And, she had no ties to where she was now.
We discussed limits, and she had the typical ones -- but also said that her main intent was "to find a good man and serve him." That is, she wasn't seeking specific kinks, but rather received her pleasure from serving. Sound familiar? True of many legitimate subs -- but also very convenient to avoid the time otherwise needed to discuss specific compatibilities. [idiot] Good scams also happen quickly -- to avoid giving the mark time to think about things too much.
On later calls, she said that she really didn't enjoy talking on the phone -- that she much preferred to interact in person. I found myself nodding, and helping to justify this (many people rely a lot on body language and eye contact). [idiot] In fact, it again helped to minimize the possibility that she might say something I might question. And, it lowered the total effort/time she had to put into the scam.
After a few calls, she notified me by email (no longer on CM) that she had changed to a new telephone number because of receiving prank calls on the previous one -- and provided the new one. This engendered more trust on my part -- "ah, the bad guys are gone, and I am a trusted good guy!" [idiot]
She wasn't greedy; when we calculated the cost of relocating her, she volunteered that she had some money (not a lot, but enough to reduce the total by about 30%). She gave a miles-per-gallon figure for her car that was reasonable, and relatively good. We included the costs of meals and cheap motels on the drive, and an oil change for her car before she left. The end result was that I sent her $350. I consider it tuition.
Once it became clear to her that I was attempting to get the money to her, there were no further messages from her -- at all. Since I'm quite efficient at such things, the total elapsed time for this to happen (i.e., without further communication) unfortunately was only about 30 hours, not long enough for me to realize that I was about to be had.
More stupid mistakes I made:
1) She gave a street address of a motel she was staying at. I didn't ask for the name or phone number of the motel (or, obviously, try to call it). [idiot] The way I finally determined for sure that it was a scam was Googling the street address -- which exists, but is actually the address of a defunct landscaping company, and some distance from the area where other motels are located.
2) She claimed that California law doesn't allow transients to establish permanent residency in a motel. I took her word for this. Why did this matter? When, after agreeing to join me, she raised the need for gas money and we initially agreed that I'd use a Postal Money Order, she quickly (before it would have been possible for me to get one) got back to me claiming that the motel owners had told her that if people received postal mail there, it would make them residents, which wasn't allowed. I'm now pretty sure this is complete BS (she supposedly had been there for about 6 weeks, but only discovered this right after we spoke?), but it seemed to hang together at the time. Since we'd already agreed that having her relocate quickly would make the most sense (hah!), the remaining option (which of course I concluded without her help) was a wire transfer ... which I duly made happen. So no snailmail ... which means no chance of committing mail fraud. And of course, snailmail wouldn't have worked anyway, since she had given me an address where she couldn't possibly be. [idiot]
Conclusion
I seriously doubt that, while the above was going on, anyone would have been able to dissuade me from proceeding as I did. I'm way too confident of my own abilities ... [idiot] ... although I will say that all along I was aware of the possibility that I was being taken. I just figured that if it turned out I was, the total amount lost wouldn't break the bank -- and I'd have learned something. This attitude did have one benefit: I'm not emotionally devastated. Not happy about it, and certainly not happy about losing the money, but otherwise fine.
Unfortunately, it isn't likely that this person's next scam (or anyone else's) will closely replicate the one I've presented. So even having read this (my compliments on your persistence, by the way!), you won't necessarily be able to spot one immediately. But if you realize how convincing it can be, and perhaps pick up on some of the places where had I been a bit smarter I might have figured it out, just maybe one or more of you will stop short of actually being suckered. Good luck!
Oh, I'm willing to give a little more detail (there isn't all that much I didn't provide above) in response to specific emails -- here or off site if necessary so as not to violate the TOS here. I'm not sure it will help (see above), but perhaps it might.
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A cautionary tale of a successful scam (warning -- *ver... - 
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