Boonville man not fooled by scam
Officials say scammers are hard to track down

By John Lucas (Contact) courierpress.com
Sunday, November 11, 2007
ELISA PETERSEN / Courier & Press Jim Dorsett of Boonville, Ind., holds a fraudulent check he received recently. An accompanying letter said he had won a lottery prize and should cash the check and forward the money to pay taxes on his winnings.

ELISA PETERSEN / Courier & Press Jim Dorsett of Boonville, Ind., holds a fraudulent check he received recently. An accompanying letter said he had won a lottery prize and should cash the check and forward the money to pay taxes on his winnings.

When Boonville, Ind., resident Jim Dorsett opened his mail one day this month, he learned he was suddenly and quite unexpectedly $250,000 richer.

If he hadn't known better than to believe the contents of the letter, he could have been almost $3,000 poorer.

Dorsett was the target of a scam — one of the more popular of the past few months that law enforcement agencies say originates in Nigeria and is usually routed through Canada.


Dorsett's letter informed him he was one of 20 lucky winners in the second category of the Sept. 15 drawing of the Delotto Switzerland Sweepstakes. They were to split $5 million. His share was $250,000.

All he had to do to claim his winnings was to pay the taxes on them. The letter — purportedly from Waterhouse Financial Inc. of Morriston, Ontario, Canada — included an authentic-looking check for $4,880 drawn on a Waterhouse, Inc. of Glenwillow, Ohio, account with National City Bank of Ashland, Ohio.

The check, which had been deducted from Dorsett's winnings, was to cover the taxes, which had been calculated at $2,985. That amount had to be submitted by a moneygram or Western Union transfer. He was instructed to call claim agent Bob Morris at 1-647-832-4752 for clarification.

The scam is that the $4,880 check is no good. There is no Delotto Switzerland Sweepstakes. The only thing the recipient of the letter has won is the opportunity to be defrauded.

If a recipient were successful in reaching the "claim agent," he would be instructed to deposit the check and wire the "tax" amount. By the time the check was returned to the bank where it was cashed as fraudulent, the money would already have been sent to the scam artist.

The scam is "extremely common," said Wendy Osborne of the Federal Bureau of Investigation at Indianapolis. She noted it's being perpetrated over the Internet.

"Never, ever respond to any of these," she said. "If you send money to get money, it could put you right in the middle of a crime."

Last week the Kentucky Housing Corp. issued a fraud alert that its name and logo are being used in a similar scam. Letters indicate the recipient has won a cash prize and possibly a cruise to the Bahamas. It includes a fake check and a number to call to claim the prize. The Kentucky Housing Corp. has advised everyone to not cash or deposit the check and to not give anyone mentioned in the letter personal, confidential information.

"We work cases like this every single year — a number of them as a matter of fact," said Sgt. Todd Ringle, public information officer for the Indiana State Police at Evansville. "It's just amazing how many people fall for these scams."

For law enforcement officials, such scams prove frustratingly difficult to pursue for several reasons, but mainly because they are perpetrated by people outside the U.S. Also, the amount of money involved, typically a few thousand dollars, isn't great enough to be a priority for an international investigation.