I put my Sony Playstation Portable on the St. Louis Craigslist website for $200 and was emailed by a person calling himself Cole Sheyi, who said that he wanted to buy it for his daughter and would pay me $250. This was my first red flag. So I decided to string this guy along a little and see how much fun I could have with him. (I have played this game with a Nigerian before when I received an email stating that he was a gazilionaire and wanted me to hold his money for him but that's another story). So I told Cole that I would be happy to sell it to him for $250. Here is his response;
I received your first mail and since you said the psp plus extras is still for sale, i will like to buy it immediately i will be offering you $250 for the item because of the urgent need i got for it, I'm buying this product for my daughter who just graduated from a computer school and as a New year present and i intend to take her by surprise this time. I live in 936 Fairview St, East Liverpool. I'll making payment through TravelexExptress Payment.
As for the shipping, you dont have to pay a token for it because i'll be responsible for the shipping to her destination. Upon approval of payment, i will send you a fed-ex prepaid shipping label to you which you will need for the shipping of the package. I will like to read from you if this is okay by you. Let me have your full name and address so that i can proceed with the payment and also your contact phone number so that you can be called also to confirm payment. One more thing please no scam.
That's right, Please no scam. So the fact that his email seemed to be written by a first grader was my second red flag. So I write back to my new friend, Cole with my address and tell him that the PSP will weigh 8 pounds (heavy, I know, but I figured, getting him to pay more for shipping will only increase my giggles in the end.) To that, I'm sent a rather nicely composed yet bogus email from Travelex Customer Care stating that I would need to email them with the SHIPPING CONFIRMATION BEFORE they would send me the payment. This was my third and final red flag.
Now it was time to have some fun with this guy. I received a JPG of the shipping label I was to use from Cole which upset me a little since I figured he'd be mailing it to me, giving me an opportunity to tell him that it never showed up making him have to pay for another one. So now I have the shipping label, his mailing address, and a little red guy on my shoulder helping me make sure this guy is going to be more upset that he contacted me than I am.
My next moves are to contact the local police to fill them in and see if there's anything they can do about it. Then (graphic imagery ahead) I'm going to eat a LOT of bran and stuff myself at the Chinese buffet down the street, THEN, I'm going to fill my PSP Box with as much of my feces as I can, tape it up tightly with box tape so no smell can escape, and then put the filled PSP box into a larger brown box, slap the shipping labels on it and send my gift of love to Nigeria.
Now Imagine his (or who ever opens the brown box seeing as they do this as a business in Nigeria so I've read and seen on the news) face, and sees that PSP box. Now imagine his face when he cuts through all the box tape and opens the PSP box! I LOVE messing with scammers!
I've read some other reports of this happening to people, one woman actually sent a computer before receiving payment! People, please! Have some common sense. NEVER EVER send your merchandise before you've received payment. That's just not smart! And if you think someone's trying to victimize you have fun with them! There's a sucker born every minute, it can either be you or the person trying to take advantage of you. It's your choice!
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