Anatomy of a Scam

a reply to: NoSprockets

As is the case with most financial scams and con games, the victims are people who want more than they have, be it money, power, respect etc, and the perpetrators of these scams use this to their advantage. The promise of a better life, in any capacity, is hard to resist. I'm sure, at the onset, the victims think it's all nonsense but that nagging voice in the back of your head, saying "what if..." can, at times, be too much to ignore. Remember, this scam originally took the form of an earthly bound issue. It was all US based and used some twisted interpretation of the law to convince people that they were not in debt and, in fact, entitled to a ton of money, in the form of gold. Then it spread to other countries and, in due time, otherworldly claims somehow became the central part of the scam.

Once you're invested in these kinds of things, it's very hard to pry yourself from it. We had a client who fell for one of those 419 scams (nigerian oil, dead woman with cds etc). He was a very successful business man who somehow got conned by these guys and continued funneling money to them until his children had him declared incompetent. It happens to people all the time and this thread was set up to provide some background, and facts, with the hope that someone reading it doesn't fall for the con.

a reply to: Crakeur

I think all of the things that my brother responded to were all of the things he lacked.
"money, power, respect"
That he might have gained any of that would be a huge bonus to him.
I think that his blog was ET centric from the beginning, played into this drama. All he put into this, was his energy and relationships, which is really the only thing that matters - in the end.