Another Ugly Telemarketing Scam From Montreal

It's a sad fact that Montreal remains North America's illegal telemarketing capital and that the crimes are perpetrated largely by anglos and ethnic Montrealers in the west end of the city. The scam artists try to keep away from the long arm of the US justice system by setting up operations here and targeting victims across the border in America. The problem has so gotten so bad that the RCMP has set up a special squad called the Phonebusters to deal with it.

The latest scam to surface is not telephone fraud, but rather a neat scam that uses the mail to bilk people out of their money.



The advance-fee fraud fraud consists of a letter asking the victim to become a mystery shopper, in order to evaluate the performance of various companies (Wal-Mart, Sears, etc.) including a wire transfer company. Enclosed in the letter is a cheque for $4,200, which is supposed to cover the salary and expenses of the mark, as well the funds required to 'test' a moneygram company (like Western Union.)
Those who bite, deposit the cheque in their own bank account and wire most of the money back to the scammers as instructed, by a moneygram, making it impossible to trace the transaction or recover the money.

Weeks later they discover that the cheque was phony and that they have to re-imburse the bank for the funds that they sent to the scammers.
Pretty nasty.

You can read the original by clicking letter in the right.

It's very slick.



The New York city company, 'EXPERIAN', that supposedly sent the letter is as phony as a three dollar bill.











The address on the letter leads to a parking garage in lower Manhattan. The letter was actually mailed from Canada and very likely Montreal.


The fraudsters use a postal meter for authenticity (note the ironic cancellation stamp over the postage- 'Fraud- prevent it'.

The Canadian postal code -H3N 2L3 is around the Jean Talon/ Beaumont Street area (but it could also be phony) and is the clue that it came from Montreal. The return address is completely phony. Post Office boxes numbers need the station to be identified, as in this example;

POB 2637, Staton 'A'
Montreal, Quebec, H3N 2L3

The return addressee is a company, RSM Ritcher, a highly reputable accounting firm, who's office is really in downtown Montreal and I'd imagine, none to pleased about having their name linked to a fraud.

Every few months, the police break local telemarketing gangs, the latest being last December, but it doesn't seem to put a dent in their illicit activities.


>>>>BREAKING NEWS!!!! 12:04PM

RCMP have just announced that they are presently undertaking an operation against telemarketers and will conduct a news conference at 1:30 to reveal the particulars.

>>>>>>>>>>>UPDATE!!!! 1:58PM

The RCMP just announced that they are carrying out raids against telemarketers who are running a con called 'Grandson' whereby they intimate to victims that their grandson is in dire straits in a foreign country and needs them to wire him money. Pretty lame, huh. The police spokesman said that the fraudsters got away with $3.5 million.

It's interesting to see if this investigation is related to the con that I have described above. It sounds pretty close, using moneygrams and all.