Barr. Maxwell Nelson - inheritance scam

This is what's commonly called an "inheritance" or "next of kin" scam email, it is doing the rounds at the moment, it's a standard scam email format that is sent to thousands of intended victims, it all starts with this email the scammer sends out:

From: Barr. Maxwell Nelson (Esq.)
60 Seven Sisters Road,NW2 3PZ London.
Private Phone: +44 702 402 8457
E-mail: [email protected]


GOOD DAY,

I am Barrister Maxwell Nelson personal Attorney to Ronald Lake, On the 31st of January 2000, my client and his wife Joyce Lake were involved in a Plane Crash (Alaska Airlines Flight 261) all passengers nfortunately lost their lives, since then I have made several enquiries to locate any of my client's extended relatives but this proved unsuccessful.

Since it is not compulsory that the Next-of-Kin must be a blood relation to the deceased, hence I contacted you, be informed that a Next-of-Kin can be anybody, friends or organization etc.

Presently, the Bank where the deceased (my client) had a Deposit valued at US$8, 347, 000 000 Million issued me a notice to provide the Next-of-Kin to my client to receive its benefit or have the account confiscated, so I have contacted you to assist me in repatriating this benefit left behind by my client before they get confiscated or declared unserviceable by the Bank.

To this effect, I now seek your consent to present you to the Bank as the Next-of-Kin of the deceased (my Client) so that the proceeds of this Benefit valued at US$8, 347,000 000 Million can be paid to you and then you and I can share it; 60% to me, 30% for you, while 10% should be given to any Orphanage Home.

I guarantee that this will be executed under a legitimate arrangement that will protect you from any breach of the law.

Please get in touch with me via E-mail: [email protected] with the below details immediately you acknowledge the good receipt of this message.

Full Name:
Full Address:
Tel Number:
Fax Number:
Mobile Number:
Private Email:
Occupation:
Country of Origin:
Marital Status:
Age:
Sex:

Your prompt response is highly imperative.

Yours sincerely,

Barr.Maxwell Nelson (Esq.)

After receiving that scam email, if you were to reply to it, you will at some point be passed to the scammers accomplice who is playing the role of the fake banker, he then sends this email to you:

FUND TRANSFER NOTIFICATION
Private Banking Dept ICB <[email protected]>
Attention: Mr. xxxxx,

Re: Notification of Fund/Credit on Hold

Acting on the information sent to us by our Fund Legal Verification Department, we wish to inform you that we are through with our verification process of your fund. You require obtaining a law court of Justice Change of ownership/Approval to transfer for the transfer of your fund to your nominated bank in your country and that should be the legal requirements for the transfer of your funds and clearance procedures required to complete the transfer of the funds to your account.

Note that once you send us the law court approval/change of ownership from the Probate section of Ghana court of Judiciary with your bank details so that we can commence the transfer of your fund into your bank. We promise irrevocably that upon receipt and confirmation of the document in our bank your fund will be transferred within 4hours.

Please do contact your legal representative in Ghana to assist you obtain this certificate from the Probate section of law court of Justice as soon as possible to enable us finalize with your fund transfer. With this document, you are legally the bonafide owner of this account which will protect you from any query by your government or bank about the legitimacy and the origin of the fund. This is only legal requirement needed in this transfer and you are highly advised to contact your representative and obtain this certificate and forward to us immediately as it is paramount importance as your fund transfer becomes imminent.

For any further correspondence regarding this issue, please reference this case ID in your

Message: P/K/K/G/AC/P/No.536090

sincerely yours,
Dr. Charles Asamoah
Director Private Banking Department
International Commercial Bank Ghana

This gang of scammers claim to be from several banks in Ghana, these are the 2 most popular bank names that they use, the Agricultural Development Bank, Ghana, this is the website of the real Agricultural Development Bank:

http://www.agricbank.com

This is their contact page:

http://www.agricbank.com/ReachUs.aspx

These are the contact details from that page:

Agricultural Development Bank
ADB House
Independence Avenue
P O Box 4191
Accra - Ghana
West Africa
TEL: + 233-21 770403, 762104, 783122, 784394
FAX: + 233-21 784893, 770411
E-mail: [email protected]

The other bank they claim to be from is, International Commercial Bank, Ghana, this is the website of the real bank:

http://www.icbank-gh.com/index.htm

This is their contact page:

http://www.icbank-gh.com/banks.htm

These are the contact details from that page:

International Commercial Bank, Ltd.
Meridian House, Ring Road Central, Private Mail Bag No.16, Accra, Ghana

Telephone No: (233 21) 236 136 / 235 819
Facsimile No: (233 21) 238 228
E-Mail: [email protected]

Also, if you look on the International Commercial Bank home page, you will see this scam warning image at the top of the page, clicking on that image will take you to this page:

http://www.icbank-gh.com/scam.htm

For reference, here is the complete text from the banks scam warning page on that link:

SCAM / FRAUD NOTICE

It has been brought to our attention that a scam by email is being circulated fraudently using the ICB address or brand in an attempt to legitimise schemes concerning transfers of large sums of money.

WHAT ARE TYPICAL SCAMS

The scammers usually contact you by email or letter and offer you a share in a large sum of money that they want to transfer out of their country.

Scammers ask you to pay money or give them your bank account details to help them transfer the money. You are then asked to pay fees, charges or taxes to help release or transfer the money out of the country through your bank. If paid, the scammers make up new fees that require payment before you can receive your “reward”.
They will keep making up these excuses until they think they have got all the money they can out of you.

All sorts of documents will be sent to you to make the scheme appear “real”.

You will never be sent the money that was promised.

HOW TO SPOT A SCAM
You receive an offer out of the blue to “help” someone from another country transfer their money out of their country.

The offer sets out a long and sad story about why the money cannot be transferred by the scammer. This usually involves an inheritance or profits from natural resources that the scammer might say they are trying to protect from taxes or a corrupt government. You are offered a percentage of the total amount transferred in return for your assistance.
The amount of money to be transferred and the payment that the scammer promises to you if you help is usually very large. The email or letter is in very polite, broken English.

HOW TO PROTECT YOURSELF
If it looks too good to be true – it probably is. Remember there are no get-rich-quick schemes: the only people who make money are the scammers.

Do not let anyone pressure you into making decisions about money or investments: always get independent financial advice.
Do not open suspicious or unsolicited emails (spam): delete them.
Never reply to a spam mail (even to unsubscribe).
Never send your personal, credit card or online account details through an email.
Money laundering is a criminal offence: do not agree to transfer money for someone else.
Never provide sensitive account or personal information in response to an email.
The ICB Group and/or its related companies shall not accept any liability for any losses, damages claims, costs and expenses suffered and/or incurred by you resulting from your use or log in to the scam/phishing emails and/or websites.

Now then, go back to the first email that I posted at the top from Barr.Maxwell Nelson (Esq.), if you Google this part of the text from his scam email:

I am Barrister George Kingson, personal Attorney to Ronald Lake and Joyce Lake who used to work with Ashanti Gold Field. On the 31st of January 2000

You will find that same scam email listed on the link below, which is another anti scam website, do a search on that page for the words, "Ronald Lake":

http://www.419baiter.com/_scam_emails/4 ... 13014.html


You will also find the exact same scam email format used by yet another fake barrister, it's here in the scam email repository from October 2007:

http://www.repository.izone.me.uk/repos ... &year=2007

For reference, here is the full email from that link:

Date: 7 October 2007
From: Barr Ray Graham
Reply To: [email protected]
IP: 82.128.21.7
Subject: INHERITANCE FUND
RAY GRAHAM & ASSOCIATES
7 Queens Yard, White post Lane E9 5EN London.
Private Tel: +44 702 4035032
Private Fax: +44 870 9747801
From: Barr. Ray Graham (Esq.)

I am Barrister Ray Graham personal Attorney to Ronald Lake and his wife Joyce Lake who on the 31st of January 2000 were involved in a Plane Crash (Alaska Airlines Flight 261) which unfortunately all the passengers lost their lives, since then I have made several enquiries to locate any of there extended relatives but this proved abortive. view the below site for more details.

http://archives.cnn.com/2000/US/02/01/a ... ines.list/

Since it is not compulsory that the Next-of-Kin must be a blood relation to the deceased, hence I contacted you to present you to the Bank where the deceased my client had a deposit before his death, be informed that a Next-of-Kin could be anybody, Friends, Church, School or Organization etc.

Presently, the Bank where the deceased (my client) had a Deposit valued at US$10, 500, 000.00 (Ten Million Five Hundred Thousand US Dollars) issued me a notice to provide the Next-of-Kin to my client to receive its benefit or have the Funds confiscated, so I have contacted you to assist me in repatriating this Funds left behind by my client before they get confiscated by the Bank.

To this effect, I now seek your consent to present you to the Bank as the Next-of-Kin of the deceased (my Client) so that the proceeds of this Benefit valued at US$10, 500, 000.00 (Ten Million Five Hundred Thousand US Dollars) can be paid to you as the Next-of-Kin, thereafter you and I can share it; 50% to me, 40% to you, while 10% should be given to any Orphanage Home.

I guarantee that this will be executed under a legitimate arrangement with the Bank authorities that will protect you and I from any breach of the law.

Please get in touch with me as soon as possible with the below details immediately you acknowledge the good receipt of this message.

Full Name:
Full Address:
Tel No.:
Fax No.:
Mobile No.:
Private Email:
Occupation:
Country of Origin:
Marital Status:
Age:
Sex:

Your prompt response is highly imperative.

Yours sincerely,

Barr. Ray Graham (Esq.)
RAY GRAHAM & ASSOCIATES

If for any reason you still doubt that you are being scammed, you can simply make a telephone call to the real banks listed above, I'm sure they will be happy to inform you that you are being scammed, just a last not, real banks DO NOT use free email addresses from Gmail.com and Myway.com like the scammers above do!