Bob McCarty Writes

[Note: The post below was written by Skunkfeathers ("Dear Skunky"), a once-weekly contributor to this blog and one of the world’s most-prolific harassers of those who perpetuate e-mail scams. You’ll notice a lot of misspelled words in the communications from the scammers, but we leave them intact in order to show you how the scammers operate.]

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As Dear Skunky learns in this latest installment, turnabout is NOT fair play, at least as far as a scammer is concerned.

It’s just not fair.

In this episode, Dear Skunky once again tries to help a poor, wayworded scammer by the name of Karbiru Ahmed [ karbiru_ahmed2009 (at) yahoo (dot) com ] with his presentation and diction, as you’ll see the need for in the following excerpts from his rather pathetic effort to give me the business:

“I am Mr. Karbiru Ahmed, the diretor in charge of auditing and account section of Bank of Africa ouaga-burkina faso in west Africa with due respec and regard, I have decide to contract you on a business transaction that will be very benfical to both of us at the end of thetranaction.”

“my department come across a very big sume of money belonging a deceased person, a foriegner who died on novebmer 1999 in a plain crash and the fund has be domant in his fund with the bank without any claim from his famly or realtion before we discovery this development.”

“As it intrest you to now, I got your impressive informaton through internationle business equiry on the intenet.i bleive you will be vitel and can campion a business with such magitude without any problem.”

“I will not fail to infarm you this tansaction is 100% risk flee. On smoth concusion you will be intitle to 30% of the totel sume as gratification, while 10% will be sit inside to care of expenses like telefone bills, and 60% is for my parters and mine. Please, you have been adviced to keep top secet as we still in cival service and intend to retire from service after we concude this deal on you.”

Auditing and accounting, he might be able to do (I doubt it), but writing and spelling? Puhlease.

So, Dear Skunky responds as only Dear Skunky does in these situations:

Dear Caribou Ahmed,

I was both intrigued and bemused by your effort to give me the business here. Intrigued by the plan, and bemused by the somewhat rough, unkempt, lacking in professional appearance and presentation format.

But, I am going to help you. I am going to help you because it is my duty to help you. And it is my pleasure to help you. Of course, you offer me a fee, and I would be remiss not to expect something in return for my help. But more on that later.

Frankly, Caribou, your presentation needs much work to be effective, and have a professional appearance so as to allow you to more effectively convey the message of giving this business you wish to give. So, I have undertaken to tweak, correct and refine your appeal. Use this new template early and often, and you’ll score like a bad-toothed gigolo in a karoake bar on Sunday night:

My good friend (fill in with name if you have one),

I am Caribou Ahmed, a person of dubious antecedence who screws* monkeys when women reject me, as is often the case since I’m 5′ tall and 450 pounds of pure, rancid blubber. But this is not about me, it is about you and what I can do with you.

In 1999, some real schlock of a foreigner deposited a tremendous sum of money in the bank I make like I work for. I think it was something like $50 MILLION US DOLLARS, or better with the current world economy, EUROS. Shortly thereafter, he was killed while learning that you can’t herd lions with a cattle prod, mounted on a Vespa. It just didn’t work out, even if the gas mileage was great, and the lions apparently appreciated the easy feast. Anyway, by random chance, I am in a position to access these funds, but because of my position at the bank – I’m really a night shift janitor – I am denied access,without a foreigner to help me. So I need you, a foreigner, to claim to be the next of kin to the inept dead lion herder. For your help, I will let you believe you’re entitled to 40% of the total fund, while I get the other 60%, which of course is all crap, but you don’t need to read that into this now.

What I need from you is complete trust, sincerity, ethics, and the biggest lack of common sense anyone’s had since this yutz went after lions on a Vespa. You give me that, and I’ll be more than happy to screw* you over financially, and make myself a hero among my friends and peers here in this fly-infested tent that serves as an ad hoc internet café, that smells of wildebeest feces.

Write to me now at karbiru_ahmed2009 (at) yahoo (dot) com, and let me begin the process of self-gratification* at your expense.

Sincerely,

Caribou Ahmed, a camel gratifier* from somewhere Middle Eastern

* diluted from the more expressive metaphor used here in original text

I then concluded at the end of the aforementioned text:

So you see, Caribou, that this new and improved revision for you took some time and effort on my part, and I am sure will generate for you no end of results of some kind, if not the kind originally intended. Therefore, seeing the potential gain you may derive from it, I expect to be generously compensated for my services. Send a certified cheque for $250 to me here: J. C. Howard Linguistic Enterprises, Inc., 4334 Whittier Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90023. I accept certified cheques, Mastercard or Visa. I do not accept dinars, rubles, or merekat skins.

Sincerely,

J. C. Howard

PS: postage just went up here in the US, so kindly use sufficient postage to cover shipping and costs. Thank you.

It only took a day for Caribou Ahmed to overcome the feelings of appreciation I’m sure he was overwhelmed with, when confronted with the unexpected largesse Dear Skunky had so generously – and, if I may say so, cost-consciously – ladled on him, and he responds with a-typical scammer appreciation:

“Howard ,

what is this is never joke and shold not be joke with if realy you are willing to work with me jest must drop and get serous time is not on our side. my name is Karbiru , stop insut me.”

I probably should have left it at that. But Dear Skunky never lets an opportunity for a last word get by:

Caribou Achmed the dead terrorist,

Who, me kidding? I’m as serious as a porcupine enema. My time and effort to improve your scam letter was serious, and so is my bill. Send cash soonest. Time is on my side – I have a pocket watch – but how time works for you is your problem.

Oh, and I did send a copy of this letter to your bank; I thought it might help your position therein for a possible promotion, or at least some change in your status, when they see how you operate. No need to thank me, Caribou. It’s simply my generous nature.

Don’t use my letter until you pay me.

Sincerely…really…HONEST,

J. C. Howard

I am sorry to say that none of you will be receiving a copy of that letter from Caribou Ahmed, since he didn’t pay for the exclusive rights to use it, and make himself truly stand out amongst his fellow scammers.

To read more of the e-mail exchanges he’s had with scammers from around the world, visit his blog, Skunkfeathers. If you like his work, let us know by leaving a comment below.