Beware of the English Bulldog Puppy Scam

I have seen the lottery scams, work at home scams and several other scams, many of whom have landed in my email, usually in the junk mail thank goodness, but this one was new to me. It began with an email to my inbox, but was from someone I did not know. The subject simply stated Bulldog for Adoption and it had gotten passed by email junk filters. I opened the email and this is what I found:

MY NAME IS PASTOR WALLANCE CHARLES, I AND MY WIFE ARE ON A CHRISTIAN MISSIONARY TO WEST AFRICA AND I CAME ALONG WITH MY 2 ENGLISH BULLDOG BABIES, AFTER A WHILE I NOTIVE THAT THE AFRICA WEATHER HERE IS NOT GOOD FOR THE GORGEOUS BABIES AND I HAVE NOT BEEN ABLE TO TAKE GOOD CARE OF THEM THE WAY I ALWYAS DO BEFORE, BECAUSE OF MY JOB, I NEED SOMEONE WITH A GOOD HEART TO ADOPT THEM AND TAKE GOOD CARE OF THEM THE WAY I ALWAYS DO, IF YOU CAN TAKE GOOD CARE OF THEM DO SEND A REPLY AND I WILL E-MAILYOU THEIR RECENT PICTURES.
CONTACT ME FOR MORE INFORMATION: pastor.wallancecharles@yahoo.com
I HOPE TO READ FROM YOU
REGARDS
WALLANCE

Ok, I immediately begin to think this is a scam, so I search the internet for this man's name and find nothing. Then I searched for this man's name plus English bulldog scam and find nothing. So, with some doubt, I send him an email back:

First of all, how did you get my email address? If this is not some scam and you can prove it, I would be interested in helping you out, provided it does not cost a lot of money.

Now I have made contact with this supposed missionary, and am offering to help him out, but all the time knowing full well that this is more than likely another scam. In a few days I get a reply to my initial email:

Thanks for the mail and Sorry for the late response, I you can see that i`m a Man of God, I was busy althrough having special prayer with my new church member and motherless babies. I got your e-mail from a mail list in google and straight i sight your e-mail the lord revealed to me that you are their new parent. I will want you to get back to me as soon as you receive this message and some kind of prove that you will take good care of my babies whenever they get delivered to your lovely home.

Get back to me asap to enable me to forward your their present pictures.

God bless you.

Now I realize that this man may be a missionary working in Africa, but I am still skeptical about the whole situation. The first clue that seemed to scream scam was the email from him written in what appeared to be bad English, or from someone who has English as their second language. This email contained other clues such as him stating that my address had come from Google and that the "lord revealed " to him that I was the chosen one for his babies. However, there was still no mention of money, so I continued and replied to this email with my answer:

Please send the pictures, I would love to see your babies. I live out in the country in a large home. I already have two indoor dogs, a miniature schnauzer and a dachshund. I also have kennels with igloo doghouses for my dogs when there is some reason that they cannot stay in the house. Both of my dogs are crate trained and travel, etc. in their crates.

I have not discussed this with my husband yet, as I am out of state at the moment. So I need to have all the information collected before I contact him and discuss it with him.

How would the shipping work, do you know? I have never been involved in this type situation before. I will admit that with all the scams on the internet that I am still a little leery about this, but one thing is for sure, if this is a scam then God will get you.

Thanks for letting me consider this opportunity to help you and your babies,

Deborah Anderson

To my reply, he answered with another email and pictures of the puppies:

Thanks for the mail, I was so happy that you sound great to be my babies caring parent, My babies will be coming with all their necessary document such as AKC registered, Health Certificate, shot and vet check. I can make their shipping from here down to your lovely home all i need from you is your mailing address and the nearest airport to your home.

I must tell you to have believe in a Man that God sent to win many souls.

I hope to read from you

God bless you

I carefully read this latest email and looked at the pictures, still certain that this would end up just another internet scam, but once again there was no mention of money. I will have to admit that I was beginning to wonder what was really happening here and even had a fleeting thought that I may be actually getting these two beautiful English Bulldog puppies. I carefully answered his latest email with this reply:

The puppies are beautiful. The nearest airport to my home is Lake CharlesRegionalAirport in Lake Charles, Louisiana.

I patiently waited for the next email from him, wondering if it would be the one where he would want me to send him the money for these puppies, if they even existed, which I highly doubted, and soon I was not disappointed:

Hello Deb,

Thanks for the mail and sorry for the late response, I was bussy having special prayer with motherless children and my new church member. Do you want to pick them up at the Airport or you want them to get delivered to your door-step? If so your mailing address is needed.

I ask for $600 including with their shipping charge to your lovely home.

For immediate shipping arrangement i will want you to find my church member information that will help me to pick-up the money below.

RECEIVER`S NAME: GEORGE E. AUSTIN
ADDRESS: 101, CHRISTIAN AVENUE OKOTA. LAGOS
COUNTRY: NIGERIA

QUESTION: IN GOD
ANSWER: WE TRUST

And get back to me with the MTCN(10digt#) and the sender`s information as it is filled out in western union form.

I hope to read from you asap,And your phone# is needed to enable the shipping agent to contact as soon as they get close to you.

I can't wait to see my babies getting to their new home.

God bless you, Being a caring parent.

Finally, the email I had been waiting for, the one asking for the money to be sent Western Union to Nigeria. I am absolutely sure that this is a scam and once again did a search on Google, but this time I searched puppy scams and Africa and came up with what I had been looking for during the first search. Immediately I found www.fraudwatchers.org, which has a warning on from the Better Business Bureau and American Kennel Club about puppy scams such as this. With this in mind, I answered the latest email with this:

Does the $600 include the shipping charge? I would need details of the shipping in order to be able to decide if I want to pick them up or have them delivered.

This 'missionary' answered my email shortly:

Thanks for the mail, The $600 include with their shipping arrangement down to your location and i must tell you that money is not matter to me what matter most is my babies welfare as you can see that i really need a caring parent for my babies.

Let me know that amount you can afford because i want my babies to get ship-out of this harsh wether asap.

I hope to read from you

God bless you

Now this 'missionary' is stating that he is not worried about the money and I was almost suckered in again. But the little voice in my head kept saying, if it is too good to be true...so I answered once again, leaving the door open just incase this is not a scam:

I really don't have any extra money to help with the shipping, but it may be cheaper to send them to the airport in Houston and I could pick them up there. I feel like I need to explain that we are in the area where the hurricanes hit year before last and are still trying to recover from that, making money tight, I am sure you can understand. But I can promise that your babies will have a loving and caring family, if we can just get them here.

Ok, if money is no object, send the puppies, right? Nope, I received another email from him with a little different slant now:

Thanks and God bless you, May thy lord almighty be with you and help you in recover all your properties. I will love to ship-out my babies to you free since you sound great to a caring parent. But i`m expecting some a pay check from the state that i will want you to assist me on. I just got a phone call about 1hour now that a pay check will be issue out for a voluntary donation to the new Widow Program going on here in west africa.

If you can assist me in cashing-out the money, i will want you to for you information in which you can use to cash-out the money as soon as the check get sent to you. Because this will enable me to ,ake use out of the money in shipping your babies to you.

Because i can see that you are sceptical about all this transaction, I just want to use this great opportunity in making you have believe that there still a Man of God you still have to believe on.

I hope to read from you

God bless you

Now he wants to send me a check to cash and then I am to send the money back to him using Western Union. I have already heard of these scams. The check will bounce and the money will already be sent Western Union with no recourse to recover any funds. No, this is not happening either and I email him back to inform him that his latest scam was not going to work:

I am sorry, but I cannot help with the paycheck situation. If that hinders the process of the puppies being sent I am sorry. You already know that I am very skeptical about this whole situation and I feel like it is best that I not get involved any more than I have to. I really am sorry if this is an inconvenience.

I would like more information on the puppies, such as how old they are, what are their names, who the breeder was that you got them from (so I can get information on properly caring for them), and of course more pictures of these precious babies.

I do ask him to send more pictures of the puppies because I am sure that the pictures he sent me are stolen off the internet and there will not be any more of these two particular puppies to send. I am also interested in the breeder information, primarily for the same reason, just to verify if these puppies exist. I received an answer from him quickly:

Why are you skeptical over a Man Of God that have won meaning souls in the world. Let me know if truly you want to be a caring parent for my babies.

God bless you

It appears that I have ruffled his feathers with the latest request of more pictures and information on the puppies. I decide that I have had enough and inform him of it by sending him a final email that says that I am passing on the opportunity to adopt his babies. To my surprise, or not, he does not seem to get that I am aware of the scam he is trying to run. He sends one more email, which I thought was funny:

They are close to 4month now and their breeder is the lady that referred you to me, I name them Chapman-male while Beauty-female and they are ready to go home as soon as will both conclude on this transaction.

Let me know how care you care for this babies dont be nervours anymore Okay.

God bless you

Now, if you are lost, when I asked him how he got my email, he stated that it was from a list from Google and God had shown him that I was the person to adopt these puppies. Well from this last email, I have learned something that I was not aware of... God is a woman who breeds English Bulldogs and knows me well enough to refer me to someone else. By the way, I don't know any English Bulldog Breeders and have never had the pleasure of being an owner to one of these beautiful dogs.

I fully realize that internet scams come and go, but I felt like this one was somewhat different from the others that I usually delete out of my junk email box. If nothing else, it was interesting to see what angle the scammer would try next and hopefully it will prevent someone from falling for this trick and paying their hard earned money for a puppy that will never arrive. Now if two English Bulldog puppies find their way to my house from Africa with no monetary aide from me, I will quickly let you know.