Sarah over at Acme Bicycle emailed this to me this AM, which I’m posting here in the hope that it might help:
it has come to the attention of acme bicycle company
in kansas city missouri
that someone from ontario callifornia
has used our return address
on ups envelopes
mailing out fraudulent checks
in the attempt to steal from good folks such as yrselves
the local police(in kc and many other cities involved)
and the fbi are well aware of this activity
and are trying to nab the a**hole
what i wanted to do was first
warn you guys n gals
in case yr making an internet sale
particularly craigs list at present
this person from ontario callifornia
is sending out big fat checks
the typical internet scam
twice the amount of sale
hoping youll cash the check
and give them back their “change”
second
we want to let you know
we are not involved in this crap
and are doing everything we can to bring it to a stop
the friends and family of acme bicycle company
are pissed off about the whole deal
and wanted to let this thief
know how they feel
http://flickr.com/photos/acmebicycle/sets/72157600049497962/
peace
Non-Original Thought - I know that it has been observed that there’s one born every minute, but it astounds me that folks fall for this method. While online, people seem reasonably predisposed to believing the most egregious types of scams. Now, I’m not talking about high quality cons, but these stupid, petty, what-the-hell-were-you-thinking? kinda things… For example, if this souless predator is hanging out on Craigslist, the patsy would’ve had to ignore this and the ever-present “Avoiding Scams & Fraud…” warning with the link, which appears in RED ALL CAPS on every main page (and another on every individual listing page…). Look, if I appeared next to you at a bar, and tried to write you a check for twice the amount of a round of drinks and have you give me the change, you’d have me in a hammerlock and hustle me out the door in an instant. Why is it so easy to believe on the internets? (And of course, I reckon that you - that is the person reading this - has things a little better figured out than the gremmie who gets suckered by this stuff.)
Note to the Thief - What squirmy little idjit wants to piss off the collected bicycle muscle of Kansas City, MO? I mean, these are not delicate, bird-boned, Southern-California-centric, 14.5 pound bike-riding, non-confrontational, let’s-discuss-our-feelings-about-this kinda folks. They have heavy frame alignment tools and own welding apparatus. They ride their bike through endless winters and handle hardships with an ease that should make you a bit worried. They have friends with farms, farms with large expanses of little-visited topography, where the winds would make your cries no more than a tiny mosquito-like buzzing. If anyone could even hear them. If anyone cared if they did hear them. Amtrak can get a car full of KC’s toughest to Ontario in under 63 hours. They may be on their way now. In short, you’d best hope the FBI does catch you first… You should just box up all those faked checks and march down to your local police station and turn yourself in, pleading for protective custody.
Working hard to make common sense common once more…
UPDATE from Sarah:
Fri, 13 Apr 2007 15:55:03 +0000Subject: [BOB] naming a thief and i dont mind if i doups had found the culprither name is michele garciashe lives in reseda californiaand the feds r on her a**peace ** __(AT)** = \<._*** (_)/ (_) “Dream like you’ll live forever, live like you’ll die today.” James Dean
April 13th, 2007 at 9:11 pm Wow!! I was sent my check ups with your company on it last week!!! The check came back counterfeit and I just thought i would look up your company and I found this!! Well I have emails and names that have most likely been changed, who do i get my info to??
April 14th, 2007 at 8:24 am I would contact sarah directly at acmebicyclecompany.com
There has been a final followup which I just posted on the main blog entry. It seems they’ve found a suspect in the caper.