There's a Thief About.

Shooter wrote:

So this is how Paypal look upon Fraud, they don't call it theft, they say
it's "Non Delivery Of Item" thus allowing them to play silly buggers while
the fraudster spends the money sent to him. I think PayPal have a nasty
smell about them and should advertise Fraud Is Fun. Ebay have the same could
not care less attitude, having tried to find out about him, if you type his
email address in find all you get is the feedback and percentage and a
message saying, "Because you have not had dealings with this person in the
last 60 days we are unable to give you further details". The meaning of this
is that everybody in the world who log on to Ebay will never know if they
have looked at an auction this frauster is running, Now how safe is that.

My own opinion is that fraud is a specific type of theft, and "Non
Delivery of Item" would be a specific type of fraud. However, I'm no
legal professional by a darn sight, and besides, I'm in the US and
you're not. Different country, different rules.

That said, I believe you have to give Paypal bank account information
when you sign up as a seller. I might be wrong about that, because it's
been a long time since I signed up. I signed up with Paypal before Ebay
bought the company, and the rules have changed several times over the
years. But, I can't imagine them getting less strict in that regard. So
they know where to go to get the money, unless of course that account is
no longer valid. The trouble is, they can't just go there and get the
money without permission. Then THEY would be accused of theft.

Unless Paypal has told you, "We've done all we can do to resolve this
claim," you're being too impatient. It takes time to access somebody's
bank account without their permission. You have to be sure of your
ground, and probably have to go through the courts. Investigation takes
time, and the courts move slowly. Those things are the same no matter
which country you're talking about.

I know it's maddening, but be patient.

TJ

I don't know a lot about the law in the UK, but in the US and Canada you
can report fraud like this to the Attorney General's Office for each
state involved, as well as to the Postal Fraud division if any of the
transaction did or was to take place using their services. This will
give him a record with those organizations. In some cases, they may
even intervene and demand the goods or refund of money be sent to you by
the person. I had one case where the NYC Attorney General's office
took on a case for me over an internet fraud sales transaction and
warned the guy he would have a permanent record with them if he did nor
make good on his sale. It took him nearly a year but he delivered the
goods.

Art


Shooter wrote:
Thanks for the replies, no one feels worse that I do at this time at been
taken in, I am most careful in all my transactions. Paypal offer no
protection in sending money unless the purchase is made with Ebay. Their
Status in Send Money fails to work. When you email them they start a dispute
which is their way of dragging their feet. You then make a claim and have to
wait another 10 days on top of the posible 20days the dispute takes to give
the thief time to reply to an email they send, that's really a joke, a thief
returning money to the person he has robbed.

Now comes the rub, the money I sent to the fraudster through PayPal went
into his Paypal account and because of the time they took he was spending it
on Ebay, I had to sit and watch his feed back increase from the day he
received the money until PayPal after sixteen days took what was left from
his account, the amount of £5.45, over £200 had gone.

How do I know this, well it is unlikely a fraudster would have the money
forwarded to a bank, to much of a trail back to him so he used Paypal as a
bank and withdrew what is required to pay his Ebay commitment, as I say
leaving just over a fiver in the account.

So this is how Paypal look upon Fraud, they don't call it theft, they say
it's "Non Delivery Of Item" thus allowing them to play silly buggers while
the fraudster spends the money sent to him. I think PayPal have a nasty
smell about them and should advertise Fraud Is Fun. Ebay have the same could
not care less attitude, having tried to find out about him, if you type his
email address in find all you get is the feedback and percentage and a
message saying, "Because you have not had dealings with this person in the
last 60 days we are unable to give you further details". The meaning of this
is that everybody in the world who log on to Ebay will never know if they
have looked at an auction this frauster is running, Now how safe is that.

If anyone comes across this person be aware that you will loose your money
so please let me know any details you may find.



"Shooter" wrote in message
...
I saw an advert in a magazine called Macromart, well known and well read
weekly. The item was an A3 printer, the private advert looked good, not to
expensive but not to cheap, it stated preferred payment PayPal, I ran the
email address through Ebay and it told me he had a feedback of thirty odd
with 97.7% positive feedback.

I paid after a couple of emails from him, I sent the money through PayPal
to the email address he had given in Macromart. That was the last I heard
from him, I started a dispute with PayPal and have got nowhere, infact
they insisted on waiting ten days to see if he replied to their emails and
nothing, of course he had cleared out his PayPal account in that time.they
then asked him to return the money, what a joke, any one know of a thief
retuning freely the money he has stolen.

I am asking this group if anyone may have come across this Thief, he is
using multi addresses one is the other we have found
as Because of data protection both Macromart
and PayPal refuse to pass any details to me, seems a thief has the same
protection as an honest person. he now has my postal details and I have
nothing about him. He could be anywhere in the world or the person living
next door.

The Police have been informed and I have a crime number but at this time
they have not found him. I have no complusion in broadcasting his email
addresses, I do however hope someone may know a little more than what I
have been able to obtain. I apologise in advance if anyone thinks this is
off topic, I think otherwise. Thank you.

Thanks Art, we have the FSA They are the governing body for the banks and
give companies like PayPal a licence to operate as a bank in the UK, inreal
terms it means that PayPal have to have an address in the UK.

PayPal because of the many customers who may wish to litigate tell customers
that their offices are in Europe thus discouraging many from County Court
proceedings, as in your country it would be the Attorney Generals Office. In
the UK they would only be interested in Large scale fraud, but because
PayPal have a UK office they are subject to the UK court system.

I have been considering this road for some time and it may be my only way to
get at this fraudster, the problem is, all I have is an email address at
this time so I would have to go to a County Court and ask that the
fraudsters details be released under the UK Data Protection act 1998 section
35.2 which allows the protection given to be lifted in the case of theft.
However, the UK Police are also trying to find this person and would be able
to give me his details as well as prosecute. Again the problem is PayPal,
it's now over two weeks and they have not replied as yet to the police
request. Well and truly stuffed comes to mind.

"Arthur Entlich" wrote in message
news:mo4Ij.12978$rd2.9593@pd7urf3no...
I don't know a lot about the law in the UK, but in the US and Canada you
can report fraud like this to the Attorney General's Office for each state
involved, as well as to the Postal Fraud division if any of the transaction
did or was to take place using their services. This will give him a record
with those organizations. In some cases, they may even intervene and
demand the goods or refund of money be sent to you by the person. I had
one case where the NYC Attorney General's office took on a case for me over
an internet fraud sales transaction and warned the guy he would have a
permanent record with them if he did nor make good on his sale. It took
him nearly a year but he delivered the goods.

Art


Shooter wrote:
Thanks for the replies, no one feels worse that I do at this time at been
taken in, I am most careful in all my transactions. Paypal offer no
protection in sending money unless the purchase is made with Ebay. Their
Status in Send Money fails to work. When you email them they start a
dispute which is their way of dragging their feet. You then make a claim
and have to wait another 10 days on top of the posible 20days the dispute
takes to give the thief time to reply to an email they send, that's
really a joke, a thief returning money to the person he has robbed.

Now comes the rub, the money I sent to the fraudster through PayPal went
into his Paypal account and because of the time they took he was spending
it on Ebay, I had to sit and watch his feed back increase from the day he
received the money until PayPal after sixteen days took what was left
from his account, the amount of £5.45, over £200 had gone.

How do I know this, well it is unlikely a fraudster would have the money
forwarded to a bank, to much of a trail back to him so he used Paypal as
a bank and withdrew what is required to pay his Ebay commitment, as I say
leaving just over a fiver in the account.

So this is how Paypal look upon Fraud, they don't call it theft, they say
it's "Non Delivery Of Item" thus allowing them to play silly buggers
while the fraudster spends the money sent to him. I think PayPal have a
nasty smell about them and should advertise Fraud Is Fun. Ebay have the
same could not care less attitude, having tried to find out about him, if
you type his email address in find all you get is the feedback and
percentage and a message saying, "Because you have not had dealings with
this person in the last 60 days we are unable to give you further
details". The meaning of this is that everybody in the world who log on
to Ebay will never know if they have looked at an auction this frauster
is running, Now how safe is that.

If anyone comes across this person be aware that you will loose your
money so please let me know any details you may find.



"Shooter" wrote in message
...
I saw an advert in a magazine called Macromart, well known and well read
weekly. The item was an A3 printer, the private advert looked good, not
to expensive but not to cheap, it stated preferred payment PayPal, I ran
the email address through Ebay and it told me he had a feedback of
thirty odd with 97.7% positive feedback.

I paid after a couple of emails from him, I sent the money through
PayPal to the email address he had given in Macromart. That was the last
I heard from him, I started a dispute with PayPal and have got nowhere,
infact they insisted on waiting ten days to see if he replied to their
emails and nothing, of course he had cleared out his PayPal account in
that time.they then asked him to return the money, what a joke, any one
know of a thief retuning freely the money he has stolen.

I am asking this group if anyone may have come across this Thief, he is
using multi addresses one is the other we have
found as Because of data protection both
Macromart and PayPal refuse to pass any details to me, seems a thief has
the same protection as an honest person. he now has my postal details
and I have nothing about him. He could be anywhere in the world or the
person living next door.

The Police have been informed and I have a crime number but at this time
they have not found him. I have no complusion in broadcasting his email
addresses, I do however hope someone may know a little more than what I
have been able to obtain. I apologise in advance if anyone thinks this
is off topic, I think otherwise. Thank you.

Well, good luck.

I had another case where I bought something on line via a for sale
newsgroup (this is almost pre-ebay) and again no delivery of goods. I
discovered the guy was working as a post grad at a university and was
employed by them as well. I did some detective work and was able to
find out he had defrauded several other people as well.

I wrote a letter to the dean of the university informing them of the
quality of graduate students and employees they had, but they were less
than interested, other than to tell me that he had just graduated, after
waiting months to reply.

Then I teamed up with one of the other people he defrauded and together
we found his new employer. We both emailed him that he had 10 days to
issue us certified checks (or cheques ;-)) for the full amounts he owed
and if not received we were reporting him to his new employer (he was a
coder working for a IT company). This wasn't a bad debt which you
cannot report to an employer under most circumstances, this was outright
fraud he was involved in and we had documented proof, and he was working
on potentially high security internal stuff. He tried to "negotiate" a
smaller payment but we both stood on principle and demanded full
payment. Well, the cheques showed up within days and were good. We
informed all the other people we knew of who he had defrauded to demand
payment as well. Sometimes you have to play hardball.

Art


Shooter wrote:
Thanks Art, we have the FSA They are the governing body for the banks and
give companies like PayPal a licence to operate as a bank in the UK, inreal
terms it means that PayPal have to have an address in the UK.

PayPal because of the many customers who may wish to litigate tell customers
that their offices are in Europe thus discouraging many from County Court
proceedings, as in your country it would be the Attorney Generals Office. In
the UK they would only be interested in Large scale fraud, but because
PayPal have a UK office they are subject to the UK court system.

I have been considering this road for some time and it may be my only way to
get at this fraudster, the problem is, all I have is an email address at
this time so I would have to go to a County Court and ask that the
fraudsters details be released under the UK Data Protection act 1998 section
35.2 which allows the protection given to be lifted in the case of theft.
However, the UK Police are also trying to find this person and would be able
to give me his details as well as prosecute. Again the problem is PayPal,
it's now over two weeks and they have not replied as yet to the police
request. Well and truly stuffed comes to mind.

"Arthur Entlich" wrote in message
news:mo4Ij.12978$rd2.9593@pd7urf3no...
I don't know a lot about the law in the UK, but in the US and Canada you
can report fraud like this to the Attorney General's Office for each state
involved, as well as to the Postal Fraud division if any of the transaction
did or was to take place using their services. This will give him a record
with those organizations. In some cases, they may even intervene and
demand the goods or refund of money be sent to you by the person. I had
one case where the NYC Attorney General's office took on a case for me over
an internet fraud sales transaction and warned the guy he would have a
permanent record with them if he did nor make good on his sale. It took
him nearly a year but he delivered the goods.

Art

Arthur Entlich wrote:
Well, good luck.

I had another case where I bought something on line via a for sale
newsgroup (this is almost pre-ebay) and again no delivery of goods. I
discovered the guy was working as a post grad at a university and was
employed by them as well. I did some detective work and was able to
find out he had defrauded several other people as well.

I wrote a letter to the dean of the university informing them of the
quality of graduate students and employees they had, but they were less
than interested, other than to tell me that he had just graduated, after
waiting months to reply.

Then I teamed up with one of the other people he defrauded and together
we found his new employer. We both emailed him that he had 10 days to
issue us certified checks (or cheques ;-)) for the full amounts he owed
and if not received we were reporting him to his new employer (he was a
coder working for a IT company). This wasn't a bad debt which you
cannot report to an employer under most circumstances, this was outright
fraud he was involved in and we had documented proof, and he was working
on potentially high security internal stuff. He tried to "negotiate" a
smaller payment but we both stood on principle and demanded full
payment. Well, the cheques showed up within days and were good. We
informed all the other people we knew of who he had defrauded to demand
payment as well. Sometimes you have to play hardball.

Art


Hardball would have been to turn the guy in. I'm sure you've heard the
story of the former governor of New York State, Eliot Spitzer. He broke
several US federal laws, and as a result is no longer our governor - and
rightfully so.

What you did by grabbing your money and turning away was to knowingly
expose that IT company and all its customers to a potential security
breach. Perhaps several before the guy got caught. Maybe he had
reformed, but even if he did, if he fell on hard times who knows what he
might have done? After all, he got away with it once, didn't he? And
what if somebody else got to him later, somebody interested in getting
more out of him than simply getting their money back. What company
secrets would he have exposed to save his own skin?

The guy had no business being in a sensitive position, and his company
should have been informed of that.

TJ

Well, we'll agree to disagree in this matter. Sometimes one has to
allow for people to reform and give them the opportunity to prove
themselves as having done so. My hope is that this guy learned a
valuable lesson that it isn't that easy to get away with what he was
doing, nor was it righteous, and that there are consequences to actions.
I do believe people are capable of learning from their mistakes, and in
this case, it is much more the responsibility of his employer to be
watchful and careful of both who they employ and what those employees do
as it is for me to make assumptions about what that employee might do in
certain circumstances. Had I known for a fact that he was a security
risk, I would have not held back. We all need to weigh our word against
the real and apparent risks. In this case, I gave my word I would not
interfere with his work situation if he made proper restitution, which
he ultimately did. I was not out to ruin his life, but to both correct a
wrong and to hopefully provide a life lesson.

Since you brought it up, I was very disappointed in Mr. Spitzer's lack
of good judgment, not because he strayed or even that he was a
hypocrite, but because he betrayed those who were relying upon him to
protect them through the hard nosed approach he took to corruption and
sloppy bookkeeping practices. His personal indiscretions are of no
concern or personal interest to me, and are between him and his spouse,
similarly to Bill Clinton, and many others (it seems many men in
positions of power have a difficult time controlling their intimate
relations). That, in and of itself, doesn't make them bad at the other
things they do. He spent his own money buying sex. Unfortunately for
him, he also encouraged a pro to cross state lines for him which is a
federal offense, but not one I am particularly worried about when it
comes to high price call girls who chose that as a profession. I'm not
sure who we are protecting in cases like that which seem relatively
victimless.

What actually was much more disconcerting for me, was the reaction of
the brokers and traders of the stock market on hearing of Spitzer's
problems and ultimately his resignation. They cheered. What exactly
were they cheering about? Spitzer may have been a hard nose, but he was
helping to clean up a very dirty and corrupt monetary mess which has
defrauded millions of people of many millions of dollars. It makes me
realize those same people are still all there ready to pounce at the
next opportunity to cheat stockholders. Makes me want to sell off my
stock knowing what I'm up against. It means little guys do not have a
chance to make legitimate money investing on Wall Street when traders
oppose proper reformation and oversight.

Anyway, we've gone way off topic here, for which I apologize, but I'm
not convinced the world is black and white, and as much as I would
prefer everyone was honest and consistent, I also recognize that in
truth, we are all shades of gray, and in both the case of the individual
I was referring to and Mr. Spitzer, I have a similar point of view, that
it is not always appropriate to throw the book at someone when a couple
of thinner pamphlets would do. ;-)

Art


TJ wrote:
Arthur Entlich wrote:
Well, good luck.

I had another case where I bought something on line via a for sale
newsgroup (this is almost pre-ebay) and again no delivery of goods. I
discovered the guy was working as a post grad at a university and was
employed by them as well. I did some detective work and was able to
find out he had defrauded several other people as well.

I wrote a letter to the dean of the university informing them of the
quality of graduate students and employees they had, but they were
less than interested, other than to tell me that he had just
graduated, after waiting months to reply.

Then I teamed up with one of the other people he defrauded and
together we found his new employer. We both emailed him that he had 10
days to issue us certified checks (or cheques ;-)) for the full
amounts he owed and if not received we were reporting him to his new
employer (he was a coder working for a IT company). This wasn't a bad
debt which you cannot report to an employer under most circumstances,
this was outright fraud he was involved in and we had documented
proof, and he was working on potentially high security internal
stuff. He tried to "negotiate" a smaller payment but we both stood on
principle and demanded full payment. Well, the cheques showed up
within days and were good. We informed all the other people we knew of
who he had defrauded to demand payment as well. Sometimes you have to
play hardball.

Art


Hardball would have been to turn the guy in. I'm sure you've heard the
story of the former governor of New York State, Eliot Spitzer. He broke
several US federal laws, and as a result is no longer our governor - and
rightfully so.

What you did by grabbing your money and turning away was to knowingly
expose that IT company and all its customers to a potential security
breach. Perhaps several before the guy got caught. Maybe he had
reformed, but even if he did, if he fell on hard times who knows what he
might have done? After all, he got away with it once, didn't he? And
what if somebody else got to him later, somebody interested in getting
more out of him than simply getting their money back. What company
secrets would he have exposed to save his own skin?

The guy had no business being in a sensitive position, and his company
should have been informed of that.

TJ

Arthur Entlich wrote:
Well, we'll agree to disagree in this matter. Sometimes one has to
allow for people to reform and give them the opportunity to prove
themselves as having done so. My hope is that this guy learned a
valuable lesson that it isn't that easy to get away with what he was
doing, nor was it righteous, and that there are consequences to actions.
I do believe people are capable of learning from their mistakes, and in
this case, it is much more the responsibility of his employer to be
watchful and careful of both who they employ and what those employees do
as it is for me to make assumptions about what that employee might do in
certain circumstances. Had I known for a fact that he was a security
risk, I would have not held back. We all need to weigh our word against
the real and apparent risks. In this case, I gave my word I would not
interfere with his work situation if he made proper restitution, which
he ultimately did. I was not out to ruin his life, but to both correct a
wrong and to hopefully provide a life lesson.

Well, perhaps. I wasn't there and I had only your description to go by,
and it was wrong of me to jump to a conclusion without all the facts. I
too have maneuvered myself into a position where I had to weigh keeping
my word against what potentially might be the Greater Good, and I chose
to keep my word. It's no fun.

Since you brought it up, I was very disappointed in Mr. Spitzer's lack
of good judgment, not because he strayed or even that he was a
hypocrite, but because he betrayed those who were relying upon him to
protect them through the hard nosed approach he took to corruption and
sloppy bookkeeping practices. His personal indiscretions are of no
concern or personal interest to me, and are between him and his spouse,
similarly to Bill Clinton, and many others (it seems many men in
positions of power have a difficult time controlling their intimate
relations). That, in and of itself, doesn't make them bad at the other
things they do. He spent his own money buying sex. Unfortunately for
him, he also encouraged a pro to cross state lines for him which is a
federal offense, but not one I am particularly worried about when it
comes to high price call girls who chose that as a profession. I'm not
sure who we are protecting in cases like that which seem relatively
victimless.

Had Spitzer's only offense been a violation of the Mann Act, I wouldn't
be as adamant as I am. Spitzer's whole attitude of arrogance turned me
off from the time he started running for the governorship, so maybe that
colors my perspective. The infidelity isn't my problem with him,
although it's a symptom of the bigger problem. The hypocrisy is the big
thing with me. He seemed to think, whether consciously or not, that the
laws he swore to enforce shouldn't apply to him. That doesn't fly with me.

What actually was much more disconcerting for me, was the reaction of
the brokers and traders of the stock market on hearing of Spitzer's
problems and ultimately his resignation. They cheered. What exactly
were they cheering about? Spitzer may have been a hard nose, but he was
helping to clean up a very dirty and corrupt monetary mess which has
defrauded millions of people of many millions of dollars. It makes me
realize those same people are still all there ready to pounce at the
next opportunity to cheat stockholders. Makes me want to sell off my
stock knowing what I'm up against. It means little guys do not have a
chance to make legitimate money investing on Wall Street when traders
oppose proper reformation and oversight.

Anyway, we've gone way off topic here, for which I apologize, but I'm
not convinced the world is black and white, and as much as I would
prefer everyone was honest and consistent, I also recognize that in
truth, we are all shades of gray, and in both the case of the individual
I was referring to and Mr. Spitzer, I have a similar point of view, that
it is not always appropriate to throw the book at someone when a couple
of thinner pamphlets would do. ;-)

Spitzer's resignation WAS just a pamphlet. The Feds are still holding
the book while they investigate further, and from what is rumored that
book is getting bigger and bigger. He was getting more and more
ineffective as governor anyway. This just completely ruined any chances
that he would ever be effective in that role again, and just when our
state budget was coming due. He needed to go.

I too apologize for wandering off topic, and I have said all I have to
say on the matter. Art, if I have offended you, I apologize for that,
too. It was not my intention.

TJ

TJ wrote:
Art, if I have offended you, I apologize for that,
too. It was not my intention.

TJ

Absolutely no offense taken. I'm glad I was able to explain my actions
further.

Art