A scam in which the perpetrator claims to be a Spanish Lawyer seeking to dispose of a late client’s assets has found its way to Yorkton.
In a letter on official looking stationery addressed to Yorktonite Wade Karcha who, immediately recognizing its illegitimacy turned it over to Yorkton This Week, supposed barrister Rafael Caracuel Garcia lays out the tale of woe of Canadian business magnate Martin Karcha. Martin Karcha, it is stated, was a resident of Spain for 12 years, but, along with his entire family, died in the Sichuan disaster of 2008 while vacationing in China.
It is these kinds of details that are designed to lend credibility to the claim. A quick Google search confirms the deadly earthquake of May 12, 2008 killed nearly 90,000 people. It is not so easy to verify if an ex-pat named Martin Karcha and his family were among them. Scammers count on the fact potential victims, motivated by greed, will not dig too deeply.
Martin Karcha, apparently, was a wealthy man, whose estate consists of $11.2 million U.S. dollars on deposit in a Spanish bank. The lawyer has been diligently trying to locate a true relative of Mr. Karcha, but has been unsuccessful. Now, all that beautiful money is about to be liquidated under Spanish law. The attorney is desperate not to let that happen and has turned to finding a Canadian who legitimately has the same surname to pose as next of kin.
Garcia acknowledges this is a less than ethical solution and apologizes if the “business proposition offends your moral values.”
Another nice touch to put the mark at ease that he will not be pressured into doing something against his personal ethics.
Five and a half million bucks, however, might give even the most moral of persons pause. The idea is that the local Mr. Karcha and the Spanish lawyer will split the pot 50-50.
It also establishes it is a sketchy deal and therefore must be kept quiet.
“Please mind you that we don’t need to make undue publicity as this can hamper the process taking into cognizance that we are not quite sure if you’re really related,” the letter states. “Discretion must be maintained.”
This is another in a long line of derivations of the “Ethiopian Prince” scam. Ultimately, in order to collect the booty, the victim ends up having to turn over all his banking information so that the transfers can be made. It’s just that the transfers end up going the other way.
The RCMP are warning people to be wary of this and anything else that sounds like it is too good to be true because it almost invariably is.
People who become aware of fraudulent activities can report it at antifraudcentre-centreantifraude.ca or by calling 888-495-8501.
