Ahearn: It's why he loves Nigerian scams
Article published Oct 26, 2007
news-record.com
At this late date, most of us see the words "Australian lottery" on a piece of junk mail and deposit it directly into the circular file.
Ditto for those unsolicited e-mails from the first-born son of Liberian tribal chief and diamond dealer Jojo Swaray, in desperate need of help in transferring $19 million his murdered father secretly left stored in boxes.
He's so desperate, in fact, he'll give us a 30 percent cut. All he needs is — yup, you guessed it — our bank account number to do the transfer.
True, most people are beyond weary of see-through flim-flams, but not Marvin Cohen. He loves them, and he responds to every last one.
"I write back, 'How can I help?'" says Cohen, 60, a disabled vet who operates out of a tin-roof house in Rockingham County. "I play these people to the hilt. I'll have six or seven going at one time. Finally, they'll get so frustrated, they'll say, 'What kind of game are you playing?' "
Cohen's name may ring a bell. He's run colorful school board campaigns, been a bail bondsman, professional wrestler and host of the cable-access show "Piedmont Crime Control," where he was known to taunt accused criminals as "crybabies" and "phlegm-dripping liars."
Now that a nerve disease has sidelined him to a wheelchair, Cohen has trained his sights on counterfeit-check scams that the FTC says continue to bilk consumers out of hundreds of millions each year.
What's his system? Corresponding by e-mail, he first gives them the name of a real bank, but a fake account number. When the counterfeit transfer doesn't go through, the scammer contacts Cohen to ask why not.
"I say, 'Oh, I'm sorry, I made a mistake. I gave you the wrong number.' Then I give them another number," says Cohen, who meanwhile tells the Nigerian contact that he has wired the required "processing" or "shipping charges" — usually in the neighborhood of $5,000 or $6,000 — to receive his 30 percent cut.
"I'll have them using up their cell minutes, and running back and forth to Western Union two and three times," Cohen says. "They start complaining, 'I'm wasting my time and putting wear and tear on my vehicle.' I scam the scammers. I even had one threaten to call the FBI."
Apart from the fun of it, Cohen believes that by tying up con artists' time with his tricks, he may prevent them from preying on someone else.
Which isn't to say consumers who get hoodwinked are blameless. The schemes are painfully obvious — for example, the Helsinki, Finland "tourism minister" who has an office in China. Or the Nigerian National Bank officer who, despite his position, needs "help" to transfer money, and insists on Western Union.
Moreover, the scams are usually shady even if taken at face value. One was from a widow, "Suzan John," who was simply trying to access her dead husband's extorted millions. One of her e-mails to Cohen included a photo of the money in big steamer trunks.
"They play off people's greed," Cohen said. "If the public could just get it through their heads that there IS no $10 or $15 or $20 million sitting in a storage shed somewhere."
Cohen, using fictitious names, strings scam artists along for weeks and months, usually with the mention of his "trust account" with no fund limit. When even he finally tires of the game, Cohen gives them one last number to burn up their international phone minutes trying to reach him.
And that would be the number to the local police department.
Contact Lorraine Ahearn at 373-7334 or lahearn@news-record.com
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