Lawyer Sues Citibank for Not Stopping Him From Losing Money in Nigerian Scam

A lawyer in Houston is suing Citibank after he got scammed in a variation on the classic Nigerian email scam. There are a few interesting tidbits here that are worth discussing. First, the details: The lawyer, who does collections work, was contacted via email by a company that claimed to be a Japanese company that was trying to collect money from four clients in the U.S.–offering a contingency fee to the lawyer for help in getting the customers to pay up. Soon after that, the “Japanese company” claimed that one client had agreed to pay some of what it owed–and it sent the law firm a check for $367,500. Citibank said the check cleared, and the law firm wired $182,500 to the company. Of course, it later turned out that the check was fraudulent, and the law firm was out the $182,500.

This is a variation on a popular version of the Nigerian email scam. The way it usually works is that the scammer buys something that’s for sale… and then sends a check that’s for significantly more than the purchase price using some sort of excuse. Once the check “clears,” the seller is asked to wire back the excess money.

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