Ratiated tortoise scam?

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RichardS

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Anyone seen this ad?
http://www.stumblehere.com/classifi...es-for-sale--clovidas-farms-yahoo-com--376269

The seller basically advertises in multiple states (AK, IN, AL, AZ, NC) using this email address: [email protected]

The ads read like this: "Hello, i am a Breeder of all Tortoise Breeds. I have tortoises ranging from males, females, babies to breeding pairs of all the breeds listed below and so many more . Elegans Tortoises, Radiated Tortoises, Egyptian Tortoises, Leopard Tortoise, Galapagos Tortoises, African Spurred and Sulcata Tortoises. If you are interested get back to me for more information and pictures"

When I emailed the seller, this is the response I got:
"Richard!
Yes i have Radiated tortoises for sale. below you are going to find the price list.
babies..................$195
Juveniles................$280
breeding pairs.................$600 ( for sexually active male and female )
adults........................$350
you go through the price list and let me know how many tortoises would like to buy. males and females? where are you located? do you have a permit to keep these tortoises? if not, then you let me know so that when i give you the tortoises i give you a permit also. how do you plan to take care for the tortoises? ,what are you going to feed the tortoises with?, where do you plan to keep the tortoises? do you have experience with these animals? get back to me with answers and i will send you pictures and will let you know if there is a shipping fee included. if also you have any questions about the tortoises you want to buy, ask them and I will provide you will answers.
waiting for your response.
Greetings
Charmaine"

Is this some Nigerian scam, a smuggler, or the USFW running a sting?

Thoughts??
 

Yvonne G

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Those prices seem pretty low for a radiated tortoise....to my uneducated eye. I'll bet its a scam.
 

RichardS

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The prices are too low, the english is terrible and what the h*ll does this mean: "do you have a permit to keep these tortoises? if not, then you let me know so that when i give you the tortoises i give you a permit also."
 

Millerlite

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see where you have to send the money to, also see if he goes through a 3rd party shipper, those are good signs.
 

egyptiandan

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Nigerian scammer all the way :p It's always fun to string them along and waste their time though ;)

Danny
 

RichardS

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Here is the latest:

"I am sorry but i am not from USA. But i have shipped into US just this month. so it is not going to be a problem. I am in Yaounde Cameroon. if you need tortoises, then i will ship from here. if you need them , can i have your order please?"
 

Seiryu

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RichardS said:
Here is the latest:

"I am sorry but i am not from USA. But i have shipped into US just this month. so it is not going to be a problem. I am in Yaounde Cameroon. if you need tortoises, then i will ship from here. if you need them , can i have your order please?"

Cameroon lol. Yep scammers. If you ever have been to craigslist in the pet section you will see a lot of the "higher end" birds like cockatoo's and amazon's from cameroon. Always asking for you to send the money there.
 

RichardS

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I had a job where I worked with people like this quite a bit. If you think they are bad over the internet, they are much worse in reality. The scary thing is that they must be successful on some level, or they wouldn't be doing this. I would imagine this person is running ads in China, India and Western Europe as well.
 

Neal

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This person or group of people are all over the internet...100% scam. I've seen these ads on multiple classified sites for a long time now, and you can tell very quickly if it's a scam or not. Poor English and claims to be selling an unlimited amount of high end tortoises for dirt cheap are the major indicators. Good rule of thumb is - if it seems too good to be true, it likely is!
 

spikethebest

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i have people even send me their CITES permits to get me to send them cash....lol. the permits are 100% fake, but look pretty!
 

ZippyButter

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These people will do anything to scam innocent people for a few hundred bucks.....the latest thing that circulates on Craigslist is car for sale....expensive late model car for sale for less than $3000.00. I guess buyer beware, and don't send or leave your hard earned money until you see and inspect your merchandise first.
 
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