Paul Smith
Complaint 132685 Details

I met this person through millionairedates.com website. I did not have a paid membership so i could not contact anyone. This person provided their email contact indirectly and i was able to contact him and we started communicating. He was the perfect match for me and i thought it was too good to be true. His profile indicated that he was from Allen, Texas; he was an engineer; he was widowed and had an only son. During our communication, he told me he was currently in the United Kingdom for the past 3 months on a contract supervising a bridge construction that was about to finish. His son was travelling with him and being home-schooled because he didnot have anyone to take care of him. After one week of communications he indicated his work was finished and he just got his check payment (2 large checks). But he had a small problem. He needed to go back to the US to cash his checks and return to the UK to pay his workers, but he didnot have enough money to pay for his plane tickets. This raised 100 red flags for me and I started to ask a million questions.
How could a rich businessman (who said in his profile that his income was 500,000.00 - 1million) run himself so low that he cannot afford 1500.00 to buy a plane ticket to go back home - not even on a credit card
His excuse was that he had used all his own funds for the project he was working on and was now being paid, but had to go back to the states to deposit the checks into his account and go back to pay the workers.
I made 101 suggestions since i have some banking work experience - none of which were good enough for him. He said he already notified his account manager who was expecting the deopsit to his account. I suggested why not fedex the check to the bank and let them deposit it to his account, then he can just withdraw the funds. I suggested trying to find a correspondent in the UK that could deposit the funds to his bank in the US. I suggested asking the company that gave him the check to take back the check and wire the money directly into his account so he could access the funds (it was a bank draft drawn from US Bank). None of my ideas were any help to what he claimed was a desperate situation. The only solution he could see to his problem was for me to send him the money to help him purchase the plane tickets. Trying to put me on a guilt trip, he claimed if i really cared about him i would send him the money; he would leave the Friday, come back on saturday, pay his workers and send me back my money. I tried to explain to him that i was a hardworking single parent, barely working for enough money to pay my monthly bills and buy enough food. I was hoping he would be in a position to assist me, and here he was almost demanding that i send him what little i had. I played along with him and told him that i was expecting some extra funds by the monday, but was not sure if it would come true definitely.
I couldn't believe how he was acting as if the rest of his life and he being able to pay his workers depended on a total stranger he had not even yet met but only communicated with after just one week. I told him if i was going to help him he had to give me some guarantee, like send me a copy of the check - he did so, but i had no way to verify if it was a valid check. I asked him to give me his US address and phone #. He sais he had disconnected his phone since he was away for so long. I asked him what was his last Telephone # and the # he gave me was a Dominican republic area code. When i told him the area code was incorrect, it seemed like he did not know what the area code is. When i told him the area code he gave me was for the Dominican Republic, he said he made an error and meant to put 806 and not 809. When i checked, 806 is an area code in Texas, but not in Allen, TX which has three area codes. when i asked for his house address, he gave me an address that i googled and found it was the address for a supermarket in Allen, Texas. When i told him that was not a residential address but for a supermarket, he replied he lived at the back of the supermarket and that the address he would give to someone so they could find where he lived. So i asked if one would have to pass through the supermarket to get to his house why he dont have his own address. He said he lived in an apartment building in the back. So i told him his profile stated how he enjoyed working on his one acre property - he replied that he did not say he lived on the property. He said he bought the land and has it to build his home and business on. Added to all this, I indicated in my profile and to him that i was a christian and looking for a godly relationship. I guess to gain my interest he kept saying how he knew for sure that it was God that connected me to him and i was the answer to his prayers to God. He even shocked me by telling me the sunday that he had gone to church when he already told me he had not been back to church since his wife died nearly two years ago. when i questioned why he decided to go to church, he said he wanted to pray to God and ask God to guide him. To top it off, on a wednesday morning, after all my questioning and his persisting that i find the money to send to him, he told me he was on his way to church for prayer. That's when i thought God is really working on him, or he is the biggest liar. He even wanted me to borrow money from my friends so that i could help him since i said i did't have any. I started to tell him how i started to realize the scammer that he was, but was just trying to see how far he would take it before giving up.
His last message to me was - " I am still in united kingdom and didnt have anyone to help me and all my co workers are complaining now"
Doesn't that sound like i am responsible for his status? I thank God that he had never done anything for me or given me anything, so i don't have to feel responsible or guilty about anything. I may not have any money - but i never said i was a dumb fool.
If i am wrong - may God forgive me for wrongfully judging
If i am correct - may God help him for bring God and God's name into his scam
For all those women out the looking for the real thing - i warn you to be overly cautious. They try to soften your heart and tell you what they know you want to hear, then make you feel obligated to do what the say and what they want.
I hope know one else has fallen into this trap
I hope there is something out there that can capture these people and do something.