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Busted!: Woman Leads Fight Against Nigerian Fraudsters |
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By Daniel Balint-Kurti
LAGOS (Reuters) - Five years ago, three Nigerian men tracked Frieda Springer-Beck to her village in Bavaria, put a gun to her head and told her to drop charges against a man she accused of staging an elaborate international fraud.
Now the 54-year-old German woman's fight against Nigeria's notorious junk-mail conmen is starting to see results.
Since May, Nigeria's new anti-fraud unit, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), has arrested more than 200 people for junk mail scams, including the man Springer-Beck says duped her out of $360,000 in 1993.
The so-called 419 scam, named after the article in Nigeria's criminal code outlawing it, has become so successful over the last 20 years that campaigners say it is now one of the African country's biggest exports after oil, natural gas and cocoa.
The fraud swindles hundreds of millions of dollars every year from people around the world who respond to junk e-mails promising them a share of nonexistent fortunes in return for an advance fee.
I know through my own experience how you feel when you say you have been cheated. Nobody is in a position to help you or wants to listen at all, said Springer-Beck, who moved to Lagos last year to push ahead with her campaign.
In 1994 Springer-Beck formed the International Nigerian Interest Group, an association of fraud victims battling the swindlers through Nigeria's notoriously slow and corrupt justice system. The association is currently handling 89 cases.
None has led to a conviction and, up until May, the association had brought about only one arrest.
Nigeria's inaction over the fraud helped earn it the dubious distinction of the world's second-most corrupt country after Bangladesh from the sleaze watchdog group Transparency International.
Nuhu Ribadu, who heads the EFCC, said property worth $200 million has now been confiscated in connection with more than 30 cases now before court.
A member of parliament was among those arrested, and others are being held for the biggest ever 419 swindle, which was worth $180 million and brought down a Brazilian bank.
Our intention is to bring them to justice for the first time...to return the money to the victims, said Ribadu.
419 has destroyed the credibility of our country. As a result of this it is almost impossible to do business. No one takes us seriously, he said.
FAKE CENTRAL BANK
Springer-Beck's own 419 saga began in 1993, when a letter arrived for her recently deceased husband asking him to come to Nigeria to collect his interest on an investment in a Nigerian electricity plant.
She got in touch with the author of the letter, who recommended a lawyer to help her get all the information she needed. She took on the lawyer only after checking his credentials with the German Embassy.
On her first of several trips to Lagos, Springer-Beck was taken to what she thought were the offices of the Central Bank of Nigeria. Officials presented her with documents displaying her late husband's letterhead, showing he had invested a large, but undisclosed, amount of money in the country.
Today I know it was the building in front of the Central Bank of Nigeria, she said, adding that she was fooled by security guards wearing CBN uniforms at the gate.
Although doubtful at first, she eventually paid her lawyer the $360,000 he requested as a down-payment for staking her claim to the investment. After five months she realized she had fallen victim to a scam.
In August 1993, she tracked the alleged fraudster to his home in downtown Lagos and confronted him.
He laughed at me, called me a snake, she said. I told him if you don't give me back my money I will find a way you will never forget me.
In 1995 the lawyer was arrested and held on remand for two years only to be released without standing trial, and the case has been adjourned repeatedly since.
But in May this year, he was arrested again by the newly created EFCC, and charged with defrauding a Dutchman of $1.7 million.
Springer-Beck is optimistic.
The cases will be successful. It is only a matter of time. You can't change things at once which grew up over 20 years.
Source: Reuters
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