Silure en Francais, Part Deux

As some of you may recall, back in late January I struck up a conversation with a woman in Belgium named Angella. We kept talking from time to time, but she was insistent that I buy her airfare to visit the US. I told her (in French) that I didn't have any money to spare; while that wasn't necessarily true, it kept Angella at bay for awhile. I still found it odd that she still didn't have any Facebook friends, so in late February I reported her profile. Even though she ended up in Facebook jail, she ended up creating a second account.

A change in location was the straw that broke the camel's back. Angella told me that she had a 10 day business trip in Mali, and that I could the money order for plane tickets to her hotel. She gave an address that didn't make sense, regardless of how I entered it in Google Maps. I told her I only had $100 to spare, but she insisted that I send at least $700; this way, she claimed, she could fly straight from Bamako to Chicago. I told her I wasn't comfortable sending a money order to a developing nation in Africa, but she kept begging me. One late evening (in the middle of the night wherever she was) I blocked her, then filed a complaint on the U.S. government identify thief page.  I'm no one's fool.

Even if "Angella" had invited me to call her via Facebook, there was just too much to be suspicous about. Since I blocked her on Facebook and Google Hangout, I have not heard a word from her. For now, it seems my concerns were validated. I thought I was getting scammed, and without giving away a red cent I alleviated the situation. Perhaps there is a 34-year-old single mom in Belgium (by way to Mali) that is absolutely clueless about social media, and she was lonely enough to strike up a conversation with a random American. I chose to believe it was a likely story.

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