Warning over latest lottery scam
Last Updated: Thursday 15th July 2010, 13:37
Police are giving our warnings in the Avon and Somerset areas of the UK over the latest lottery scam where one pensioner has already lost £7,000. The telephone lottery scam centres round the Spanish Lottery and police are concerned that elderly and vulnerable people could be especially at risk. The scam works in the same ways as many scams that have been aimed at UK Lottery players.
The ‘lottery winner’ is contacted by telephone and told they have won a large amount of cash on the Spanish Lottery draw. Then they are told they must pay admin fees and taxes on their lottery win before they can claim their winnings.
One unnamed pensioner from Avon and Somerset was called and told he had won a big prize on the lottery and he handed over £7,000 in cheques into a Western Union deposit box. After parting with his cash and not receiving any more contact he contacted the police and this new lottery scam came to light.
Lottery scammers are notorious difficult to catch as they often operate from the other side of the world. They can be telephone, postal or email based and work because all of us would love to believe we have won a large amount of money.
If you haven’t bought lottery tickets for any lottery around the world then you can’t possibly be a lottery winner and the main thing to remember, and ensure you don’t get caught out by one of these scams is, if something seems to good to be true, then it probably is.