It's a conBy Chingford GuardianA BUSINESS owner and local police have hit out against mysterious African con artists attempting to trick people into revealing their bank account details. Cindy Mitchell, who runs Pat's Pet Sitters company from her Chingford home, has received three letters pleading for help to get people out of troubled Zimbabwe. Each one has offered her the chance to get rich quick, while at the same time helping a person escape the clutches of President Robert Mugabe. The letters state that the sender has a large amount of money but is unable to get it out of Zimbabwe. Each of the senders has asked for Mrs Mitchell's bank account details and has promised that, in exchange for holding the money, she can keep up to a quarter of it. But each letter is nothing more than a cynical ploy to rob people of their money by African con artists, police have warned. Revealing your bank account details could lead to your savings being stripped bare. Mrs Mitchell, 44, said: "The letters were all very similar. Each one was a sob story about how the person had all this money but was trapped in Zimbabwe until they could put it in a bank account outside the country. "It's quite a well known con and I would never have fallen for it because I've worked in the fraud department of a bank. I just ripped the first couple up, but by the time I got the third letter I thought it was worth contacting police because this was something that could fool other people. "It's quite a nice little letter that they send and if you didn't know any better, or if you were financially hard up, you might be tempted into handing over your bank account details." Police in Waltham Forest are well aware of the con and have been keeping an eye on it for some time, although they say that making prosecutions in Africa has proved difficult. They say that up to 20 per cent of people who are sent the letter hand over their bank account details. DS Mark Mills-Bishop of Chingford CID said: "I want to urge people not to get involved in this scam and to contact police if they have been targeted. "Once you give out your bank account details they can rob you of all your money. My message is that we simply do not live in a something for nothing world." Call the police on 8345 3117. Guardian staff have received e-mails, ostensibly from Amsterdam, from a man who claims his father was murdered in a land dispute in Zimbabwe after transferring more than ten million American dollars to a bank in the Netherlands. He offers to give us a percentage of the money if we go to Amsterdam to open a non-resident bank account into which the money can be transferred He ends his e-mail: "I implore you to maintain the absolute secrecy required in the transaction." 12:21 Thursday 30th January 2003
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