I’m a Nigerian scammer and these are the tips I used to fleece ladies

Rippling biceps, quick blond hair and a army uniform was the masks of alternative for Christopher Maxwell.

During 5 years as a romance scammer, Christopher, now 24, posed as an American military man to prowl social media platforms and relationship websites in the hunt for his subsequent sufferer, and efficiently tricked as much as 50 ladies into sending a complete of £55,400.

Speaking to Money Mail, the self-confessed reformed scammer reveals the misleading and merciless tips he used to seduce ladies throughout the English-speaking world from the UK to the US, Canada and Australia.

Christopher, who’s utilizing a pseudonym and now works as a marketing consultant at fraud-busting group Social Catfish, began scamming in 2016 as a method of constructing simple cash throughout his second yr of college in Nigeria.

‘I had no money and my family was broke so I had to do something. I chose to go into scamming,’ he says.

‘I know people might not understand, but I’m knowledgeable and it was my full-time job. It took months to get to that stage, like coaching on the job,’ he says. ‘I scammed every day of my life at the time.’

Christopher says he used a 40-page bible for scammers in Nigeria entitled How To Make A White Woman Fall In Love With You From Online Chat.

The e-book, which has been proven to Money Mail by SocialCatfish, presents a step-by-step information for love scammers with scripts of romantic phrases, dialog starters and questions that it guarantees will make susceptible individuals ‘fall head over heels in love with you’.

It says the sorts of ladies who’re ‘easier to get’ and who will ‘fall in love with you ASAP without much stress’ are these over the age of 40.

It says: ‘They are working hence they have the money you need. Also, being single at 40, they are eager for love.’

Once the goal is recognized, the playbook instructs scammers to do their analysis earlier than chatting up their ‘client’.

‘You will want to find out everything you can before chatting [to] her as this will help later on. Check her [social media] bio for information.

‘It can be her hobbies, her pets, job, passion, if she has kids, where she lives, what she loves etc.

‘You can take a pen and paper and list them [next] to her name. This is something I like doing.’

For the opening message, it recommends complimenting ladies on their actions or what they take pleasure in and asking a query regarding it. It says: ‘You want to go gentle and different. Do not send a “hi…” There are many people that have sent her hi before. You want to send something that will make her like you from the very first text. Something that will make her open your message and her heart for you.

‘For example, if on her Facebook profile she has pictures of her dogs you can use a line like: “Hi, I just spent the last 10 minutes debating if those cute dogs beside you are mountain shepherds or Belgian Malinois. Please help me here …they are super cute btw”.’

Another suggestion is: ‘You always have the best music in your stories! I’d like to swap playlists.’

Once the dialog is flowing, the e-book says to ‘make it about her’. It says: ‘Oyinbo women [a Nigerian term for Western women] like talking about themselves. They will think you care and will fall in love.’

Next, it instructs the criminals to go with ladies utilizing one in every of 60 urged phrases, akin to: ‘I can’t imagine I discovered somebody such as you’ and ‘Your mind is just as sexy as your beauty’.

Women are extra prone to messages at evening, it claims: ‘Get to know her time zone and text her around 10pm. Night is when you can easily get her to fall for you. You will have her full attention, and if the chat goes well, she will sleep thinking about you.’

Scammers are advised to take their time in asking for cash to construct belief first. It says: ‘Spend days talking about random things. It can be time-consuming, but it’s completely price it.’

When it involves asking for cash, it instructs to ‘ask without looking like you are asking’ for instance: ‘When she asks about your day you can tell her it was bad then tell her you are broke, you are behind your mortgage and they will kick you out next week and you have exhausted every means to get money.

‘By herself, she will offer to give you money. If you want a new phone you can tell her your phone is bad and you won’t be capable to chat anymore.’

These tips have been extensively utilized by romance scammers, together with Christopher himself. But did he really feel responsible for tricking lonely ladies? ‘No, I did feel bad at the start, but at some point I stopped,’ he says. ‘I was making good money. I never felt for these people and didn’t let any emotion kick in.’

Christopher says he was arrested in Nigeria however by no means charged over his romance scams.

He provides that he used social media platforms Facebook and Instagram to contact ladies in addition to relationship web sites. He primarily focused ladies of their 50s and 60s who seemed to be lately divorced or widowed.

‘I can take advantage of that. The dating apps make it easy because you can set your interest on your profile to a particular age and it brings up people of that age group,’ he says.

His profile confirmed footage of a person he had discovered on-line who was within the military and he advised ladies he was American and had been deployed to both Afghanistan, Israel or Korea.

Christopher says he had no prescribed opening line, however stated what got here to thoughts when that girl’s profile to personalise the message. At anybody time, he could be in a single or two relationships, chatting with ladies around the clock – from his lecture halls to the nighttime to make up for time distinction.

He would wait till he had gained their belief earlier than asking for cash. He says: ‘It would depend on the victim how long I waited to ask for money. I have gotten money in three days before but sometimes it takes months. I would make sure to message every single day.

‘One time I met this woman who had a boyfriend but she broke up with him because of me and was giving me $400 within a few days. I said I cared about her and I would do everything for her. She was 35 and white, working at a communications company. She gave me $400 (£317). We talked for four months,’ he says.

The 24-year-old says he had a variety of false excuses to ask for cash, which included saying he wanted cash to take a flight and spend the remainder of his life with the lady or to switch his uniform: ‘I started with small amounts and always said I would pay everything back.’

His largest windfall got here from a 61-year-old American girl, he says, who despatched him a complete $30,000 (£23,700) throughout their one-year relationship. However, she used Social Catfish, an organization that verifies on-line identities utilizing reverse picture searches, and was capable of monitor Christopher down.

When he was confronted by the lady whose life he ruined, he says he felt horrible and is completely happy he not has to rip-off to make a residing.

The National Crime Agency says that almost all of romance scams originate from fraudsters in West Africa – Nigeria and Ghana, particularly.

Christopher says he was open together with his girlfriends and defined why he was messaging ladies day and evening. ‘There’s a variety of poverty so lots of people go into it right here – they’re used to it so it was by no means an issue.’

Christopher reveals that the largest inform that you just’re chatting with a scammer is that if they received’t present their face through video name.

‘Avoid anyone who says they cannot meet because they are in the military or live overseas,’ he says. If they confess love too rapidly and demand the identical in return, it’s a rip-off.