District attorney warns residents about 'El Gordo' lottery scam

Wednesday, June 14, 2006 posted 11:04 AM EDT

Your name is supposedly on a list of lottery winners, but in reality your name is really on a list of potential scam victims.

Authorities have recently been tracking a number of scams running through the area, the newest of which tells the intended victim they've won the "El Gordo" Spanish Sweepstake Lottery.

"We've seen this from a couple of people now," District Attorney Scott Andreassi said yesterday. The latest report of the scam came from the Dayton area, where letters were being sent through the mail. The scam artists also target people through e-mail, the district attorney said.

In the "El Gordo" scam, a person is notified that they've won the international promotions lottery, and need only fill out a form, which includes their bank account information, to receive a prize of several hundred thousand dollars.

"Don't do it, please don't it," Andreassi said of returning information.

The hallmarks of the "El Gordo" letter, as with many scam letters, is poor English and a request for up-front funds to claim a larger amount of money. The scams are called "419 Scams," named after a section of Nigerian law dealing with fraud.

Andreassi said the people behind "El Gordo" are behind many similar 419 scams and need only hook a few people to make a lot of money.

He said people should take pains to safeguard personal information such as bank account information, social security number and the like.

"Be very (cautious) with your personal information."

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