Mrs. Maya Luis Needs Your Help: Ridiculous Scam Hits Lubbock

If you've spent any time with an email account or a phone, then you're well aware of all the ridiculous scams people try to pull.

Many of these scams come in the form of an email asking for you to urgently respond to something or a phone call about your car's extended warranty. They're usually along the lines of needing you to pay some non-existent bill, "secure" an account and many other variations. One of the most interesting scams I recently came across was in the form of an email from an elderly woman on her deathbed requesting that you take on her $5.5 million dollar inheritance.  

Get our free mobile app

Mrs. Maya Luis is a widow from Madrid, Spain who's very ill and looking for someone to give her millions to. Why does she want to give you her inheritance? Because she doesn’t want her evil brother-in-law, who apparently wants her dead, to get the money, and she knows you would do good things with it.  

How can you not feel terrible for this poor, elderly woman, withering away as her late husband's brother tries to steal everything they worked for. 

Well, this is what is known as a 419 scam.  

What's a 419 scam? Thanks for asking. A 419 scam is the term used for advance fee fraud based out of Nigeria. This is when a scammer impersonates someone and offers a reward of a large sum of money, but you have to pay a fee before the money can be sent. The scammer then takes the money you sent before cutting off contact. 

I wonder how many people actually get bamboozled by these scams? Maybe it's because I was raised in the digital age, but I almost never even open an email unless it's from someone I know or from a business that I'm expecting an email from. 

Keep an eye out for this 'Mrs. Maya Luis,' and if you got this email and thought about taking the deal...don't do it.