WARREN — Working with the San Francisco Police Department, detectives here helped recover nearly $9,000 in computer equipment on its way to Nigeria.
Lt. Gary Vingle said detectives in San Francisco called Warren police April 24 after learning the equipment was delivered to a home on the city’s southwest side.
A manager at Townsend Networks said someone claiming to be an employee of 3M Corp. sent an e-mail request for five computer routers and five multi-part ethernet switches in mid-April. The total value of the merchandise was $18,475, not including shipping.
Townsend shipped the order April 16 to a home in Warren, which was the address listed on the invoice. After no payment was received, the manager called San Francisco police on April 24, Vingle said.
After some investigation, police discovered the man who placed the order was posing as an employee of 3M and had created a fake Web site that mimicked the site of the actual 3M Corp., Vingle said.
Detective Wayne Mackey said the scenario had a familiar ring and realized he saw an identity theft segment by Chris Hansen on ‘‘Dateline NBC’’ about Internet scams based in Nigeria. He said the international scams involve people living in the United States who are contacted through Internet chat rooms with offers of money to accept shipments from various companies and then reship them to Nigeria.
‘‘Most companies in the United States will not ship products to Nigeria without prepayment because these scams are so prevalent. So the Nigerian scammers have to find a middle man,’’ Mackey said.
He said he and Vingle went to the Warren home, where the resident admitted receiving 10 items over the past several weeks. Mackey said the resident did not open the boxes, but put them inside a larger box to ship them to Nigeria.
‘‘The seals were still on the original boxes so he had no idea what was in there,’’ Mackey said.
The resident did not ship the first set of boxes without receiving payment from the Nigerian company. Mackey said the resident received more than $900 via Western Union for the shipping costs, but never received the large amount of money promised for agreeing to the job.
The name on the Western Union receipt was John Knoll, but Mackey said it’s doubtful police will be able to track down the person’s real name or location.
‘‘This is a nationwide problem. People are being pulled into these scams all over and this one happened to land in our backyard,’’ Mackey said.
He said the resident is being extremely cooperative and will not be charged because police consider him a victim.
Police recovered the five computer routers, valued at $1,800 each, that the resident had not yet shipped. Mackey said they’re in the process of stopping delivery on the other shipment.
‘‘The resident didn’t lose any money, but he is really embarrassed about the whole situation,’’ Mackey said.
mkosinski@tribune-chronicle.com
