Terry Scholes Associates

I have noticed that there have been a lot of fraudulent emails arriving in my junk folder on my Hotmail account. I thought it would be funny to reply to a few in the hope of luring the scammer into another one of my infamous wind-ups.

The current scam was from a man claiming to be 'Terry Scholes' who is representing the estate of the recently deceased Jurgen Krugger. Mr Krugger has left me some money in his will and Scholes has contacted me to break the news.

We're not talking pennies here, either. Jurgen, the man who I have never met in my life has left me fifteen million and one hundred thousand dollars. Not bad!

The problem is, I am cannot claim this money for reasons that will become clear. My solicitor, Mr Edward Muller had to break the news to him.

Dear Mr Scholes,
I am Edward Muller of Muller & Muller Solicitors and am accessing this email account on behalf of Mr David Taylor. Mr Taylor was unfortunately killed on the 6th of April under mysterious circumstances. Would it be possible for us to contact you to see if you can shed light on this matter? His family will be informed of this inheritance and we look forward to your hasty response.
Yours Sincerely,
Edward Muller
Muller & Muller

Mr Scholes responded to the email ignoring the fact that I had been killed 'under suspicious circumstances'. He sent a number of forms for me to fill in. My lawyer's partner had to read him the riot act.

My learned friend,
Did you read the email my associate sent you? We are working on behalf of the estate of David Taylor who has been killed under suspicious circumstances and have total access to all email correspondence and looking at possible clues towards his death. We implore you to send us more information regarding the dealings you have with Mr Taylor as well as evidence of a legal license. I do not know any legal firms based in The Strand and I certainly am not aware of a Terry Scholes Associates.
Are you new? If so, welcome to the brotherhood.
If you need any information regarding wotrking in the city then give me a call. Back to business, though.
We will require the information about your involvement with Mr Taylor as well as his last contact with you. He was found dead on the sixth of this month and to be perfectly honest with you it was very, very gruesome. A mafia kind of hit if you ask me, it is so suspicious that the MI5 and InterPol are working on it. It won't be long before they catch the people who did this - I hope!
We will contact you as soon as we are back in the office, we implore you to tell us as much as you can before M15 and InterPol seize the Internet from his family.
Yours Sincerely,
Edward Muller Jr.
Muller & Muller

The alleged Mr Scholes did not reply to this email. I sent a few more emails to him over the course of a week letting him know of the investigation going on and that the mafia, as well as the law, were now looking out for everyone who had been in contact with 'Mr Taylor' in his last days.

I sent him an email saying that his ignorance on the matter was a sure-fire sign that he was the murderer. It prompted him to reply saying he was not involved in any of the conspiracy. I ended the communication warning him that he had better hope the law got to him first.

He's probably walking around in fear of his safety and I don't really give a damn. I just hope that the time he wasted worrying about me saved a potential target a bit of money. There are quite a lot of people out there who fall for this kind of scam. Mr Scholes certainly fell for mine.