I've not seen this one, they're "Giving their Macaws away" huh? That's a new one...
These parrot scams are getting out of control, combined with the English Bulldog/French Bulldog/Boston Terrier/Pug scams. In fact, I'm not sure there are any ads at all out there for an English Bulldog or French Bulldog that are real, and now there are just as many African Gray and Macaw scams. I love that on Craigslist different scammers are so lazy that they are just using the same photos used in ads posted by some other scammer the same day!
Almost two years ago the rescue I volunteer at started specializing in helping people that have been scammed by people advertising puppies online and using Western Union/MoneyGram to steal their money. I actually have had about a dozen cases where a puppy did in fact show up at the airport on the day expected, but it was always a mixed breed of bulldog, not purebred, and the sad part was every puppy had parvovirus and all but 3 died within a week or less. The only satisfaction I've ever gotten from working these cases are the ones where a sick puppy actually arrived at the airport, because these people were in this country. The scammers who just take money and disappear are typically in Cameroon. I actually managed to nail a couple operating a horrible puppy mill (if you could call it a puppy mill, it wasn't that nice or organized) out of Maryland (most are in Maryland, Washington DC, Deleware, and Virginia for some reason). With the help of Verizon Wireless and the Hagerstown Police Department, we set up an online buy for a French Bulldog puppy with this couple that had scammed somewhere between 50-100 people, sometimes taking their money and disappearing, but usually either shipping a horribly sick mutt puppy by airplane or in several cases planning to meet people in a parking lot or abandoned house and when the buyer arrived there would be a puppy inside a cardboard box that was taped shut, and in some instances the puppy was dead and had been dead for some time. It was awful, they scammed a grandmother trying to buy a puppy for her grandson who had lost his mother in a car accident, and that was when they finally nailed these people. It felt good! Unfortunately there is really no way to catch the scammers operating out of Africa or other Continents or countries, you can only get their connections here who pick up the money at local Wester Union locations.
I've yet to personally see a parrot scam locally but I'm sure I will soon, it seems to be the new way of ripping innocent people off.
"Dance like nobody's watching..."
