Breach of lease agreement scam by Nan Zhang of NPI Lease Company Limited
Date First Reported: January 2012
Primary Name Associated: Nan Zhang
Description of Potential Fraud:
Over 130 lawyers have reported to us that they’ve been contacted by the purported Nan Zhang of NPI Lease Company with regards to retaining their services to collect on a breach of a lease agreement. It is nearly identical to the Kiyoshi Yukio emails lawyers across Canada also received today.
This is another bad cheque fraud in which the ‘customer’ accused of breaching the lease agreement will no doubt also quickly send a (counterfeit) cheque for damages to the lawyers office, and the lawyer will be asked to wire the funds (minus fees and costs) to an offshore account. See our Fraud Fact Sheet for more information on how these scams work and how to spot them.
Here is an example of the initial contact email:
From: Nan Zhang [mailto:[email protected]]
Sent: January 6, 2012 3:18 PM
To: lawyer name
Subject: re: lease matter
Sir,
We sent this correspondence earlier. We are a consolidated subsidiary of
Shoji Equipment Leasing Company Ltd. We ask of your Services regarding a
breach of lease, that was duly guaranteed, involving us, and a customer
of ours in your province. We secured equipment requested by them and
leased it to them for an agreed period of time, but they have since
fallen short of the executed agreement we have in place.
We look forward to a response from you, so that we can provide you with
more information. We will appreciate your helping us with our request
regarding this matter.
Regards,
Nan Zhang
Executive Director, Finance & Accounts
NPI Lease Company Limited
MITSUZAWA MINAMICHO 22-26-202
KANAGAWA – KU, Yokohama
Tel: 81-45-225-2321
Fax: 81-45-225-2322
How to handle a real or suspected fraud
If you have been targeted by any of these frauds, please forward any of the emails and supporting documents that you have received to [email protected].
If you suspect you are acting on a matter that might be a fraud, call LAWPRO at 1-800-410-1013 (416-598-5899). We will talk you through the common fraud scenarios we are seeing and help you spot red flags that may indicate you are being duped. This will help you ask appropriate questions of your client to determine if the matter is legitimate or not. If the matter you are acting on turns out to be a fraud and there is a potential claim, we will work with you to prevent the fraud and minimize potential claims costs.
If you have been successfully duped, please immediately notify LAWPRO as there may be a claim against you.
For more immediate updates on fraud and claims prevention, subscribe to the email or RSS feed updates from LAWPRO’s AvoidAClaim blog.
Fraud Fact SheetMore fraud prevention information and resources are available on the practicePRO Fraud page, including the Fraud Fact Sheet, a handy reference for lawyers and law firm staff that describes the common frauds and the red flags that can help identify them.
January 06, 2012 at 5:28 pm, Max said:
Thank you!
January 06, 2012 at 5:40 pm, Michael Clifton said:
We have also received this email twice.
January 06, 2012 at 11:13 pm, Paul B Belanger said:
Thanks for your feedback. I too received the scam letter today.
January 11, 2012 at 7:56 am, Hamagin Finance said:
We Hamagin Finance Co., Ltd.is a leasing Co in Japan yokohama.
An organization called NPI Lease Company Ltd is sending mail of dealings invitation to many overseas lawyers.
Since unapproved use of the telephone numbers of our company(Japan+45-225-2321and2322) is carried out at this mail, much inquiries are coming from the receiver of e-mail.
NPI Lease Co should keep in mind that it is not related with our company at all.
Moreover, the address and photograph of a homepage of Shoji Equipment Leasing Co. which are parent company of NPI copy the thing of some other existing Japanese leasing companies without notice, and paste it together.
It seems that it is a company which does not exist really at all.
February 13, 2012 at 5:17 am, Monika said:
Hello,
I’ve also received this email twice in January. As it went to my junk e-mail I recognized it only today and tried to find information about the sender. I can see now that this is the same email for everyone.