by FraudInfo

Date First Reported: March 2015

Primary Name Associated: Gloria Daley

Description of Potential Fraud:

fraud-warning

Ten lawyers in Ontario and the U.S. have notified us that they received an email from the purported Gloria Daley looking to retain them with regards to a collecting overdue payments resulting from a separation agreement.

This is a classic bad cheque scam that presents as legal matter requiring the assistance of a lawyer. In this scam lawyers will be duped into wiring real funds from their trust accounts after depositing a fake cheque received as payment from the debtor (who is part of the fraud). See our Confirmed Fraud Page for more of an explanation of how these frauds work and to see other names associated with it. Our Fraud Fact Sheet lists the red flags of a bogus legal matter that is really a fraud.

Here is the initial email sent by the fraudster to the lawyer:

From: Gloria Daley [email protected]
Date: Sun, Mar 1, 2015 at 11:36 PM
Subject: Legal Inquiry
To:

Dear Sir/Madam,

I kindly write to know if you or your law firm handle family law, I need legal representation regarding a breach of divorce agreement.

Please contact me via Phone: +447087625114 or Email ( [email protected] ) to provide you with further Information.

Yours sincerely,

Gloria.

Replying to the email brought this response:

Good day to you and thanks for responding to my email. Please pardon my late email response as my condition does not allow me to stay long on the computer.

My ex husband and I agreed under this out of court Collaborative Law Agreement in the United States of America for a onetime cash settlement of $641,000. To his credit, he has paid me $71,000 but still owing $570,000. Ever since, he has refused to come up with the balance giving one excuses or the other. I expect this to be a non-litigation matter. I have already advised him I am planning on retaining a legal firm to litigate this issue if need be.

The lawyer that helped me with the matter earlier is now retired. Different payment dates have been promised and I still have not received anything. I was advised to seek legal assistance in my ex husband new jurisdiction which is why I contacted you to act as my counsel in retrieving these funds. My last contact with my ex husband, he told me I would receive payment not later than Mid September 2013 and till now, nothing has been paid.

Kindly let me know what your fees would be in order for me to inform my ex husband to expect contact from you as you have been authorized to act on my behalf. I would like to forward your details to him on your approval, so he knows a law firm is representing me and I can sue for breach of agreement if he doesn’t keep his promise. I would like to give him this last chance to fulfill his obligations before we start legal proceeding.

Please do get back to me so I can furnish you with the required details to contact my ex husband on my behalf as I know he respect law firms and do not want to be carried to court. Before we proceed kindly forward your fee/retainer agreement for my review and if okay upon receipt. Note that my ex husband will be the one to pay for any fees or charges.

Thank you for your anticipated co-operation and understanding. Contact me should you require more information and kindly confirm your readiness to act so i can forward our collaborative law agreement document to you.

My ex husband name is Scott Daley.

Yours sincerely,

Gloria.

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 are an Ontario lawyer who suspects 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.

What can you do to help put a stop to the fraud attempt? You can simply stop replying to the fraudster’s emails or inform them that you suspect fraud and will not act on the matter (or will take no further actions on the matter). You can report the fraudsters email addresses to the email hosting company. If you have a fraudulent cheque you can destroy it or send it to the fraud department of the financial institution, which may wish to see it. In Canada, you can report the fraud to the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre.

We are often asked if it is worthwhile to report the fraud attempt to the police in the hopes of helping catch the fraudsters. You can certainly report the fraud to your local or federal law enforcement agencies, but unfortunately it is often difficult, expensive and time consuming for them to attempt to shut down these online fraud perpetrators (though there are some successes).

If you have been successfully duped, please immediately notify LAWPRO as there may be a claim against you. Instructions on how to report a claim are here.

For more immediate updates on fraud and claims prevention, subscribe to the email or RSS feed updates from LAWPRO’s AvoidAClaim blog.

Fraud Fact Sheet More 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.