Divorce settlement agreement scam by Harmony Young
Date First Reported: September 2012
Primary Name Associated: Harmony Young
Description of Potential Fraud:

Over a hundred lawyers in Canada and the U.S. have notified us that they’ve been contacted by the purported Harmony Young with regards to a to a collaborative family law agreement dispute. This is a fraud we have seen before under several other names and similar scenarios. For details on how this fraud works and a full list of names attached to it see our Confirmed Fraud page.
Updated Oct 2013: Toronto police are looking for additional information from anyone who has received this scam and come across the name “Joe Mathewson” in any of the responses from the fraudsters. Click here for more details
Here is the initial email:
From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]]
Sent: September-10-12 10:29 AM
Subject: Contempt of Judgment
I wish to file a contempt petition against my ex-spouse for breaching the court’s decree with regards to payment of divorce settlement. Please advise if you handle such case.
Harmony Young
Email: [email protected]
A lawyer who replied received the following response and counterfeit documents:
Thank you for your prompt response to my inquiry. Am residing in South Korea for an assignment at present and my ex-spouse Shin Young lives in Oakbrook, Illinois. As a result of time difference it is a little bit difficult to reach you. We were divorced in South Korea but my ex-husband Shin Young relocated to the United States. He is a citizen. We both agreed under a Separation Agreement incorporated, merged into and made part of the court decree for a settlement of Child Support, Spousal Support, and Medical support of $941,100.00, he has paid me $270,500.00 but still owing $670,600.00 and the stipulated time for completion of payment has long elapsed. This is the reason why I contacted you as there is already an agreement in place. I know for sure my ex-husband has the financial means to pay for balance he owes me. Thus, I request your legal services to enforce the court order compelling him to remit balance owed me. Attached is a copy of the terms of separation agreement, and the Court’s Decree (i.e. Divorce Decree) and I will be pleased to provide further information on this case on request.
I expect this to be resolved in a timely manner. Sequel to this, If you are happy to proceed, kindly send me a copy of your retainer and if the terms are acceptable I will sign so we can commence the process without delay
Thank you for your anticipated cooperation and professionalism
Yours truly,
Harmony Young
Young Divorce Decree
Young Separation Agreement
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 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.
May 23, 2013 at 10:13 am, Alessandro Pedone said:
They ask to send money to:
Marc Roskin acc. n. 6210 981 000 1376 1939 CHONGWEN LU BEIJING
Swift Code: PSBCCNBJXXX
Beneficiery address: HUTONG LU FENTAI China
All the check are counterfait.
May 24, 2013 at 3:50 am, Adrian Berkeley said:
With all the evidence and thousands of attempted frauds, WHY are the authorities not interested? Could it be because the banks won’t be loosing??
June 25, 2013 at 3:46 am, Philip said:
We have also received a scam from them and search it on net to know whether it is a scam as they haven’t include our email id in “TO”. Kindly find the details below, So that If anyone receive it, will not waste their time on it.
——————-
From:
Date: Tue, Jun 25, 2013 at 12:57 PM
Subject: I NEED AN URGENT LEGAL ASSISTANCE
To: [email protected]
Dear Counsel,
I wish to file a case against my ex-husband for failure to complete court ordered payments of Child Support, Spousal Support, Equitable distribution and Medical support in our separation agreement. Kindly respond to confirm your readiness to assist. my personal email is [email protected]
I am earnestly waiting for your reply.
Warmest Regards,
Harmony Young.
July 29, 2013 at 7:04 am, Dylan Macaulay said:
Mail from Harmony Young arrived in my in-box Saturday – I am in Dublin.
July 29, 2013 at 5:46 pm, Goodwin Aldarondo said:
Hi, I am a Lawyer from Puerto Rico and I received the same scam but with different names, Huan and Shang Song. If its too good to be true, it is! Dont be fool by these fraud
August 06, 2013 at 11:38 am, Soma Kolcsenyi said:
It is the second time I end up receiving this scam content in the last 2 months. Its figures are ridiculously high, especially for a hungarian lawyer like me, so it is suspicious in general.
What I did the last time is looked for him/her through google and then lmgify.com the whole stuff to her/him.
Since then, no sign of mrs. young or whoever this entrant is.
Cheers,
Soma Kolcsenyi,
Budapest, Hungary
August 21, 2013 at 10:16 am, Clearwater Injury lawyer said:
Greetings Soma, I have some friends who are lawyers “doctors” in Budapest, I studied at Elte Állam- És Jogtudományi Kar 3 years ago.
I have just received an email similar to this. I hope no one falls for it. This is a great resource thank you!
August 27, 2013 at 9:39 pm, A. Mayer said:
Dear Colleges and visitors, I have received this from Harmony Young suspect:
From: Harmony Young
Sent: Sunday, August 25, 2013 10:17 PM
To: undisclosed-recipients:
Subject: Divorce Settlement
I seek to retain your firm to provide legal services with regards to
compelling my ex-husband to pay the unpaid balance set forth in our
separation agreement.
Warmest Regards,
Harmony Young
September 23, 2013 at 11:22 am, JoAnn Rinaggio said:
well I am ssetting here with 3 checks from Joe Matgewson and billy whitney for 143,000.00 and the bank I cashed them at which was held for 30 days then ok’d till they were finished checking them and they came back counterfit all of them all wrote on several different accounts and banks. also a business in hong gong is part of it . he has a large business all over world and needs help from his clints to pay there bills,One of the check was to pay joes account take my 10% and send the rest to him in hong gong. It was no good.This guy shows he owns a dedt consumers inc in canda and has accounts for several compamyies he pays there bills for them so mabe that is where the checks come from.How can we stop him I have address if someone wants them I am going to notify Canda official to press charges if they find him for conterfit checks,Well see what happens.
September 26, 2013 at 7:41 pm, James said:
These are arriving in Australia as well.
All the cheque fraud matters appear to follow the same story.
Copy and paste the contents of the email (and names) and do searches to see whether these are broadcast scams.
As always: “If it looks too good to be true, it probably is.”
October 19, 2013 at 5:41 am, Michèle said:
Following mail from Harmony Young arrived in my in-box today– (I am in France):
Return-Path:
Received: from mwinf5c28 (mwinf5c28.me-wanadoo.net [10.223.111.78])
by mwinb1p04 with LMTPA;
Sat, 19 Oct 2013 05:56:26 +0200
X-Sieve: CMU Sieve 2.3
Received: from dub0-omc1-s4.dub0.hotmail.com ([157.55.0.203])
by mwinf5c28 with ME
id erwS1m00d4NnYXR01rwSlK; Sat, 19 Oct 2013 05:56:26 +0200
Dear Counsel,
I wish to file a case against my ex-husband for failure to complete court ordered payments of Child Support, Spousal Support, Equitable distribution and Medical support in our separation agreement. Kindly respond to confirm your readiness to assist.
I am earnestly waiting for your reply.
Warmest Regards,
Harmony Young.
February 21, 2014 at 12:42 pm, Jeanette said:
The e-mails below were received by Harmony Young on 3 separate occasions. We did not respond to any. We are located in Antigua in the Caribbean.
From: HARMONY YOUNG
Date: Sun, Nov 3, 2013 at 12:06 AM
Subject: I NEED AN URGENT LEGAL ASSISTANCE
To:
Dear Counsel,
I wish to file a case against my ex-husband for failure to complete court ordered payments of Child Support, Spousal Support, Equitable distribution and Medical support in our separation agreement. Kindly respond to confirm your readiness to assist.
I am earnestly waiting for your reply.
Warmest Regards,
Harmony Young.
From: HARMONY YOUNG
Date: Fri, Oct 18, 2013 at 10:36 PM
Subject: I NEED AN URGENT LEGAL ASSISTANCE
To:
Dear Counsel,
I wish to file a case against my ex-husband for failure to complete court ordered payments of Child Support, Spousal Support, Equitable distribution and Medical support in our separation agreement. Kindly respond to confirm your readiness to assist.
I am earnestly waiting for your reply.
Warmest Regards,
From: harmony young
Date: Fri, Feb 21, 2014 at 8:55 AM
Subject: Dear prospective Counsel,
To: “[email protected]”
My name is Harmony Young. I am contacting
your firm in regards to a divorce settlement with my ex husband (Shin
Young) who resides in your jurisdiction.I am currently in South Korea.
We had an settlement agreement for him to pay $941,100.00 plus legal fees.
He has only paid me $270,500.00 since . I am hereby seeking your firm
to represent me in collecting the balance from him. He has agreed
already to pay me the balance but it is my belief that a Law firm like
yours is needed to help me collect this payment from my ex-husband or
litigate this matter if he fails to pay as promised.
Warmest Regards,
Harmony Young.
6th Floor City Air Tower,
159-9 Samsung-dong, Gangnam-gu Seoul, South Korea, 135-973
January 22, 2019 at 10:30 am, Michelle Ridge said:
From: Harmony Young
Sent: Tuesday, January 22, 2019 7:13 AM
Subject: Divorce & Separation Case
Dear prospective Counsel,
My name is Harmony Young. I am contacting your firm in regards to a divorce settlement with my ex husband (Shin Young) who resides in your jurisdiction.I am
currently in South Korea. We had an settlement agreement for him to pay
$941,100.00 plus legal fees. He has only paid me $270,500.00 since . I am hereby seeking your firm to represent me in collecting the balance from him. He has agreed already to pay me the balance but it is my belief that a Law firm like yours is needed to help me collect this payment from my ex-husband or litigate this matter if he fails to pay as promised.
Warmest Regards,
Harmony Young.
6th Floor City Air Tower,
159-9 Samsung-dong, Gangnam-gu Seoul, South Korea, 135-973
January 30, 2019 at 6:13 pm, Lawyer Law said:
I just received this one. It’s the same sort of language as most other scammers like the ones purporting to be in Japan and the same sort of poorly photoshopped passport.
Remember, bank drafts still have to clear! A forgery will NOT be detected immediately at the teller unless you ask them to do some checks
May 16, 2019 at 11:39 am, April Walsh-Padilla said:
May 16 at 7:52 AM- I just received this one.
Thanks for your response to my inquiry.
Am a Citizen of South Korea and my ex-spouse is an American citizen (California United States). We were divorced in South Korea but my ex-husband relocated to the United States.
I request your legal services to enforce the court order compelling him to remit balance owed me
Below is my name and the opposing parties information and attached is the copy of the judgment obtain and separation Agreement for your review, Please run a conflict check, and advice us on your standard retainer fee and forward your retainer letter for signing.
My Full Name: Choon Hee Kim My Mobile Number:+82264650307
Ex-husband full name: Shin Kim
Ex husband email address: [email protected]
I look forward working with you on this matter,
Warmest Regards,
Choon Hee Kim.
6th Floor City Air Tower,
159-9 Samsung-dong, Gangnam-gu Seoul, South Korea, 135-973
May 07, 2020 at 3:17 pm, Alan Killen said:
it is coming back around. received the e-mail today. I am a lawyer in Louisiana
August 17, 2020 at 4:55 pm, Lawyer AK said:
Poor Harmony. Eight years and still cannot collect from husband, who is now in Canada as I received her email in Canada
November 26, 2021 at 9:29 am, Amber said:
Harmony Lewis or muniz also Lynette here in great New Mexico dies this exactly even making the passports and is a identity thieving one that cops just let go . Look like her work though I met her in Albuquerque and found she lied and stole identifications from everyone. Be safe she and more like her still out there .
January 05, 2023 at 6:13 am, Karol said:
Hi All,
The scam is still alive. This is what I received:
Dear Lawyer,
My name is CAMILA DIEGO. I am contacting your Law office in regards to a divorce
settlement with my ex-husband MR. PEDRO DIEGO who resides in POLAND.
We were based in the United States, but I am still currently in the
United States. We had an out of court Agreement (Collaborative Law
Agreement) for him to pay me $180,450.00 plus legal fees. He has only
paid me $50,000 since. I am hereby seeking your Law Office for assistance in
collecting the balance from him. He has already agreed to pay me the
balance but it is my belief that a Law office like yours is needed to help
me collect payment from my ex-husband or litigate this matter if he
fails to pay as promised.
Sincerely,
CAMILA DIEGO.