My wife grew up in Virgina and her grandfather hunted lots of hares with Lurcher/Greyhound things. She became quite good at it, but when they moved back to the UK when she was a teen they never had dogs again.
It has always been on the cards and she now has her heart set on getting a scent/gaze dog again. I have reminded her about the hunting with dogs act, and she seems to just want it as a pet.

To that end we went hunting for a lurcher pup. Nothing good enough local to us, until we found this guy on email, advertising lurcher pups in Crawley.

Hello Dear,

thanks for answering all the questions,from all your answers i am now
convince that you will provide a wonderful home for the puppy.i have
attached some pictures of Lizzy the female,since you are interested in
the female.the puppy will make a lovely companion for your family.
Since I have made up my mind to let the puppy into to your home ,i
just hope you are delighted to care for this puppy.our reason for
giving out the puppies is due to the nature of my job and the fact
that my wife just gave birth to a baby boy, we just want to give all
our attention to our baby and make sure he has a good family and
environment .We would have been very happy if you can come to view the
puppy,but since you are out of ( Isle of Mull, Scotland UK ) then we
can arrange Delivery of the puppy to your home directly,since this is
just the best way of sending the puppy to you,so kindly get back to us
with your delivery information’s below,and i will also need all your
delivery address for our vet to change the ownership papers of the
puppy to your names.

Full names ?
Home address ?
City ?
Post code ?
Mobile number ?
Home number ?
Email address ?

When you email me the information’s,i will register the puppy for
delivery over to your door step first thing tomorrow morning. you will
have to pay just the £260 for the puppy including the delivery charges
and the payment will be made directly to the delivery agency when they
contact you . You will also be making the payment to the delivery
company first before they can get Lizzy deliver over to your door
step because,they will need to issue and also process a home delivery
card for Lizzy transportation and also do the change of ownership
papers from my name to your name which will show that,you are the new
owners of Lizzy and also give you the exact time you will be
receiving Lizzy tomorrow okay.I will send all the paper works for the
puppy together with the health certificates and ownership papers.all
we ask is just for you to take good care of the puppy and remember to
update us with good pictures of the puppy all the time and the Puppy
will also be come with the following papers;

# Health guarantee
# Vaccine record
# KC registration papers
# Microchip Registration
# Pedigree
# Nutrition supplement
# Traveling Crate

Thanks and waiting to read from you.
He sent some pics which I found in 30sec on google images of a dog in the USA. He also gave me a number to call which started 070.
After some to and fro I asked for my friend, who coincidentally lives on Mull, to come over and view the dog. (Don’t be surprised, my mate “Adam” is as real as the dog.)
He agreed and then went through a charade that he had just popped out.
So I keep asking, when can Adam pop round, he keeps saying he is busy and keeps sending emails asking for payment.

So what to do next?
I was thinking of asking who is vet was on Mull so I could wind him up that way, maybe if I can talk to the vet about the dogs parents and the pups who he must have inspected at some point?

Dodgy breeder / puppy farmer type – avoid with barge pole.

There are lots of greyhound rescue organisations who also do lurchers looking for rehoming – one of my FB friends is involved in one and get lots of rehoming requests including young dogs / puppies.

If you read it through, he isn’t even that. He is a flat out scammer.
If you could link me to you FB friend that would be great, we thought about rescue dogs but she only wants a puppy.
(no disrespect to you dovebiker I am sure you only glanced, but what are stats on threads where the chances of the first responder hasn’t actually read/comprehended the first post, it’s like an internet law)

If you really want to wind him up, set up a new email account, contact him about the dog from the new account and then start a bidding war with yourself pushing the price up to ridiculous amounts.

If you really want to wind him up, set up a new email account, contact him about the dog from the new account and then start a bidding war with yourself pushing the price up to ridiculous amounts.

Ok this is a great idea.

Edit – although given he has no dog, and me and the “other buyer” do not know each other, he might just sell us both a dog for the same price.
I googled his email address he is advertising every breed of dog in almost every major city in the UK. I guess email scamming is a numbers game.

It would be more of an achievement if you could turn the scam against the scammer. Typically the would-be victim baits the scammer by tempting them with money then, at the last minute, hits a hitch with the payment and needs the scammer to pay an upfront fee or some such story. If that’s not possible, at least get the scammer to send you a photo of themselves holding up a placard with an insulting name on it.

Last time I saw this one I had a terrible time trying to convince the victim to stop worrying about the poor dog stuck in a crate at Aberdeen docks because it didn’t exist. She showed me pictures that proved it did! Got there in the end. Good luck OP, I think protocol when baiting scanners is to get them to send you a picture of them with a painted tit or a loaf of bread on their head or some such jape.

EDIT Always the bridesmaid…

I’d be testing out his photoshop skills.

Tell him you normally like to dress your dogs up in silly outfits for shows, so can he send you a photo of the dog wearing a top hat….

Tell him you were on the way to the big city to deposit the funds but your car broke down and you haven’t any spare cash to fix it; could he transfer a small sum of money to help you with the repairs please?

globalti this is a great idea.