Lonestar Foxhall Research Group Sylvia Galdon; Mary Brown; Amanda Hayes; Mark Green Freeman G. Carter Counterfeit check fraud: Mystery Shopping Job Offer; Cross-Border scam; Evaluating the service of Western Union Dallas, Texas

A mystery shopping job offer is sent to victims who applied for a work-at-home job on the Internet.  The victim receives a plain envelope postmarked in Canada and contains a letter and a check.

The letter sent with the job offer is signed by Freeman G. Carter, Director of Human Resources.  There is no such person.   The letter instructs the victim to assess the performance of Western Union, as well as other businesses such as Walmart, Home Depot, JC Penney, KMart.  The letter instructs the victim to call Mark Green at 1-888-330-7563 ext 2 to confirm receipt of the check. Do not call these people. They will have your telephone number if you do call.

The check accompanying the mystery shopping job offer appears to be a legitimate check drawn on the Wilshire State Bank account of "Lonestar Foxhall", a legitimate company, BUT THE CHECK IS COUNTERFEIT. Do not deposit this check. 

The amount of the check received by the victim is usually $2950, but sometimes the amount varies. In the case of the $2950 check, the victim is directed to deposit the check into the bank and immediately wire transfer $2320 via Western Union to an international bank account held by the scammer.  Do not deposit the check and do not follow the instructions in this scam because you will be a victim and lose money from your account when the check is returned as a fraud.