PATRICK DAVILA FINAL AWARD WINNING NOTIFICATION RIPOFF ENCLOSED IS A CHECK OF $3175.00 PART OF CHECK SHOULD BE USED FOR ADMINISTRATIVE FEES NORTH BAY ONTARIO

I received a letter from this company Allen & Heath Financial Holdings (a division of Allen & Heath USA.

The letter began:

RE: FINAL AWARD WINNING NOTIFICATION MAY 7th, 2007

We are please to inform you through this letter that our network shows you as the lucky winner of unclaimed prized money in the amount of Sixty Eight Thousand dollars ($68,000.00) in United States funds. The system indicates that your name was randomly selected through a computerized ballot system as a winner for the 2007 sweepstakes draws. Congratulations!
All participants were selected through a computerized ballot system drawn from Readers Digest, Publishers Clearing House, Online Sweepstakes, Internet games etc.

The letter goes on to say that enclosed is a check of $3175.00 made payable to you. Part of this check should be used to pay for your administrative and processing fees of your winnings. The letter goes on to state that I need to contact my North American agent, Patrick Davilia upon receipt of this letter at 705-770-3819. It goes on to further say that my winnings must be claimed no later than Friday, June 1st 2007 by 5:00 pm Eastern Standard Time.

This letter is signed

yours sincerely,
Sam Silver
Prize Coordinator


************I thought this was an official notification of winning prize money associated with Readers Digest or Publishers Clearing House, etc... I took the check to my bank and I asked the teller if this was a real check and after examining it in the back with another teller, they concluded that it was an actual check and congratulated me! It had the waterford insignia on the back. I deposited it in my account and was happy the rest of the day! When I re-read the letter, I called Patrick Davilia and he instructed me to "wire" or "moneygram" $2920.00 to him today and by tomorrow I would received a fed ex envelope with a check for $68,000.00. He said that I needed to list the receiver's name as Mike Moore. The red flags went up and since I spoke to him he keeps calling me to see if I sent the money. He finally stopped calling late this afternoon. This is a weird scam! The letter is real looking and reads well. Seems like it would fool alot of people even the most skeptical ones because the letter mentions reputable companies by name. The part that I don't understand is, why send money and then turn around and ask for 3/4 of it back? I can use an extra 3 thousand dollars. I think I will let it sit there for awhile and see what happens.

Sharon
Dallas, Texas
U.S.A.