Written by Patrick Russell
Posted in Legal News - Articles

So you think you are immune from scams?  Lawyers, you better read this!

Lawyers are no longer immune from fraudulent email scams.  In fact, the new trend seems to target lawyers specifically with email requests for legal services.  One such scam by a party in Hong Kong requests lawyers for help with the collection of accounts in the United States. 

As it goes, the email is personally addressed to the lawyer and seems legitimate enough.  The alleged client provides a link to their website which also appears to be legitimate and very detailed.  Finally, the email requests the lawyer to respond with their legal fees and a proposed retainer agreement.  Again, the amount of details as to the business of the alleged client, the number and amount of past due accounts is quite simply staggering.  Upon receipt of the lawyer's fee requests and retainer agreement, the alleged client will agree to all of your terms without question.  In my instance, I do not handle collection matters on a contingency basis so I requested a $5,000.00 legal fee deposit.  A major red flag was raised when the alleged client volunteered to send me $20,000.00 as a legal fee deposit without explanation.  I know of no client that voluntarily departs with more money to a lawyer than the lawyer requests. 

 A final confirmation of the scam was revealed when the alleged client wished to thank me for my attention on behalf of a  company with a different name.  A quick search of the web found that the other named company has a website that matches exactly that of the original company that contacted me in the first place!  Further, a search found the same exact text of the email correspondence from this new company name as being used in a previous fraud as posted on www.scamfraudalert.com.

In the end, these scams are no different than the litany of other email scams that request you to accept and cash checks on behalf of another party in exchange for a percentage of the check.  The trick is to lure you into trusting them by sending you funds without condition under the guise of a legitimate attorney-client relationship.  Once deposited, they will request that you send some small portion of the funds back to them only to discover that the initial underlying check was drawn upon an account that does not exist.  They take great pains to use account numbers that often match a legitimate account but only inverse a number or two.  These type of errors are hard to find by your own financial institution until it is too late.  These bad guys send out hundreds if not thousands of these emails per day and they profit greatly just by a few unfortunate souls falling prey to their scheme.

The best advice in all email solicitations is if it sounds to good to be true than it probably is.  Further, if you discover any obvious misspellings, irregularities or contradictions, be sure to conduct your due diligence by searching for an scam alerts related to the names on the email, both corporate and personal.  This could certainly save you a major headache and some hard earned cash.