Page 16 THE VILLADOM TIMES III • October 3, 2012 Another scam is the Craigslist fraud. One of the most bizarre cases I remember from this field is the mail order snake. A client’s son wanted to sell a snake, so he advertised and found a buyer who agreed $200 was a fair price. However, the snake purchaser sent a check for $2,000. The honest seller contacted the would-be buyer and told him he had sent too much money. The buyer told the seller to cash the check, keep $200, and send the balance to him in cash or by a personal check. The seller then sent the snake and a personal check – and the buyer’s $2,000 check bounced. This scam has permutations. Lonely men sometimes contact mail order brides who advertise online. Many already have boyfriends in their own countries and want to get their names on a U.S. marriage license. The bride shows up, the papers are signed, and the marriage sometimes ends before anything else happens. In the meantime, the boyfriend arrives in America and marries the new divorcee. Then there are the e-mail scams. Have you ever received an e-mail from some foreign country telling you a man who hated his own government wants to leave you his entire estate of $2,500,000, but the lawyer who is the executor of the dead total stranger’s will needs a mere $20,000 to process the will? I get these messages all the time, and so do my friends. Whoever sends this stuff must have researched Bergen County’s demographics and found out that most people could use $2,500,000 and are probably well enough off to have $20,000 available. What he or she failed to find out -- I hope -- is that you need a three-digit IQ to make that money or hold onto it. Sorry if any of my readers fell for this one. My son talked me out of it. Repair scams are still popular. They usually start with a worker saying, “Excuse me, ma’am/sir, but I just happened to be finishing a job around the neighborhood and I noticed that your (driveway, chimney – you name it) is in really bad shape. I just happen to have enough material to fix it and I can give you a really good discount on the price.” What the person usually gets is a coat of black paint that looks great through the winter and costs a lot more than if he or she hired a college kid to do it. The Ponzi scheme is kind of a blood libel, because the technique existed long before the Charles “Carlo” Ponzi got caught in 1920. John Law worked such a scheme in France in the early 1700s and fled when he got caught. Charles Dickens described two fictional instances. Around World War I, Ponzi noticed that he could make pocket money by buying and selling postal exchange coupons. He made a few cents on the dollar depending on whether the American or Italian prices were higher when the coupons were redeemed. J.P. Morgan used to do the same thing on a grander scale with arbitrage, swapping French francs for German marks or vice versa and sometimes making $10,000 a day before he got out of bed and went to work. No one ever questioned Morgan’s arbitrage legality. Ponzi and Law went wrong because they attracted investors through paying good money for stock using the proceeds from new investments, rather than any profits earned by the money invested. In Law’s care, there were no profits. French ownership of Louisiana did so badly that the French later traded it back to Spain. Ponzi’s postal coupon sales could not generate anything like the high-profit stock dividends he was sometimes asked for. He paid off the old stockholders with money he took from new stockholders, and when the public discovered this, there was no money to redeem most of the stock. This happens all the time when people expect 15 percent interest while the banks are paying three percent. Bernie Madoff was one spectacular Ponzi artist, but he was not the last one. The answer to this is not “cruel and unusual punishment.” The answer is simple: honest scorn of anyone who deliberately cheats others with fraudulent investments, worthless repairs, or non-existent bequests from total strangers. These are middle-class crimes, and they deserve middle-class punishment -- as in a complete loss of trust and respect, not the rope or 100 years in Rahway. Know what a humbug really is? We have all heard Ebenezer Scrooge use the expression, but the origin of the term is particularly interesting. Back before cell phones replaced watches as time-keeping devices, having a pocket watch was a status symbol. A pocket watch was generally the first thing paupers pawned when they needed a meal or a drink, so having a watch on your person meant you were still flush. People who were not flush would somehow acquire a watch that was hopelessly broken, scrape out the cogs and wheels, and insert a cricket that would scurry while trying to escape from the empty watch casing. The pauper who wanted to appear to be flush would whip out the watch to consult it, and if anyone questioned whether the watch was really working (since there was no second hand in those days) he would hold up the watch, and the noise made by the cricket would pass for the ticking of the watch. Thus the “hum bug” was born. An Oct. 17 Scam & Fraud Prevention Workshop that will start at 7 p.m. at Glen Rock Borough Hall will introduce citizens to some of the more insidious ways in which people will try to scam others. Some people may be so down and out that stealing from trusting people is the last resort. I urge everyone who can get there to go to this or to any similar lecture, but based on reports from various police departments, I can provide a brief introduction to some of what they may hear. Ever bought stock through a friend in need? Dubious stockbrokers sometimes hire desperate people whose friends still have money. When the stock quotations start to go drastically up and down, this means somebody is making money by dropping his or her own shares to make the price fall and then buying them back when they are assumed to be rock-bottom and creating the illusion of a rebound. That is the time to get out. If you jump fast and ignore appeals to friendship, loyalty, manhood, or whatever, you may be lucky enough to break even. One of the items on the Glen Rock agenda is the “Grandparents sam.” We’ve had a couple of these in this area. In one of the earlier cases, a couple of grandparents from Wyckoff received a gruff call from a “Canadian attorney” who said their college-age grandson was under arrest in Canada after a DWI with an injury to another motorist. The hapless grandson was facing immediate jail time if the grandparents did not send a substantial amount of money. The grandson was in custody and could not come to the telephone. The grandparents sent the money. The grandparents shortly learned that their grandson had not been in Canada and had not been involved in a DWI. There are three lessons here. Do you know where your grandsons are? Do they generally have enough common sense not to get involved in driving drunk? Do you know enough to put the caller on hold and find out from your adult children whether the grandchildren are vacationing in out-of-the-way places before you commit five-figure checks to Western Union? Is scamming the last ditch of the American middle class? Ho-Ho-Kus Jottings Church offers Sunday school, youth group Saint Bartholomew’s Episcopal Church located at 70 Sheridan Avenue in Ho-Ho-Kus offers Sunday school classes for children in pre-school through high school. Classes for preschoolers and children ages six through 11 are held Sundays at 10 a.m. The youth group meets the third Sunday of the month from 11 a.m. to 12:15 p.m. Activities include competitive games about making decisions in challenging situations, puzzle solving, socializing, and refreshments. A pontoon boat eco-cruise is planned for Saturday, Oct. 6 at 3 p.m. Sign up in the parish hall. For more information about the youth group, contact Peter Loder at ploder101@yahoo.com, call (201) 444-5025, or visit stbartshhk.com. Club plans Bridge Marathon The Ho-Ho-Kus Woman’s Club invites bridge players to take part in the club’s Bridge Marathon. Games are held at the Ho-Ho-Kus train station on the second Monday of each month from October through May. The $25 entry fee supports the club’s many charities. For more information, call Emma Lou Sayers at (201) 652-5086. Club plans Cabaret Night The Woman’s Club of Ho-Ho-Kus will host a Cabaret Night on Saturday, Oct. 13 at Saint Bartholomew’s Episcopal Church, 70 Sheridan Avenue in Ho-Ho-Kus. The evening will feature the music of Steve Ross. Known as the “Prince of New York Cabaret,” Ross will entertain with the music of Cole Porter, Gershwin, Noel Coward, and more. Ross has a wide knowledge of popular American music and its history. He has hosted radio series and outdoor events. The event will include wine and cheese at 6 p.m. Entertainment will begin at 6:30 p.m. Tickets are $20. To purchase tickets, call (201) 652-2236. Church hosts annual Bistro Night Saint Bartholomew’s Episcopal Church, located at 70 Sheridan Avenue in Ho-Ho-Kus, will host its Fiesta Bistro Night on Sunday, Oct. 21. The annual event will feature live music, including a strolling guitar player. Participants will enjoy Latino-influenced appetizers, Spanish wines, decorations, and special fundraisers. Tickets for the fiesta are $75 per person, or $140 per couple. To purchase tickets, call the church office at (201) 444-5025. Seniors plan fall events Interior designer Suzanne Curtis will present “The Language of Color” to the Ho-Ho-Kus Seniors on Oct. 23. This demonstration will show how to bring color into the home. The seniors group meets in the Hermitage Education Building at 335 Franklin Turnpike. Beverages and desserts will be served at noon, and the program will begin at 1 p.m. Residents age 55 and up are welcome. Upcoming events include a trip to the Platzl Brauhaus in Pomona, New York for a Golden Oktoberfest on Oct. 24, an International Jamboree at the Fiesta on Nov. 13, and an outing to Hunterdon Hills on Dec. 3. Contact Joan at (201) 444-4896 for program information. Call Sue at (201) 444-7235 for trip information. Fall Story Time under way The Worth-Pinkham Memorial Library, located at 91 Warren Avenue in Ho-Ho-Kus, will host its Fall Story Time on Tuesdays at 1:30 p.m. and Wednesdays at 11:45 a.m. The program is recommended for children ages three and up. Registration is not required. For more information, call (201) 445-8078 during regular library hours. Oktoberfest set The Community Church of Ho-Ho-Kus will host an Oktoberfest on Saturday, Oct. 27. The event, which will be held from 7 to 11 p.m., will feature music performed by the New Jersey Polka Band, beer sampling, German food, savories, and desserts catered by Market Basket, special fundraisers, and door prizes. Tickets to this “bring your own beverage” event are $60 per person. To purchase tickets, for more information, or to donate a prize, contact Jeanne Hamlin at (201) 445-6310. The church is located at the Community Church of HoHo-Kus, 410 Warren Avenue in Ho-Ho-Kus.