TrueLife - Let’s Unionise the Nigerian Scammers

Episode Date: June 24, 2022

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Darkness struck, a gut-punched theft, Sun ripped away, her health bereft. I roar at the void. This ain't just fate, a cosmic scam I spit my hate. The games rigged tight, shadows deal, blood on their hands, I'll never kneel. Yet in the rage, a crack ignites, occulted sparks cut through the nights. The scars my key, hermetic and stark. To see, to rise, I hunt in the dark, fumbling, fear. Hears through ruins maze, lights my war cry, born from the blaze.

The poem is Angels with Rifles. The track, I Am Sorrow, I Am Lust by Codex Serafini. Check out the entire song at the end of the cast. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to the True Life podcast. I hope wherever you are, whatever you're doing, the sun is shining on you, the winds that's your back, and you're thinking good thoughts. You know what today is? You want to know what today is?

Any guesses? It is True Crime Friday. True Crime Friday, Friday, Friday. We're getting into it today. You know what? I think everyone can, on some level, respect a good hustle. Respect a good scam. If you remember last Friday or a few episodes back,

I talked about a scam that I was in, your boy George over here, getting hustled a little bit. But I turned it into a educational experience and I even flipped it and did my best to scam the scammer. If you haven't checked that out, you should go back into the podcast archives and look for the mushroom scam. It's pretty interesting and comical and a little bit humbling for yours truly. This particular day, we're going to be talking about something called the Fall of the Billionaire Gucci Master. It's an article from Business Week and it's written by Evan Ratliff. who wrote an amazing book called The Mastermind, Drugs, Empire, Murder, Betrayal.

You should definitely pick up that book. In fact, we could be doing a, hopefully, maybe a show on it, and definitely a book review on it coming up. But it's a great book. The book's called The Mastermind. This is a different scam. And this is a recent article out of business week. And this is about a guy, a scammer, a hustler, a fraudster, a huckster.

Any guesses where this guy is from? Come on. guess you can do it take one guess where this guy's from you're right no no no nina n n nigeria nigeria man home of the great Nigerian print scam home of the email fishing scams hey you send me one Bitcoin I'll send you for Nigeria you know what I'm talking about hey here's my what's up address yeah I'm totally legit just send it over here so this guy While we love a good hustle, we love a good scam, we hate being scammed ourselves, that sucks. But you know what I find like a little bit of Schadenfreude in?

You know what I find brings a slight smile to the corner of my cheeks is when somebody scams the banks. I love it. I love it. It's like they scam the scammer. You know, here's the legitimate scammer, the banking industry, just reaching into your pocket every day. Here we're going to create some money out of thin air and let you buy a house.

We've got to pay us back five times what it is. Maybe I'm jealous. Maybe I'm jealous because the banks are hustlers. Maybe. Or maybe I think they're pieces of shit. And I'm glad when they get scammed, especially by a Nigerian scammer. Take that, banks. Put that in your pipe and smoke.

Let's talk about it. The guy's name, let me give you a little brief. I'm going to read a little bit of the article. I'm going to comment. I'm going to read a little bit more of the article, and I'm going to comment. But I'm not going to read too much of the article because I want you to go and read it and give the author Evan Ratliff credit. Let's give credit where credit is due. Let's begin.

Authorities say Ramona Boss, aka At Hush Puppy. That's his Instagram thing. Perfected a simple internet scam and laundered millions of dollars. His past says a lot about digital swagger and the kinds of stories that get told online. Everybody knows about that. Beware of the Instagram swagger. For Ramona Boss, the Instagram influencer, popularly known as Ray Hushpuppie at Hushpuppie.

Hush, or the billionaire Gucci Master, birthdays were always a time for reflection. Aren't they always? Reflection and extravagance. But then extravagance was Hush Puppies brand, A 365 days a year affair, a way of being. On October 11th, 2019, the day he turned 37, he was living in a penthouse apartment at the Palazzo Versace, Dubai, with a private pool, private hot tub right there on his Lanai. A typical at hush puppy post on Instagram where he had more than 2 million followers featured.

a boss smiling in front of one of his Ferraris or his Rolls Royces, kicking back on a seat on a private jet or moving in and out of posh stores like Louis Vuitton, Fendiz, Hermes, always flawless, never the same outfit twice. Hashtag Gucci. More often than not. You don't become the billionaire Gucci master any other way, folks. All right? You can't be wearing the same outfit, more than once, man. You've got to be matching your shoes to your hat. Maybe put some diamonds in your smile. That's how you become the Gucci master. You know what I mean? I'm often remember. I don't know why this is popping in my head, but you remember that song by the Gucci crew? Oh, whoa, whoa, oh, Sally. That girl. That da, that, that girl. They should play that song.

I should play that song while I'm doing this podcast. Maybe I'll go back in it a bit. Probably won't. So right off the bat, I am thinking of Dan Balzarian. Here's another guy who had private jets, limos, cars, talking all this shit online about how great they are and how much money they have. They are, on one hand, showing you how great they are, and on the other hand, trying to tell you how dumb you are, how weak you are.

Maybe they're not trying to tell you that. but it's that level of, hey, look at me, look how much I have. This is how great I am. And I think that says a lot about our society. I think that these scams where people portray themselves as billionaires are usually an outgrowth of the cancer that is our materialist society. And like I said, it bothers me when the scammers hustle people that don't have anything, when they hustle small, old grandmas and grandpas and working people.

I don't like that. But again, the Nigerian scammer over here, who did he get? He got the banks. He got the banks. So for that, in that category, I think he targeted the right audience. I think he targeted the right audience. And I don't think there's anybody here who, I think I would rather this scammer scam the banks and the bank scam me. Okay, continuing with the article.

Even back in 2019, there were questions about how much money Abbas really had and how exactly he acquired it in Nigeria. Where he was born, his Instagram presence had turned him into a celebrity adjacent to the biggest names in pop culture. He had appeared in social media with pop idols, DeVito and the Wiz Kid and soccer players on English clubs like Chelsea and Man City. So you can see he's getting some credibility with his well. And it just goes to show you that wealth will buy you credibility, which leads us back to the

outgrowth of our whole world system based on finance is kind of based on a scam. It goes to show you that if you have money, you can buy credibility. If you have money, you can buy influence. Even if you're a piece of shit scammer, even if you're just a piece of shit, if you have money, you buy influence. Think about that. That's why our world is so messed up. All you have to do is do a couple of scams and all of a sudden you have credibility. It may not be a lot of credibility, but you can buy credibility. And that's why so many people in positions of authority today are pieces of shit. Because they have no experience. They have no real life ability to be leaders. They have

money. They may have pulled a scam or maybe their dad or their mom worked hard, but the majority of people in positions of authority probably are pieces of shit, just so everybody's clear on that. Okay, maybe not everybody in authority. Maybe I'm having a rough morning, all right? Maybe I woke up on the wrong side of the bed. But I'm thinking of, I don't know, pick your poison. Trump, Biden, politics, bankers, insurance companies, Jerome Powell. It seems to me these people are all pretty much Nigerian scammers. They might as well be. They're stealing from the American people, right? So you're probably thinking to yourself, all right, George, I get it. This guy, this Nigerian prince, Mr. Robos, he's flexing on Instagram. He's got gold and diamond and crusted Rolex's,

Ferraris. He's living in Dubai in a Versace mansion. How did he get his money, George? What scam did you know what he did he did the old business email compromise the BEC the man in the middle attack a little a little old you know the old one-two the old hey open this email here diding and you're in but he did it okay so he fires off his BEC his business email client scam and the story goes there was a new york law firm the money was meant to be a payment owed to one of its clients who'd refinanced a piece of real estate at citizen bank you know how much for nine hundred and twenty two thousand eight hundred and fifty seven dollars this is one of this guy's scams so one scam one million dollars

This is just one. I want you to read the article if you want to see some of the rest of them. But this was this guy's M.O. Man in the Middle Attack, email. He fires off a piece of code that gets in. He's able to socially engineer the operator on one end. Fires off an email. Yes, this is me.

I'm the person this is supposed to go to. The clerk looks at it. Okay, it looks good. fires off a question to verify like a 2FA. This guy's got control of it. He verifies the 2FA, Bada bada boom, million dollars in his account.

Good to go. A few months later, the customer that refied the properties looking at his bank, doesn't see it, wonders what the hell is going on. Oh, I don't see it there. Yeah, never showed up. So who's on the hook for it?

Nah, the law firm. The law firm in the bank. Fuck them. Fuck them, I'm glad they lost their shit. You know many people every day are losing their money? Good morning law firm. There you go, pal. Welcome to reality.

And there's nothing they can do about it. Darn, darn, darn. Like I said, I know what's wrong. I know what's bad. I shouldn't be happy when these knuckleheads lose money. But you know what? How many lawyers do you know that are stealing from people? They probably got what they deserved.

They probably got what they deserved. So it just brings me to the point of so many scams out there right now. And there's so many people that are ripe for the taking. And it's not just the common person anymore. It's not grandma that lives by herself. It's not the working family that's getting hustled on an email. It is the white calling. community. When you go online and when you see these headlines about internet scams or

crypto scams, it's usually not the small person that's getting scammed anymore. It's at a level that it's at the level where a Nigerian individual with no education can hustle a Ivy League graduate. Like, think about that. In a way, there's a poetic justice, a beauty to it. Here's a person at a law firm that probably walks around, like, look how great of a lawyer I am, getting hustled by a Nigerian scammer. And I know it probably shouldn't bring me joy.

No one likes to lose. But I think we can all find a little solace in this. There's a couple lessons here. Number one, don't open emails that you don't know who they're from. Don't do it. Number two, if you are a person who, number two, I think is our entire system is based on fraud. And if you look at any great intergenerational wealth, I think you could make the argument that that wealth was accumulated by taking something that didn't belong to them. and all you need do is look at the country you live in.

I live in the USA, so let's talk about intergenerational wealth and let's talk about taking things that don't belong to us. What happened to the Indians? Hey, thanks for the buffalo. Thanks for your land. We're going to buy it from you. Remember that?

There's a great book called Black Elks Speaks, and in that book, the character that's narrating the biography, the biography, his name Black Elk. And he talks about a time, and I'm paraphrasing here,

but he says something to the effect of when the white man came and told us they wanted to buy the land we laughed at him. He said, you can't buy the land. The land belongs to everybody. But they did buy it. And Black Elk says,

no one was laughing when they slaughtered all the buffalo. No one was laughing when they quarantined us to small pieces of land that was reserved for us and told us we could no longer roam when we were imprisoned on reservations no one laughed then and that makes me think about today we were all laughing when you said oh you can buy the air no you can't you can buy the carbon dioxide no you can't you could buy the water

no you can't but look in california this whole drought what who owns the water rights and that's Wesley owns the water rights. I wouldn't be surprised to see that we find out Lake Mead is being drained for the water. Just think about it. Watch some of the videos that are happening there and look at some of these giant spickets that are sucking the water, these giant reverse spickets that are sucking the water out. Where's that water going? Is it all going to fountains in Vegas? Is it all going to California households? I doubt it. I doubt it. I doubt it. do some digging on the research about water rights in California. Do some digging on water rights at Lake Michigan.

And you'll see that shit's being sucked out and stored somewhere. The next up I think is probably carbon dioxide. Like look at this idea of they want to charge you for breathing. Like that's the ultimate scam, man. That's better than the Nigerian prince. The most abundant thing on this. planet is carbon dioxide and there's a large group of people who have who are trying to figure out how to tax it every breath you take gives a whole other meaning that should be you know what

that should be the climate change theme song every breath you take every breath you take i'll be charging you that should be the fucking theme song okay where was i these Nigerian scammers Okay, so our entire intergenerational wealth is built on long-term theft of resources that don't belong to them. American foreign policy, we've already covered the Indians, we've already covered mineral rights, we've covered air. That's where the monetization of resources that don't belong to you is how you create long-lasting wealth and become a Carnegie, a melon, a Morgan, and then you become celebrated. It's pretty fucking sad if you think about it. And when you think about it on that level, it makes me want there to be a revolution.

It makes me think that this world we live in has become so monetized and tied up with razor wires of finance. that we must rebel and that if we are unable to be freed from the financial slavery we find ourselves in and i mean young kids who have been given loans or not being able to get out of student debt i've heard both arguments oh they got themselves in there you know these kids went there and they decided that they should take underwater basket weaving and pay $100,000, and I didn't do it, so I shouldn't have to pay for it. Well, what people don't understand is you're going to pay for it one way or the other.

You're going to pay for it in society by saddling these kids with debt forever. I don't have student debt, but I don't think this kid should have to pay it. I don't think they should have to pay interest on it. And I don't understand people who do. Like, you can't even file bankruptcy on it. Fuck the banks, man. You know what? It's scams like that. It's the banking industry stealing from our youth by giving these loans out that make me proud of Nigerian scammers. Good. The Nigerian scammers did to the Citizen Bank and the White Shoe Law firms with the White Shoe law firms, the banking institute and the insurance companies are doing to people all over the world. How's a little taste of your medicine there? You guys like that? You like that? Good. I hope there's more of it. I hope Nigerian scammers unionize and go after all the banking institutes. That's what I hope. That would be awesome. In fact, we should get the teamsters. Hey, if you're a teamster, get on it. You should be unionized in the Nigerian scammers. It would be a great idea. Well, that's what I got for today, ladies and gentlemen. I forgot how I got here. I'm going to link to the article. I'm going to link to the book of Evan Ratliff. And I hope you check.

this thing out and you think about the world in which you live. That might be the title. What do you guys think about the title? The title should be unionizing Nigerian scammers. I love it. Let's get at it today, guys. It's Friday. Let's get up and get at them. I'm not even going to edit this. It's just a rough shot coming at you. I love you. Aloha.