It really amazes me that after so much press even outside the net about these Nigerian scams there are still people stupid enough to fall for them. I've often thought it would be interesting to profile the gullible people who fall for these scams to see if we could find a clear demographic that could be targeted for an awareness campaign of some sort. It's not that I feel much sympathy for people so stupid as to believe money will magically fall into their lap, but scams tend to have broader social costs I'd prefer to reduce beforehand. For instance, my tax dollars that go to the police and attorney general in my state are already spread thin enough so perhaps if it were possible to get the fools who fall for these scams to avoid them in the first place, spending valuable resources on them could be avoided.

I love it! Glad to see them getting nailed (though the sentences seem EXTREMELY light, considering the value of the theft), however I do think the Nigerians are providing valuable assistance to financial Darwinism. If you are stupid and greedy enough to bite, you deserve to get burned.

I got one of these emails a while back, I wish I had kept it. I want to try and scam them out of some cash. Talk them into some sort of "Good faith" transfer of like $50, just to show that they are real and can work the financial mechanism. Then I'll cash out the $50 and go buy dinner and tell them to kiss my ass. What are they going to do, sue me?