Victims Stuck with $80,000 Scam Loss.

December 01, Honolulu Advertiser

Two Windward Oahu, HI, residents who thought they had been hired by legitimate foreign companies to distribute checks were victims of a scheme that's left them responsible for $80,000. One victim is a Kaneohe businessman who negotiated a contract with a Japanese company. The other is the wife of a Kaneohe Bay Marine who filled out an online application with a Chinese corporation claiming to be a subsidiary of oil giant Sunoco (Japan Sun Oil Company aka Sunoco Group of Company, Ltd. www.sunoco.com) Inc. Both believed they would be acting as "check distributors" for companies. After being "hired," they agreed to receive checks from these companies and keep a percentage while wiring large sums to accounts in China and Japan, police said. Unwittingly, both the man and woman were about to cash fraudulent checks 4 and wire the money back to the perpetrators.
The checks from the "foreign companies" initially cleared the local banks, and the residents were each able to wire $40,000 to accounts in Japan and China as instructed by their employers. But federal regulators discovered that the checks deposited by the residents were counterfeit, and the banks are holding the residents responsible for the funds. This is a new twist on the Nigerian letter fraud. Source: Error: Invalid story key (M1,20061201,NEWS06,612010362,AR). - The Honolulu Advertiser