09/28/2021
Be aware folks!
Horse Scam Calls Rising
The Cochise County Sheriff's Office is advising of numerous scams reported in the rural areas involving the sale of horses.
Essentially, persons are posting horses for sale on a local ranch, at a very cheap and enticing price. Persons are asked to send money electronically, then are asked for more money before the horses are shipped all over the country. The horses are never shipped.
Our eastern region has had multiple calls for this lately and the ranch posting the horses for sale, does not exist.
We are encouraging anyone who is considering the purchase of horses or livestock be diligent in their research before sending any money.
Equine.com advises provides some information regarding recent scam/fraud cases:
Here are the basic common scams that are currently being attempted on many horse classified sites. These scams all have one thing in common – they are offering something at thousands of dollars below market value and always have an excuse as to why.
Examples include: “My sister is sick and I am selling the horse for her very cheap to get rid of it.” Another one is “We just want the horse to go for free to a good home, but to be safe we want you to use OUR transportation company, we’ll send you an airbill.”
“The Friesian Scam” – This is one of the most popular horse scams currently circulating internet classified websites. The seller is always offering a very expensive breed of horse for anywhere from $2000 to free. Common other breeds used are Gypsy Vanners, American Walking Ponies, various Warmblood breeds, and others. They specifically target more expensive breeds and make the buyer think they are getting something at a steal of a price. Common terms used in their ads for these types of scams are: “Loving horse for adoption”, “Friendly horse for rehoming”, and frequent mentions in the description about the horse having had all of his shots and friendly for family use. When you see an ad of this nature, please email us and we will assess whether the ad is indeed valid, and remove the ad if it is found to be fraudulent.
For many of the horse scam ads, what the scammer does is copy someone’s legitimate classified ad and then just change the price to free or ~$800. Beware if they want to rush a sale as quickly as possible – this is a big tip-off that you might be dealing with a scammer.
“The Transportation Scam” – This scam often goes hand-in-hand with The Friesian Scam. Here, the seller is giving away a horse for free with some excuse as to the reason. Because they “care so much about the horse”, they will give you the horse, but require you to use their shipping or transportation company. They will send you a fake airbill or transportation invoice, with instructions for you to wire the money via Western Union or MoneyGram for several thousand dollars.
Many people fall for this scam because they think they’re getting a $10,000 horse for just the $2,000 cost to ship. In reality, there never was a horse for sale, and that victim is out $2,000.
Stay safe out there!
