Savina Goo, a 19-year-old anthropology student at Northwestern University, began her day on May 2 a little earlier than usual. This allowed her to take her time walking to her job in the anthropology department.
Walking down Hinman Ave. in Evanston, she was stopped by a black, well-dressed man in his 40s, 5'9 and 160 lb., holding a Bible in one hand and a piece of paper in the other. "Excuse me," he said, " Can you tell me where the Baptist Church of Africa is?" Goo stopped and told him that she had never heard of it.
A black woman about 50 years old, 5'5" and 130 lb., happened to walk by and the man stopped her to ask the same question. She asked him for the address and he showed her the piece of paper with the church's name but no address. "Sorry," she said, " I can't help you without an address. I'm a postal worker and I haven't heard of this church before."
The two women were now engaged in a conversation that would cost Goo $900.
"Are you a Christian?" the man asked the black woman. "Yes," she said. "And you?" the man asked referring to Goo. "Yes," she answered.
"I want to make sure I am talking to Christians because I want to trust you with something very important," he said. Goo told Inside that the man seemed to have an accent, as if he had come from some African country, and he spoke quite loudly as if he were a preacher.
The man said that he was from an African country Goo had never heard of. His visa was going to expire within the day so he was in desperate need to find people he could trust. He had come to the United States because his brother was killed in an airplane crash while working for the government and that as the beneficiary he received $300,000.
He took a letter from his suit pocket and gave it to the women. "Read it. Read it aloud," he said and the black woman read the letter as Goo read over her shoulder. "But why are you looking for this church?" the black woman asked.
"I was at the lawyer's office in Sears Tower settling my brother's affairs, and I told them that I would like to give the money to charity. I cannot take such a large amount of money into my country. It is at war and it would be confiscated and used for more killing. The lawyers wanted me to donate it to their cause but they weren't Christians and I thought they had made enough money on my brother's affairs. I took the money and left the office," he said.
"I was in the lobby on my knees praying for guidance and the security police told me that I could not pray in the lobby or I would be arrested. I told him I wanted to donate some money to a worthy charity to do God's work. He gave me this name of a worthy church in Evanston. He hailed a taxi for me and that is how I came to be here."
"He came off as an innocent person," Goo told Inside. "He said he was afraid and he didn't have much time left. He even asked me to hold his hand...and I did."
"I must make sure that I can trust you," he said. " How much money do you have in the bank?" Goo explained that she is a student on scholarship and she has only two dollars in her bank account. The other woman provided her bankbook for him to see and he was convinced she was "trustworthy to do the work of God."
" You have a credit card, don't you?" the woman asked. "Yes," Goo said. "Well, get a cash advance," the woman said, trying to be helpful.
"If you can prove that you are able to get money," the man said, "then I guess it would be all right to trust you."
"I am on a scholarship here and my parents are heavily subsidized so the $150,000 I would get from you [to deliver to the church] would give me and my family a lot of problems [if I were to keep it]," Goo said, "I really don't want your money. I only want to help."
The woman offered to drive Goo to Goo's bank for the money. The man sat in the back seat and Goo sat in the front. He took out a large wad of money and separated it into two bundles saying that each bundle contained $150,000.
They went to a nearby bank with an ATM and the woman accompanied Goo into the bank. "Can't I just get a letter of credit from the bank?" Goo asked. "No, you have to prove that you have access to money and you don't want to show him that you can't be trusted," the woman said. During each of these exchanges, the woman acted as a facilitator, making the unreasonable demands seem reasonable, persuading her to be honest and trusting. Goo said there were a number of times during the encounter that she thought something was wrong but the man seemed so innocent and the woman seemed genuinely concerned.
Goo withdrew $900 as a cash advance on her credit card and gave it to the man. "He took out a handkerchief saying it was blessed by the high priest of his church in Africa. He placed the fat bundle of money he had separated before on the cloth and wrapped it up, tying the ends securely. "This will keep the money safe to do God's work," he said. They drove Goo to her dorm and said good-bye.
Goo went to her apartment and opened the handkerchief. Inside was a bundle of newspaper cut to the size of U.S. currency. She reported the incident to police but they offered little consolation, saying that victims of this type of scam are usually elderly people.
On May 3, Goo was in Uptown finishing her anthropology fieldwork. "Maybe I believed him because my experience with Chicago community groups has been so positive. I believed things were really great... that all you need to solve a lot of problems is to trust people and get them organized to do something constructive."
She told her story to one of the people she was working with and he said he just read something similar in Inside (May 1-7 issue). "They seem like the same people," she said, and contacted Inside to share her story, to prevent others from making the same mistake. An incident with the same method of operation perpetrated by subjects of similar description took place on March 1 and was reported by Inside (March 13-20 issue) as well.
Goo said that she was more religious than her parents and the experience has made her faith even stronger. However, the bank has not been so forgiving. She will have to pay the $900.
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