In a new variation on the “brick in a box” scam, a South Carolina woman who thought she purchased an iPad from two men in a McDonald’s parking lot discovered yesterday that the purported tablet was actually “a piece of wood painted black with an Apple logo.”
According to a Spartanburg County Sheriff’s Office report, Ashley McDowell, 22, told deputies that she was approached by two black males who claimed to have purchased iPads in bulk and were selling them for $300 apiece. After McDowell explained that she only had $180, the duo agreed to sell her the device at a cut rate.
But when McDowell drove home and opened the FedEx box containing the iPad, she instead discovered the wood with the Apple logo. The “screen”–which was framed with black tape–included replicas of iPad icons for Safari, mail, photos, and an iPod. It also had what cops described as a “Best Buy sales ticket…”
Deputies have dusted the phony iPad for fingerprints. McDowell told probers that the swindlers were driving “a white Impala with no rims and no tint.” One of the men, she noted, “had a gold tooth.”
Har.
she should have taken it to the aNus bar to see why is ddint work.
#11 They abandoned the hardware, NOT the platform.
Anyway, at least the wood iPad can be useful in many ways, unlike the actual item.
I wouldn’t be so quick to laugh at the woman who was scammed. It probably looks like the real thing if wrapped in that translucent bubbly packaging that apple uses. At least good enough so you could open the box and ‘check’ the contents. If whatever it’s made out of is dense enough (high density fiberboard?) maybe the crooks could even hand it to the customer and say ‘look it’s new, even the packaging is unopened’.
I just watched a movie by a director I hadn’t heard of before so I looked it up on IMDB and found out she had been killed when walking into her hotel room and finding a burglar.
So easy to confront a person/stranger rather than simply turn and run. Need to train yourself for that unnatural action==just like coming home at night and your front door has been jimmied.
So–I do wonder what all the other circumstances where such that once you have gone so far its safer to just give the money over and go with the flow? I’ve never bought anything out of the truck of a car. Craigs list isn’t the trunk of a car is it?
Ha, ha. Yes, training oneself how to react to maximize your safety takes time and intent. What would you do with a gun put in your side and you are told to get in a car?
Experts fairly uniformly say to do one thing. Know what it is?????
Ha, ha. Yes–who would choose to more likely die over whatever is in your purse? None, if we could think thru it. pratice.
Rinse and repeat. You only get one go round.
Bobbo, you are one off-topic strange fuckin’ dude.
Do not buy from strangers outside a store.
Be aware of your surroundings, and always be ready to react if said surroundings offer an intruder.
Diversion and submission, give up your belongings *be ready to run* “Fling & Flee”
If you come across a situation, use your phone or better yet your right to bear & use arms 😉
There’s an app for that
I thought the topic was crime? No?
Cliff–Fling and Flee==quite right.
With 5 years of judo and karate training in Japan it took me years to figure out why I should flee rather than fight. A good friend of mine who had similar training said: “Run with Confidence.”
I really like that. I once saw a fender bender in San Fran. Two dudes got out, big guy threw a punch, little guy ducked and punched back. Big guy lost his balance, hit his head on the street. DOWN GOES FRAZIER, as Oberman would say: big guy dead. I’ll bet he could afford the bumper repair many times over. Well—he used to.
Run with Confidence, my friends: Run with Confidence.
MARCOS, TE QUIERO!!
It happened again.
http://wyff4.com/news/29056564/detail.html
Wood turns out to be mahogany, so the cops bust her for handling illegally imported wood.
#29 “Another Apple employee ‘accidentally’ left another prototype electronic device in another bar… aaaand there it is!”
Speaking of that, I was going to post this on Cage Match but I guess I am persona non grata on those areas.
Anyway, someone did it with a phone again but it’s really hard to believe this response.
Police assisted Apple in search of man’s home.
http://tinyurl.com/3k2g7w3
Hey, wait a minute. A woman named McDowell, at a restaurant named McDonald’s? Now that’s pretty coincidental, right there! And while we’re type-casting by names. Presumably she was Scottish, and didn’t ask to look at what she was spending her money on, first. Kind of tosses the whole thrifty Scotsman idea, right out the window. Maybe she was a well lit, Irish woman. Anyway, Mcdummies have got learn to be a little less trusting of sales of dodgy merchandise, in McD’s parking lots. Especially from those sporting cold teeth.
The next variation of the “White van” scam.