ear trusted and valued friend," began the letter I received by e-mail last week. Since I did not recognise the sender, I was intrigued to discover how I was so well thought of, so I read on.

"You may be surprised to receive this," I read, "as we have never met. I got your name from the Chamber of Commerce in your country as a reliable business man."

At this point I began to know what to expect. I was about to read a "419 Scam Letter." The 419 Letter takes its name from a section of the Nigerian Criminal Code which makes obtaining money by means of a false pretence an offence (this is very similar to Section 368 of the Bermuda Criminal Code).

In law enforcement parlance the letters are referred to as an advance fee fraud. This means that the fraudster attempts to persuade the victim to send funds to the fraudster in the hope of gaining a greater return.

A typical advance fee fraud consists of several parts. First there is the tale which establishes the background to the existence of a large amount of money. Secondly there is the device, which is the means the fraudster uses to entice the victim. Thirdly there is the up-front cost that the victim must pay in order to get the huge rewards offered in the device. Once the fraudster has milked the victim for all the up-front money possible, the fraudster disappears.

The tale can be a terrible sob story of hardship and woe, or just a factual relation of events that led to the availability of the money. The device will appeal to our emotions, often greed, sometimes pity, and sometimes, Christian charity. Very often the letter is written in poor English to give the reader a sense of his inherent superiority over the writer (if the writer's English is this bad, the victim should be able to out-smart him). Almost invariably no mention of any advance fee is made in the initial letter, but always there is an address to which some information should be sent.

Once the potential victim has replied to the letter the work (or sport) really begins for the fraudster. The fish has now taken the bait; the angler must now play and ultimately land his catch, then throw it back, several thousand dollars lighter. Some of the most successful frauds have led to victims parting with as much as $60,000 ? or as many of the letters would put it "USD60,000 (SIXTY THOUSAND US DOLLARS)."

Many letters refer to "over-invoiced contracts" which resulted in over-payments that left employees of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation with funds on hand that would have to be returned to the Government. These employees were seeking a reliable person to help them get the money out of Nigeria, in return for which the reliable person would receive a portion of the money (usually between ten to 30 percent). A small portion was to be used for expenses, while the employees would keep the remainder. This was a clear invitation to join in a theft of Government money; consequently, once the reliable person has joined in the conspiracy, the likelihood of him reporting to the authorities is very unlikely.

More recent invitations have come from the surviving relatives of notorious political figures. Often these letters refer to the vast personal fortunes of the deceased and the impoverishment of wives or children who are denied access to the fortunes by the political opponents of the former leader.

The leaders whose families have sought help have included Sani Abacha of Nigeria (who looted the Nigerian treasury and almost alone led the international anti-money laundering community to coin the acronym PEP, meaning politically exposed person), President Mobutu of Zaire and others. Letters also arrive from children of assassinated farmers from Zimbabwe, relatives of losing generals in civil wars, and also bank managers holding vast sums for deceased foreigners.

These are the most common scams, but they are not the only ones. Often more enticing are the letters informing us that we have been entered in a lottery, that we did not even know existed, and have won. In order to claim our prize we have to pay some expenses, which we are assured, will be returned. We are also invited to enter the next round of the draw. These letters tend to originate from Europe and give an impression of authority and gravity that is lacking from the standard 419 scam.

The senders of e-mails, faxes and letters are becoming more creative. Only a small percentage of the letters now originate in Nigeria. The common denominator in the letters is some news event, an air crash, civil war, political upheaval and, in the case of e-mails, the source.

Although much e-mail is now purporting to originate from well-known banking organisations, the actual e-mail address of the sender is invariably a public ISP, such as Yahoo or Hotmail, and the reply should usually go to such a destination.

However professional or creative the come-on, there is a golden rule: If you are offered something for nothing, and the offer seems too good to be true, it probably is ? do not get involved.