A New Paris scam
 

Paris muggers are faking heart attacks.
GOOD samaritans have become the target of a new mugging trend in Paris,
A number of thefts have been reported in recent weeks involving victims who rush to help a passer-by who has collapsed in the street, clutching his chest in pain.
The "injured" man tells the target that they are fine and do not need an ambulance, then grabs them and steals their bag or wallet before running to a nearby waiting car.
The suspects are in their 20s and 30s. One victum had 5euros another 10,000.

Hi cig,

Thanks for the update.

I guess that the best way to determine if someone is actually in need of aid is for one person to step on his wrist while another calls the police.

((I))

Thanks for the laugh, Professor

When in Paris, always be VERY WARY of anyone who approaches you speaking ENGLISH with an accent. That is a sure sign that they are up to no good. You are in Paris, why would anyone assume you speak English? Why would anyone just start speaking in English if it is not their native tongue?

When you are in Paris, you will see people reaching down in front of you to to pick up a ring on the ground. They will shout out, in English, "It is GOLD! Did you lose your ring?" This is a scam aimed at tourists. These people will offer you the ring for a price.

In Rome, all the scam artists speak English. You will see women speaking English trying to get people to sign a petition against drug use, then ask for a donation. The petition will be written in English. If the petition was legitimate, why would it be written in English? Why isn't it written in Italian?

So, when in France, Italy, Spain, etc., beware of anyone approaching you on the street speaking English. Just pretend you don't understand and walk away.

Thin

>>So, when in France, Italy, Spain, etc., beware of anyone approaching you on the street speaking English. Just pretend you don't understand and walk away.<<

And expect a chain of threads here from people complaining about the crazy/rude people in Paris who back off when you try to speak to them in English.

Thanks for the tip-off Cigale. So far I have been approached twice on the Champs Elysees by a rather young lad asking 'Do you speak English?' I just shake my head and keep walking because I know they are trying to tap some cash off you.

Wish someone would do that gold ring trick on me....I'm going to throw down a fake Rolex and shout 'Hey, look what I,ve found - a Rolex watch!' and see if they take the bait.LOL

Well I guess I should have been wary of the SNCF employee who spoke to us in English when we were changing trains in Brive. He didn't need to hear us say anything to know that we are English speakers - even after 16 years here we don't LOOK French. Very kindly offered to show us the correct platform.

Not everyone who approaches you speaking English will be trying to cheat you.

That said, we did have the gold ring scam tried on us for the first time this trip to Paris. The same woman 3 times in about 12 hours.

We bought that big arch thing last time we were in Paris. I'm still trying to get a man with a van to get it home for us. The good thing is that the tower looks great in our garden.

When I see tourists looking a bit lost and talking to each other in English with a map in the hand, I always talk to them in English with my French accent. Please don't arrest me, just want to help! ((A))

Is Paris becoming Barcelona of the North?

coco - the difference is you don't approach them asking if they speak English. You've already heard them speak English and are offering to help. The scammers do not have French accents (at least the ones who have approached me don't).

I'm asked all the time if I speak English by people who are not native English speakers. I do not acknowledge them with even a glance or a nod of my head. I pretend I do not understand English and keep walking. I was with someone in Paris once who stopped when someone asked if she spoke English. She was convince the person was looking for directions. I explained that the person was looking to pinch her money!

I had someone pick up a gold ring in front of me during my last visit. I gave her a withering look as she showed me the ring.

Another scam in Rome around the Colosseum:

A man in a small hatch-back car will yell out, "Do you know where the Colosseum Metro stop is located?" When you approach his car, he will engage you in conversation asking where you are from. You will see boxes in the trunk of his car. He will explain that he is a salesman from Frankfurt/Dusseldorf/Cologne and will sell you a watch/leather jacket/laptop at cost because you were so nice in helping with directions.

So, don't approach anyone asking for directions in English.

Maybe you think you are being helpful, but you can be putting yourself in a dangerous situation.

Thin

Thanks for the new scam alert. When I read it, it reminded me that almost the same thing happened to a co-worker of mine many years ago at a bank in Boston. She was leaving the bank and someone in the vestibule area "fainted." She leaned over to help and another person took her wallet out of her purse.

It's always good to be reminded of these things, because often your inclination to be a good samaritan kicks in immediately when these things happen.

"One victum had 5euros another 10,000"

10,000 euros on his/her person -- just waiting to be lifted. Yikes!

I'd be the one to lose five, or maybe 10.

When we visited Paris a year ago May, a number of young women display a laminated index card, saying they have a brother who has cancer and needs money to help pay for his treatment otherwise he'll die. We were amazed at the number of sisters this young man has!! Must have had at least 20 sisters all hanging out in front of Notre Dame and Sacre Coeur. Don't make eye contact - just keep walking. Has anyone seen them this year? Did their brother recover???

4 years ago, a Pakistani-looking girl approached us near the Arc de Triumphe. Asked if we spoke English. I harked back to college when a Korean war vet taught me a phrase (<@33&!1), and repeated to her.

She turned around and left without a word.

Funny, she didn't look Korean.

ThinGorjus on Jun 17, 10 at 8:34am
When in Paris, always be VERY WARY of anyone who approaches you speaking ENGLISH with an accent.

This means, I can never ask for directions there :)

10,000 Euro? 10,000.00 EUR = 12,379.15 USD Why would anybody carry that much?

I was approached (in much maligned Barcelona) by a couple who asked a question in accented English... turned out they were tourists from Holland who thought I looked like a local.
Also seen the scam in Rome described by Thin ( twice in one day).

the people asking you to sign a petition are particularly persistent in Venice, and difficult to avoid altogether as Veince is quite a small place. they have tables set up and look very official. we quickly sussed what they were about, and developed our stock response which was to say that we are Cornish.
by the time they'd worked out what we'd said, we were long gone.

I don't know Dayenu, but I'll bet he is being investigated.
The news letter didn't give out that information.

We encountered the "do you speak English?" twice and the dropped ring once during our May visit of four weeks. I believe two of the three were while walking across the outside area in front of Notre Dame and in the plaza near the Hotel de Ville. I don't recall where the third encounter occurred. If you just keep walking they seem to move on quickly to a better target.

Um, men in their 20's don;t really have heart attacks. And even if they were - the thing to do is call the equivalent of 911.

I guess this is just basic to a New Yorker - but you help people by calling the authoriities - not taking care of them yourself - unless you are an MD or EMT

(This is not heartless, it's just common sense. If it's a scam - you're not a victim. If it's real you're getting the person real help right away - not playing medical center yourself.)

Four years ago, I went backpacking with two friends who spoke French fluently and we stopped by the Sacré-Coeur. Beautiful place, tons of tourists. Then this man approached me with a bracelet and said "hello" to me. I just smirked and turned around. As I was walking away, he grabbed my wrist and tied a knot around my pinky finger and started braiding a bracelet. And I asked him kindly to please stop doing that and let go of my hand. And he says to me "You have to buy this bracelet first." And then I just got pissed! My friends started to shout at him in French and cursed him off. He finally yanked the bracelet off of my finger, nearly dislocating it and then stomped off to another tourist.

I LOVE Paris, but money hustlers and scam artists...they ruin it for me :(

Just remembered about the gypsies boarding the Metro in Paris as we were going to the Montmartre station. They were playing violins and I made the mistake of taking their picture. DON'T DO THAT! When they finished their song, they went up to everyone in the train car, asking for money. When they got to me, I was told in English - 2 euros - for taking their photo. I was so stunned that I actually gave them the money. Later I told my husband that I should have held up my camera, clicked on "preview," shown them their picture, and then clicked on DELETE and not given them any money. Advice: Ignore musicians on the Metro.

Was in Paris three weeks ago. What a change since I was last there four years ago. The number of illegal souvenir peddlers was amazing, choking tourist areas everywhere. My friend was handed a small flier when we got out of the metro stop at Opera. Before I could stop her she took it and the guy asked for money. I handed it back and started to walk away and he grabbed my arm. He did this twice and finally showed me some kind of badge thing. I told him I didn't care and got away from him after a couple more arm grabs. Don't let anyone hand you anything. When asked if I speak English I just gesture "a little bit" and they leave me alone.

tod, I had the gold ring experience in Paris. I knew what was going on thanks to Fodor's. I laughed at the guy and said 'no' quite firmly. He backed off and then SPAT at me!!

"When they got to me, I was told in English - 2 euros - for taking their photo.......... Advice: Ignore musicians on the Metro."

A more general advice : do not take pictures of people without asking their permission.

mimi:

That young man with many sisters dying of cancer...was just called up from Pawtucket by the Sox...good field, no hit.
stu

I help tourists in English all the time, and they have never run away screaming yet.

I have never heard of or read about a heart attack scam. It sounds much too risky (for the perpetrators) for it to work correctly.

On the discussions about asking for directions, some people are just oblivious to things. We were doing a shoot in St. Peter's square. We had the Vatican police in their golf cart-whose purpose was to make certain nobody was injured by our equipment, our narrator, two camera people and me. Lucaya, the narrator, was in the process of doing the series intro.

This American family (yes we are all Americans too) first comes up to the Vatican police (who spoke perfect English with us) and asked for directions. In very broken English they told them we were Americans and could probably help them. So, while we are in the middle of the shot, the mom and dad walk right between Lucaya and the camera guys and slowly begin to ask how to get to the Vatican Museums. Now you have to remember, while they were walking up, Lucaya is going through this very involved monologue on St. Peters, in English.

We stopped the shot and I asked them if they would mind waiting until we were finished and we could help them in any way possible. The Vatican police thought this was just hilarious and ended up driving off. I am then told by the father that he has never met so many rude people as we Italians. I'm from Florida and while I don't have a strong southern accent, it is there and I don't think he even realized I was speaking English or that we were all speaking English.

They ended up storming off in a huff. I've considered using this if we ever do an out-takes video for youtube.

dave

We are just home from Paris. Have visited the city many times, have never had a problem (well, the ring scam was tried once), but this time we "bit." We were standing on a crowded metro, hanging on to the pole. Just as we pulled into a station, the man next to me apparently dropped something and knelt down, fumbling around my husband's feet. I looked around, and a man on the other side of me picked up the dropped cell phone and handed it to me to give to the man who dropped it. I gave it to him, and he left just before the door closed. Within minutes, my husband realized that his wallet was gone, and it must have happened during the confusion over the dropped phone. We suspect that the dropee and the man who picked it up were working together. Fortunately, we have credit card protection through American Express, so we called immediately to report the theft. However, they were able to charge about $1,500 on 7 separate charges, mostly at Monoprix. Apparently they were quite skilled at using stolen cards. Didn't spoil our lovely time in Paris, but beware!

Well I sympathize with those who wanted to be paid for having their picture taken. Private individuals have a right to privacy - and tourists don;t have a right to take recognizable pix of people (rather than tourist sites). If the people don't want their pix take - or want to be paid for it - that's their right.

(How would you feel if you were playing with your kids in a park and some strangers came up and started shooting pix or videos - then just walking away? I wouldn;t be happy with somebody just randomly snapping away at me.)

There is a right to privacy in France but not in public places. If you do not what to be photographed, you do not go out in public.

what = want

Thanks for this warning Mimi. Here's my own experience with scammers in Paris.

Years ago I was at the Arch de Triomphe with a friend. My friend was carrying a very expensive camera and taking pics. A well-dressed man approached my friend and said, "Let me take your picture, go stand over there." Before I could intervene my friend said yes and started to hand him the camera. I stopped her, saying "NO, DO NOT GIVE HIM YOUR CAMERA!!" I thought it was obvious the guy was going to run off with the camera but my friend would have gone for it. As we were leaving we could still see this guy scoping out the tourists.

I do agree with Pvoyageuse and nytraveler about not taking pictures of people without asking their permission, especially if you plan to use the photo in a newspaper or other media source (YouTube, magazine, etc). However, I also concur with kerouac. If you are in a public place playing music -- a Metro train car, a street corner, inside the Metro station, in front of the Eiffel Tower, -- I think you've invited people to take your picture, as well as listen to your music. We had an awesome experience in front of the Comedie Francaise Theatre when we came across a group of young symphony orchestra performers. Their music was incredible. Rest assured lots of tourists had cameras snapping and I don't recall anyone going up to the musicians and asking permission. Yes, I took pictures and I also bought their CD, which is a wonderful memory of their performance.

People often come up to me asking directions, no matter WHERE we are, US or Europe. I guess I look like everyone's Aunt Jane. 99% of the time, they really are just lost and you can tell that with a glance. When I am approached by a beggar or a scammer, I can pretty much tell that as well, so I have cultivated a very good vacant stare that seems to convey the idea that I've no idea what they are saying, no matter what language they speak and mutter a few Swedish words (which I know I'm mispronouncing anyway) with an exaggerated Southern accent. The result is very entertaining as they immediately lose interest in pursuing the conversation/scam any further.

I have no problem helping genuine lost folk with direction if at all possible!

this was posted on Paris Update


NEW SCAM ALERT

A new street scam has popped up in Paris to add the list enumerated by David Jaggard last year in Paris Update. This one has an extra nasty twist because it takes advantage of those rare people who are willing to stop and help strangers in difficulty and makes all of us even warier of playing the Good Samaritan. It goes like this: someone on the street falls to the ground, apparently suffering a heart attack. When a good-hearted passerby rushes over to offer help, the supposed heart-attack victim says that he (they seem to be mostly youngish men) doesn’t need an ambulance, then grabs the wallet or handbag of the real victim and hops into a waiting car for the getaway.