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I have been befrauded by an acquaintance of mine who borrowed large sums of money and provided contracts with his Turkish address and these contracts supposedly were sent by his lawyer in Turkey. But the several email trace leads to two IP addresses in the USA. Is it possible to trace the person through the law and charge him and possibly get my money back.

Many thanks

Marshall

Marshall Thanuvan
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    Contact law enforcement. They can decide upon the appropriate forensics necessary and get a professional to do them. They also have access to records that you do not. Do not try to do your own forensics. Anything you discover will at best be inadmissible due to lack of chain-of-custody, and may also taint other evidence. – Polynomial Mar 21 '19 at 22:54
  • @Polynomial Unfortunately, law enforcement will rarely do anything about it unless "large sums of money" are indeed extremely large (think well over $10k USD). With that said, I agree with you in full and do think this is OP's best option. Perhaps you could turn your comment into an answer. – forest Mar 21 '19 at 22:56
  • While the FBI can, and has, successfully prosecuted this kind of international crime, the reality is that unless it's high profile politically, they're unlikely to even look at anything under $100K. – user10216038 Mar 22 '19 at 01:03

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Contact law enforcement. First try your local police department. They should take a statement, provide you with a crime reference number, and give you advice on how to handle things. They can decide upon the appropriate forensics necessary and get a professional to do them. They also have access to records that you do not. If the amount was high (in excess of $10k value) you may want to also contact an agency tasked with financial crime (e.g. the FBI, or Action Fraud UK).

Next you should contact your bank. Let them know that the funds transferred out of your account were part of a scam. They will almost certainly not be able to recover the money, but by providing a crime reference number from the police their fraud team can take steps to stop this happening to someone else. It also potentially helps them build evidence against organised crime groups.

Do not try to do your own forensics. Anything you discover will at best be inadmissible due to lack of chain-of-custody, and may also taint other evidence. Do not attempt to further contact the individuals involved either.

Ultimately you should not get your hopes up on getting the money back. Sadly there is little the police can do about international fraud once it happens. I recommend that you look into getting credit alerts set up to see if the scammers later sell your details on or try to take credit out in your name. If you run into financial problems due to the amount that was taken, you may want to look for a fraud victim support group. They will be able to provide a support network and point you towards local resources that can help you.

Polynomial
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