Complaint Review: Charles McEntire

 I was selling a motorcycle on Craigslist, and was contacted by email, by an individual identifying himself as Charles McEntire.  The following is a transcript of his email to me, after I responded to his email about purchasing my motorcycle:  "Hello, Thanks for the mail, I'm interested in buying this item for my son and I'm okay with teh price, I'm a Subsea Engineer and currently offshore I want this as a surprise gift for my son so I won't let him to be aware until delivery.  I feel more comfortable to handle the payment through PayPal due to their various security measures and ensuring safety and secured transaction between both buyers and seller and kindly reply me with your paypal email address for me to processed with teh payment, incase you do not have an account with paypal you can easily set-up with an account with them today as it's secured and reliable in terms of transaction arrangement.  Visit their website on www.paypal.com I will be responsible for the paypal charges.  My movers would come around for the pick up as soon as possible, after the payment has been sent to you and your full address and phone number will be needed for the freight arrangement I would love to speak with you through the phone but due to the nature ofmy work as a Subsea Engineer i work mainly at Sea of Okhotsk and our phone is down on the rig right now due to bad weather, We can still communicate through the email exchange for now.  I will be looking forward to read from you in real soon with the paypal email address and your full address including phone number for freight arrangement.  Charles."     After receiving the email above, I received some very official looking emails from "Paypal".  I also received another email from this Charles McEntire.  The text of that email follows:  "I have a little problem withthe movers and i was told to make a payment of $1500 for the freight arrangement which i will be including with the payment to you.  I will add the $1500 along with the payment to you right now by paypal and once you received the payment confirmation you can help me send the $1500 to the movers through Money Gram as all efforts to the payment directly to them had beenproved abortive by Western Union and can't send money offshore for security reason best known to my bank.  I will make the payment right now to you and once received payment confirmation help me send the money to them to schedule the freight arrangement.  Regards, Charles.

This individual stated that he would be using the following as the "mover" for the item:  William Benson, 15080 Tradesman, San Antonio, Texas 78249.

I contacted paypal, and spoke to one of their agents.  He informed me that he had just taken 4 calls regarding this individual, and that it was a scam!  Sellers beware!  This guy is pretty slick. 

This guy is slick.  He baits you in a little bit at a time, and he follows up.   I just got another email from him, wondering if I had made the moneygram transfer!