12/31/2022
Hi all my artist friends:
There is a SCAM going on out there, targeting commercial artists! I am pretty sure they got my information off of Linked In. But, I was contacted by a man named "Cody Francisco" to do some illustrations for an upcoming symposium; the charity is legit, the 'sponsor' (from whom the checks would come) is also a legit company, although I think they know nothing of this scam. The deadlines seemed normal, also the descriptions of the artwork needed. Even so, my "spider senses" were tingling, and they really went off when they wanted to pay me all of it, up front, and wanted me to deposit the check immediately. I couldn't contact the charity because they are closed down until Jan. 3.
I talked to a friend from the IRS, and she told me that sometimes charities do want to pay everything and have it deposited, if the end of the year is coming up, and they have designated funds for certain purposes; if they don't use it by the end-of-year deadline, they lose it. The second thing suspicious, is he wanted a copy of the bank receipt after it was deposited. (Like I would even do that, without blacking out any of my information!)
The check came in the form of a Chase bank check, sent by priority mail. To my untrained eye, the check looked legit. Fortunately, I bank at Chase, and told the teller I was suspicious; she immediately noticed that the bank logo was in the wrong place. She called in the manager, and they did some more research, and it turns out, the check was a total fake! They even looked up the account, and although the account is real, checks are not allowed to be drawn on it.
So be forewarned. Scam artists are out there! Fortunately, I hadn't started work on the project, other than having some of my students pose for me (for which they got some extra-credit points). So it ended well. But... be wary!
