Foreign lottery scam in overdrive for Christmas

'Tis the season when buying presents weighs heavily on people, leaving some vulnerable to get-rich-quick schemes or fabricated tales of woe aimed at playing on their sympathies.

But consider this: Postal authorities in New Jersey alone have intercepted more than 1.3 million pieces of foreign lottery mail intended to scam innocent people.

Now imagine how much of it has actually gotten through.

Employees at your local post office are trained to identify potential lottery mailings, which are immediately handed over to U.S. Customs for inspection.

If there's reasonable suspicion, Customs will pass the mailing on to agents with the U.S. Postal Inspection Service.

These are given to legal counsel, which issues a letter to the sender, granting 45 days to reclaim the mailing.

"Which they never do," said Joshua Shandler of the New Jersey's Newark-based USPIS.

When that response doesn't come, the mailings are destroyed.

Keep in mind that, with such volume, federal authorities can't possibly notify every addressee.

So be sure if you any of these letters do somehow make it through the net, you turn it over to the proper authorities.

And remember: You can't win a lottery if you haven't bought a ticket.

For more info, go to: USPIS.gov

Or check out: scroll to “Sweepstakes”

The best part: With assets seized from such criminals, Postal Inspectors produce FREE DVDs to help people understand the workings of the mail lottery scam.

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