11 May, 2018 @ 11:53
1 min read

Scam artists from Portugal are targeting British expats in Spain with phony inheritance letters

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female hands with pencil writing on notebook

A BRITISH expat has warned of a scam targeting elderly residents on the Costa del Sol.

Kathleen Cain, 74, from Yorkshire, received a letter to her Benalmadena home last week claiming to be from Australian law firm Benjamin Meredith Law.

The letter told her she was to inherit more than seven million Australian dollars (€4.4 million) and offered her the ‘opportunity’ to split the money with the firm before encouraging her to email or get in touch by phone.


“I could tell it wasn’t legitimate, the stamp showed it had come from Portugal,” Cain told the Olive Press.

“But I am very worried that some other elderly person could open a letter of this kind thinking it could be authentic.

“There are some really vulnerable people out here who could easily become targets.”

Have you received a similar letter? Get in touch at newsdesk@theolivepress.es

Laurence Dollimore

Laurence Dollimore is a Spanish-speaking, NCTJ-trained journalist with almost a decade’s worth of experience.
The London native has a BA in International Relations from the University of Leeds and and an MA in the same subject from Queen Mary University London.
He earned his gold star diploma in multimedia journalism at the prestigious News Associates in London in 2016, before immediately joining the Olive Press at their offices on the Costa del Sol.
After a five-year stint, Laurence returned to the UK to work as a senior reporter at the Mail Online, where he remained for two years before coming back to the Olive Press as Digital Editor in 2023.
He continues to work for the biggest newspapers in the UK, who hire him to investigate and report on stories in Spain.
These include the Daily Mail, Telegraph, Mail Online, Mail on Sunday and The Sun and Sun Online.
He has broken world exclusives on everything from the Madeleine McCann case to the anti-tourism movement in Tenerife.

GOT A STORY? Contact newsdesk@theolivepress.es or call +34 951 273 575 Twitter: @olivepress

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