- Messages
- 287
- Reactions
- 66
From Guns America on-line magazine (blog)
Much to the relief of his hundreds of internet gun buyers who have encountered him first hand, Paul Steven Webster has been caught. He was arrested March 21st by Lee County Florida deputies after an exhaustive three year hunt by both state and local law enforcement. GunsAmerica was instrumental in both the opening of the case against Webster and in his eventual capture.
Webster has been known throughout the internet gun buying world as a most elusive purveyors of internet fraud operating in our small corner of the internet buying world. He has claimed victims from nearly every popular internet discussion forum, posting guns for sale several hundred dollars below their value, and he has also surfaced on all of the major gun buying and selling websites, as well as the internet gun auctions.
GunsAmerica customer service opened the case against him in 2008 (not 2007 like some of the press releases say) in Lee County Florida when he surfaced here, and our fraud prevention system kept him off of GunsAmerica until early 2011 when he again attempted to steal from our people. We quickly reached out to both local and federal law enforcement, and he was caught within a short time.
We are sending this notice out because we would like our people and the entire gun buying public to know two things.
1. That there is a new sheriff in town when it comes to internet fraud. Where as recent as a year ago we could not get any state or federal agency to pay attention to cases where there was under $100,000 in losses, the United States Postal Service has recently become the primary point of contact for what are considered small cases of internet fraud.Lee County Florida arrested Webster, but the warrants in Florida and a couple other states for his arrest were initiated by United States Postal Service Inspectors from information provided by GunsAmerica. The agent specifically involved in Florida has asked to remain anonymous, but this arrest never would have occurred with her aggressive pursuit of this case.
2. That GunsAmerica aggressively pursues internet scammers. GunsAmerica is the only website involved in this case that has had active and aggressive contact with law enforcement. Emails to several internet selling venues and discussion sites with buying and selling boards by the USPS went unanswered, and the case would have gone cold. Listen up internet gun community!! We cant be silent about internet fraud. W e are hoping the victims of Paul Webster from all over the internet gun world will get word of his arrest through our blog and blog digest email.
Other names that Paul Webster ripped people off under are Savannah Associates (the other warrants were in Georgia), Blackstone Enterprises, and PCH Traders among others. We cannot disclose the list of websites that were platforms for his fraud, but they are as far reaching as any corner of the internet that you can travel to talk about or buy and sell guns.
In the end Webster was arrested at a Publix supermarket after we gave our contact at USPS the details of the location of his latest mail drop. Our people were instrumental in getting law enforcement the bank information where he was cashing checks, and eventually our people brought him down. We hope and pray that as the case is brought against Webster that our victims here on GA are reimbursed for their losses
Much to the relief of his hundreds of internet gun buyers who have encountered him first hand, Paul Steven Webster has been caught. He was arrested March 21st by Lee County Florida deputies after an exhaustive three year hunt by both state and local law enforcement. GunsAmerica was instrumental in both the opening of the case against Webster and in his eventual capture.
Webster has been known throughout the internet gun buying world as a most elusive purveyors of internet fraud operating in our small corner of the internet buying world. He has claimed victims from nearly every popular internet discussion forum, posting guns for sale several hundred dollars below their value, and he has also surfaced on all of the major gun buying and selling websites, as well as the internet gun auctions.
GunsAmerica customer service opened the case against him in 2008 (not 2007 like some of the press releases say) in Lee County Florida when he surfaced here, and our fraud prevention system kept him off of GunsAmerica until early 2011 when he again attempted to steal from our people. We quickly reached out to both local and federal law enforcement, and he was caught within a short time.
We are sending this notice out because we would like our people and the entire gun buying public to know two things.
1. That there is a new sheriff in town when it comes to internet fraud. Where as recent as a year ago we could not get any state or federal agency to pay attention to cases where there was under $100,000 in losses, the United States Postal Service has recently become the primary point of contact for what are considered small cases of internet fraud.Lee County Florida arrested Webster, but the warrants in Florida and a couple other states for his arrest were initiated by United States Postal Service Inspectors from information provided by GunsAmerica. The agent specifically involved in Florida has asked to remain anonymous, but this arrest never would have occurred with her aggressive pursuit of this case.
2. That GunsAmerica aggressively pursues internet scammers. GunsAmerica is the only website involved in this case that has had active and aggressive contact with law enforcement. Emails to several internet selling venues and discussion sites with buying and selling boards by the USPS went unanswered, and the case would have gone cold. Listen up internet gun community!! We cant be silent about internet fraud. W e are hoping the victims of Paul Webster from all over the internet gun world will get word of his arrest through our blog and blog digest email.
Other names that Paul Webster ripped people off under are Savannah Associates (the other warrants were in Georgia), Blackstone Enterprises, and PCH Traders among others. We cannot disclose the list of websites that were platforms for his fraud, but they are as far reaching as any corner of the internet that you can travel to talk about or buy and sell guns.
In the end Webster was arrested at a Publix supermarket after we gave our contact at USPS the details of the location of his latest mail drop. Our people were instrumental in getting law enforcement the bank information where he was cashing checks, and eventually our people brought him down. We hope and pray that as the case is brought against Webster that our victims here on GA are reimbursed for their losses
