There was a documentary made by the BBC and in the show called McIntyre Undercover they investigated such cases.
These emails are called 419 fraud, scam, crime. It was originally made by South Africans but now i saw Indians Arabs and many other people doing it. In fact these people who invented it are not dumb they aim for people's greed and they know that the receiver is underestimating them.
The script goes like this they send out lots and lots of mail through the internet and through regular mail. The UK is bombarded with these mails couple of millions each year. Usually in each mail they mention couple of million dollars that needs to be transfered. But before they can transfer it you have to pay some taxes (send them money to pay that) but wait there are couple of legal troubles so more money. They don't ask for much just a couple of hundred dollars. Your probably thinking this is a small investment when i'll have the money on my account i'll move or withdraw it faster then a blink of an eye. The jokes are on you that money doesn't exists it's just fictional. With this method a poor chap lost 3 million quids. Yeah talking about human greed.
Btw it's almost impossible to catch them. They don't have a hierarchy like the usual pyramid shaped one so well known from cosa nostra. Somewhat random who's in charge didn't quite get it, sorry.
The same thing is with lotto winnings, once i was bored and started counting my winnings and reached 50 mill $ in just one week. And i'm here @ this forum searching for financial freedom
. So just ignore these letters.
Reislet