Ladies, I'd love to have your advice. I am a sugarbaby and met a man on a sugarbaby site, but as this is someone who I believe is using false promise of money as a means to get sex, it is in my best interests to post this on this escort site as well to help warn other women.

The man's name is Paul F (details at the end) and he is a middle aged British man. I met him once before and then we went out one evening and stayed overnight in a hotel.

Prior to spending the evening, he wrote me out a cheque. I was in two minds but after reassurance I accepted it. I went to the bank the very next day and they would not accept it - they told me it was written in a way that it looked like it was tampered. They told me to go back to the person who wrote it out.

I contacted this guy immediately and we mutually agreed a date/time for bank transfer of the amount owed and the money never came. He then gave excuses for delayed payment, avoided me and lied that he was out of the country (IP address said he was in UK). When I called him up on it, he became hostile. Essentially, he has scammed me and it is now clear that he never intended to honour the cheque. It has been a little over 2 weeks now.

I still hold the cheque with his signature as proof of acknowledgment to pay, but it never 'bounced' per se. I tried to call the police. Disappointingly, they told me it was a civil matter and to pursue this as a civil case.

I have told him I am taking him to small claims and am giving written notice tomorrow. I have his home address and intend to send the letter to make sure he gets it.

Is there anything else I can do? Is it worthwhile/legal to send a request for the money to the general email of his work in an effort to embarrass him? I don't want to do anything that the law will look upon unfavourably so that my case is thrown out before it has even begun. The only other evidence of our communications are email, text and verbal which I understand may not stand up to much in court.

I am angry at myself  I know I was foolish to accept someone at face value. Any advice?

His 2 UK numbers:
075636289**
078059572**

His US number:
+1-619-90572**

For full email/numbers, PM me.

The advice you got from the police was wrong: there have been convictions for exactly this. One reason for moving this post here is that it is widely read, may get other escorts going 'me too!' (you are unlikely to be the only one he's pulled this with) and the more people who complain about this, the greater the chance of the police doing something.

For the civil case, what you're holding is a promise to pay. That it's for a verbal deal for a contract - sex for money - that the courts would not enforce doesn't matter, that cheque is his acknowledgement that he owes you the money. So suing him is very much an option, and the only question is when you win, will you get the money out of him?

Do you want to send me a photo or a scan of the cheque? If it's not screamingly obvious that there is a problem, you could try paying it in via one of the automated deposit machines your bank probably has and see if it comes back. The downside is that the bank may charge if they do this.

Yep, I thought I had heard of at least one woman having success in a similar situation over a dud cheque. I think it depends on the judge, but as XW5 says it's getting him to pay up in the end that's the problem.

Cheques notoriously bounce in this line of work, and it's how scamsters and tricksters operate. I once had an argument with a guy who was trying to convince me that a business cheque can't be stopped, he tried to make out I was some stupid little woman who didn't have a clue. Except I do have some business and banking knowledge and it's very basic stuff!

Sorry this has happened to you and hope you get it sorted out, at least putting it here might stop others from being scammed too.

I'll PM you my email address.

Being a US cheque might complicate things, but the basic principle is very simple: you can't argue about paying someone when you've written them a cheque.

@ xw5 - thank you so much for responding to me and so quickly too.

You'll have to forgive my cluelessness and newbieness, but how exactly do I email you an attachment? I only know how to PM on here. 

I have the original and a scanned copy of the cheque that I'm happy to show you. I should add, it is a US cheque. I was told they clear in a week which I also found to be a lie, as the bank told me they take at least a month to clear and the recipient (i.e. me) needs to fill out a shit ton of details. But perhaps it's better in a way that I didn't cash it as it'd be horrible to have it bounce a month or more later.

@ Strawberry - thanks for your reply too. I guess I was just a very bad judge of character with this person. You are correct on the whole 'dependent on the judge' thing as I sought some legal advice and they told me that would be the case. On the upside, he did seem a little disconcerted when I told him I was going to pursue him legally as I think he expected me to feel ashamed and scurry away. I really want to get the bastard, even if to just teach him a lesson and I don't want to give up without a fight.

That's ok when I first started I got scammed but in a different way, that was by someone who came over as nice as pie and he went on to do the same with a much more experienced lady.

Do you think it's worthwhile I email him via his company email? Or is that a step too far?

I'm not a legal professional but I think it's best to not try to embarrass him into paying if you're seeking actual legal recourse. You do not want to have to stand in front of a judge, potentially, and admit to behaving in a way even remotely unbecoming of a professional person, when you're trying to claim that that's what this guy did to you. You want the judge to see you as impeccable and faultless in your methods and manners! Otherwise I'm guessing they'd be more likely to think that you might be (all or partially) at fault here?

So stay far away from doing anything that might be considered harassing him! If he lost his job because of you, a judge might be even more likely to think he'd 'already paid his dues', perhaps? I mean, possibly not, but I certainly wouldn't take that risk.

Thanks to xw5 to told me to contact other girls - I have a small update to the thread.

Good news is that I have managed to locate two other girls who are in possession of bounced cheques from this man and who want to take action against him. One other girl is hesitant to come forward and I don't want to pressure her. I am still waiting for other girls to get back to me with any news. I am pleased to here were also a handful of girls who had already scheduled to meet him and have successfully warned off him.

I have already sent my letter preceeding legal action to him for myself. What I would like to ask is: is it worthwhile that we all send a letter and file small claims, or are there enough of us to go directly to the police if noone else comes forward? It is now very doubtful he even has the money to pay each of us what he owes.

I strongly suspect he has done this more times. As I understand, he's been at this for at least a year.

Edited to add - thanks Amy for the clarification in the post below -- I've now made a spin-off thread about the legal stuff which can be found at http://www.saafe.info/main/index.php?topic=10781.0