Sue Stroud recently received a brown envelope with a Manchester, England postmark, a stamp depicting a British matriarch and an air-mail sticker from the Royal Mail.
The envelope had no return address, but Stroud was intrigued enough by its rarity to open it.
Stroud found inside one piece of paper, a typed-letter announcing that she’d won an Australian lottery held in February and was eligible for a “lump-sum payout” of more than $4 million.
According to the letter, Stroud’s winnings were insured in her name at the Lloyds TSB Bank of England, a real bank. The letter itself features an I.D. and batch number, a reference number and a barcode.
Despite the numerous visual cues, Stroud knew it was not in fact her lucky day, and notified Cadiz Police.
“I just thought about the elderly, and (them) thinking it really was legitimate,” Stroud, a nurse, a said. “People don’t need to be taken advantage of.”
