The Three Things (episode 16)--scams, scams and more scams...

Greetings and salutations! Once again it's this week's The Three Things with your (licensed) detective in Central Europe, Preston Smith, courtesy of The Corners Magazine (www.thecorners.pl) and CDDI (www.cddi.pl). Here we discuss politics, true crime, war news, spy news and more (from a Central European perspective). Each segment runs from 15 to 20 minutes, but this week Yours Truly runs through scams and more scams--as well as developments pertaining to the war in Ukraine. Time stamps below:

3:00 Letters and the strangest story I've encountered (in the Czech Republic anyway).
9:30 Boiler room scams. We've had several clients come to us as victims, and while at first it may seem somewhat ridiculous that seasoned pros in real estate or investment can get conned for millions, it's not that simple. But here is an easy first step to at least get an indication as to whether a broker is on the up and up.
25:09 Expat scams. This stems out of recent letters where expats have asked which are the most popular scams that target them specifically (in Central Europe). In fact, there are plenty more, but these are three that immediately came to mind, as they occur so often.

41:40 The Ukrainian war update. Some media are describing the Ukrainian counteroffensive as a failure. Certainly, the US funds for Ukraine appear to be drying up. And possibly the current Russian strike--which is turning into a bloodbath--at Avdiivka may define the entire year.

Check out the following articles:

Group American content: https://www.occrp.org/en/daily/18121-brazilian-and-serbian-drug-lords-arrested-in-brazil
Vessels sunk by Ukraine since 2022: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ship_losses_during_the_Russo-Ukrainian_War
Boiler room scams: https://www.occrp.org/en/daily/18200-police-across-europe-target-more-boiler-room-scams

Photo attributions: Confidence trick by Joseph Morewodd Staniforth, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
Viktor Orban photo by Európa Pont, CC BY 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
Fire boy drawing BY 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
Boiler room photo by Tristan Surtel, CC BY-SA 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
Stripper photo by J Chang from USA, CC BY-SA 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Stripper painting by ArtLover113, CC BY-SA 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
Polish zloty by Gonzuchna, CC BY-SA 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
IT photo by Lucentintenebris, CC BY-SA 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
Video of sea drone strikes released by the Ukrainian military.
F-16 photo by Staff Sgt. Cherie A. Thurlby, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.