Man in Suzuka offered 9 million yen for his semen, conned out of 38 million yen

It was just too good to be true .

Despite constant efforts by police and government organizations in Japan, the wave of “special fraud” ( tokushu sagi ) seems to continue unabated.

And as the years go by, the tactics employed by these thieves seem to constantly evolve from pretending to be an elderly person’s son to pretending to be Mick Jagger or an astronaut in orbit .

One would think the more outlandish these premises get, the less likely they are to succeed, but they do time and time again.

Just take a look at the case of a man in his 70s living in the city of Suzuka, Mie Prefecture, who was taken in by an extravagant offer for his sperm.

According to an investigation by the Mie Prefectural Police, the victim met “a woman” online and last April she sent a message over social media, offering nine million yen (US$57,000) if he provided her with his semen .

After a tentative deal was reached, the woman put the man in contact with “her lawyers” to set the terms and finalize the deal.

From this point on, the woman’s legal team continuously requested payments from the man for things such as a non-disclosure agreement and to unfreeze a bank account.

The man was instructed to do so by purchasing prepaid electronic currency cards. ▼ People claiming to be police or lawyers while asking for something like WebMoney cards is one of the bigger red flags of these scams.

Nearly 600 prepaid cards and about 38 million yen ($240,000) in payments later, the man suspected something was wrong and consulted an actual lawyer .

The attorney recognized this as a case of special fraud and advised the man to go to the police, who are currently investigating the matter.

They say the crime was accomplished in a manner similar to a romance scam , where a strong relationship is built up over a long time before the actual fraud begins.

They didn’t explain how this situation played out, since that would essentially be teaching us all how to commit a crime, but it really must have been a truly elaborate ploy to convince someone they could sell their semen.

Online comments were also baffled by how things could have gotten to the point they did.