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Man loses all his posessions after a Craigslist based hoax

By Andrew Redfern @ 26th March 2008 5:54 pm

I spotted this on The Times online and had to feel sorry for the poor guy (only after checking the date to make sure it wasn’t April 1st) :

“An internet hoax has resulted in an Oregon man being dispossessed of everything he owned – including his horse. Robert Salisbury was minding his business in a national park when he received a call from a stranger asking whether he really intended to get rid of his horse – the animal appeared in such good condition.

Not only did he intend to keep the beast, Mr Salisbury told the caller, but he had no plans to get rid of any of his belongings. To what did he owe the call? An ad on a popular website had suggested he had been forced to leave home suddenly, and that all his belongings were free for the taking, came the reply.

Mr Salisbury, an independent contractor from Jacksonville, Oregon, hurried the 25 miles (40kms) home from Emigrant Lake, in Jackson County. On his way he passed a truck laden with ladders, a lawn mower, and weed killer – all of which he recognised as his own.

“I informed them I was the owner, but they refused to give the stuff back,” Mr Salisbury said, adding that the thieves had waved a copy of an advertisement from Craigslist, the listings website, apparently authorising the seizure, in his face.

En route he passed other cars packed with his possessions, and arrived at his house to find 30 people rummaging through his barn and picking over goods on his front porch.

The trespassers – all wielding copies of the Craigslist ad – tried to brush off his attempts to get them to leave. “They honestly thought that because it appeared on the internet it was true,” Salisbury told the Associated Press. “It boggles the mind.”

Mr Salisbury called the Jacksonville police as well as the sheriff’s deputies from Jackson County, but by the time they arrived, several more cars loaded with his possessions had fled.”

All this might have a bearing on this website www.alife4sale.com. It features a guy called Ian Usher down in Western Australia who is offering his entire life (house, job, friends and jetski included) for sale on eBay.

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