BEWARE THE CATSUP SCAMM

It happened to me OK, here how it goes.
The wife and I are in the Liverpool department store at the Gallerias Mall in Puerto Vallarta just looking around when a woman approaches me and tells me I have something all over my back.  I reach around and have catsup on my shirt and the back of my pants.  The gal then points me to the restroom which is down the hall.  I am following a fellow in there.  When I enter he sees me and offers his assistance to help clean my shirt and backside.
He takes a large bunch of toilet paper and starts cleaning my shorts that have catsup on them. He asks me to remove my belt and he proceeds to get another handful of paper.  At this time I have my shirt off and he is cleaning the back of my shorts.   All this time my wallet is in my front cargo pants pocket.  He finishes and makes a quick exit.  I finish by rinsing the back of my shirt in the sink and leave the restroom.
My wife and I are trying to figure where I got the catsup from. I thought that I may have picked it up on a seat downstairs where I tried on a pair of shoes.  We went downstairs to check it out to find out it was clean as a whistle.  Now mind you I still have my wallet in my front pocket.  The only thing that I can think of is that the gal from upstairs has some gripe with gringos and goes around squirting catsup on dumb gringos.
Well the wife and I proceed to do some shopping in the mall. And about 30 minutes later we are going to purchase a pair of shoes. I open my wallet and see that there are two credit cards missing.  At this point I still have not connected the dots. I am thinking that they were removed by the maid in the hotel room.  Just about that time I get an alert on my cell from my bank that some suspicious activity was detected on my credit card and the account was locked.  About 20 minutes I get another notice that there were two purchases that were done with my debit card.  Well we went back to the hotel room and finally connected the dots.  DUHH ! The good Samaritan in the restroom was working with the gal in the mall.
He was able to pull my wallet and remove two credit cards and return the wallet to my front cargo pants pocket without me knowing it.
Now I did not just get off the turnip truck. Have been around and seen some pretty neat scams, but this was a good one.
All in all after spending way too long on the phone with our bank, credit is being issued and new cards are on the way.
So if you are walking in the mall and someone come up to you to let you know you have something on your back you might want to call security.
Hope my experience helps someone from getting scammed.

Don't feel bad they have been running this scam at Mercado Libertad for years. Their weapon of choice there is mustard. Thanks for the reminder and sorry for your crappy experience.

Here is a warning about the same scam at Soriana back in 2011.

http://www.insidelakeside.com/t2561-mustard-bandit-back-again-soriana-in-chapala?highlight=Mustard+scam

Thanks for the heads up.  Was in Galerias Mall PV Friday with grand daughters and might be going back. If anybody spots catsup on me, I'll wear it back to the hotel.
With three active grand daughters circling the wagon, it might be hard to get a clean shot off with a catsup gun.
I think I'll keep an extra clean shirt and shorts in the car.

Best is call security, shout for it! "Look what someone did!!!"

I hope it was Heinz, the other brands are......pretty bad.

You should try the Del Monte Catsup sometime. I've been buying it in Mexico for 19 years now and it suits my palate better than all the others. Actually asked a restaurant in San Miguel what kind they used because I was really disappointed with the quality of my preferred name brand. Everybody's different.

Heinz is a relatively new catsup in Mexico for someone that has been using the stuff for 43 years here in Mexico.  Del Monte was one of 2 or 3 produced in Mexico that has been around for as long as I can remember.
So I tried it a lot....more than I care to remember.
We'll just have to agree to respectively disagree, but if I was invited to your house for something that required catsup, I would gladly consume it (Del Monte) with no complaints after 30 years of living with it.
Catsup was hard to find in a lot restaurants years ago and Mexicans hadn't started putting it on pizzas yet, in fact, there weren't that many, if any, pizzerias.

This has to be the thread hijack of the year.

Pickpockets morph into ketchup ratings.

LOL

SunFan

Discerning scam artists and pickpockets always endeavor to use the finest catsup/ketchup.
Hope they follow this board/forum/thread.

Sometimes they use mustard so I hope they use Grey Poupon Dijon. LOL.

ferret wrote:Sometimes they use mustard so I hope they use Grey Poupon Dijon. LOL.

I would prefer some of that "Chinese" mustard from Min Wah and turn around and rub it in the "discoverer's" eyes.

I'm a firm believer in being equally armed. So, Waldo's here I come to buy a squirtgun and fill it when Del Monte ketchup. I'll put it in my slimline conceal carry holster and will return fire if fired upon. Let the Ketchup Wars begin!