The Spanish Prisoner is a confidence trick originating in the late 19th century.[1] In its original form, the con-man tells his victim (the mark) that he is in correspondence with a wealthy person of high estate who has been imprisoned in Spain under a false identity. Supposedly the prisoner cannot reveal his identity without serious repercussions, and is relying on a friend (the confidence trickster) to raise money to secure his release. The confidence trickster offers to let the mark put up some of the funds, with a promise that he will be financially rewarded when the prisoner returns, and perhaps also by gaining the hand of a beautiful woman represented to be the prisoner's daughter. After the mark has turned over the funds, he is informed that further difficulties have arisen and more money is needed. With such explanations, the trickster continues to press for more money until the victim is cleaned out or declines to put up more funds.
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Key features of the Spanish Prisoner trick are the emphasis on secrecy and the trust the confidence trickster apparently places in the mark not to reveal the prisoner's identity or situation. The confidence trickster will typically claim to have chosen the mark carefully, based on his reputation for honesty and straight dealing, and may appear to structure the deal so that the confidence trickster's ultimate share of the reward will be distributed voluntarily by the mark.
Modern variants of the Spanish Prisoner include the advance-fee fraud, in particular the Nigerian money transfer fraud (or 419 scam). In the advance fee fraud, a valuable item must be ransomed from a warehouse, crooked customs agent, or lost baggage facility before the authorities or thieves recognize its value. In the Nigerian variation, a self-proclaimed relative of a deposed African dictator offers to transfer millions of ill-gotten dollars into the bank account of the victim in return for small initial payments to cover bribes and other expenses. More recent examples feature people sharing the same surname as the intended victim, with the scammer guessing the surname from observing patterns in e-mail addresses, or obtaining full names from harvested e-mail headers.
The 1997 film The Spanish Prisoner, written and directed by David Mamet, includes such a confidence trick as part of the plot, as does his other film about con men, House of Games (1987). Comedian Steve Martin stars as the serious confidence man performing the Spanish Prisoner con in Mamet's film and, in contrast, also starred in the 1988 film Dirty Rotten Scoundrels as a comically unaccomplished con man who becomes associated with an expert Spanish Prisoner con artist (played by Michael Caine).
The 1967 film The Flim-Flam Man also contains a Spanish Prisoner con.
A short story by Arthur Train entitled "The Spanish Prisoner" was published by Cosmopolitan in March 1910.[2]
The first episode of season seven of Hustle shows the team carrying out this con, simultaneously, on four marks, using the same "prisoner" in each case, with a different team-member acting as con-artist and collaborative-convincer.
The March 9, 1951 episode of the Sam Spade radio program is entitled "The Spanish Prisoner" and includes a version and full description of the classic scam.