In the news recently, a second defendant was charged in a case involving trafficking in counterfeit Viagra - on Craigslist. Now, Craigslist is a great place to find a used lawnmower, to apartment hunt, job hunt, or try to find that special someone who shares your passion for dressing up like an Oompaloompa. But for buying Viagra? Not so much. So who do you think is dumber - the folks who try to sell Viagra (real or fake) through Craigslist, or the people who buy it?
As for this guy who was just put away, when his partner placed an ad on Craiglist to sell the bogus pills, he commended her on "taking the initiative to ... generate sales" - and with nearly 50,000 tablets, they had some product to move. But he also recognized the risk of getting caught, and sure enough, Pfizer spotted the ad and called in some undercover agents.
A quick search of the SF Bay Area CL yielded dozens of ads selling some version of V. Most of them make no attempt to be subtle. It's obvious there's prostitution happening on Craigslist, but the escorts and Johns have the sense to use some kind of code, even if we all know what "100 roses" means.
As for buying Viagra on CL, that's
taking a huge risk with your health (not to mention illegal). Pfizer recently issued warnings about the
dangers of counterfeit drugs, and not for no reason. "People who buy pills from
strangers over the internet have no idea what they may be ingesting," said U.S.
Attorney Rod J. Rosenstein. We would hope that would be obvious, but apparently it's not obvious enough.
