A 25-year-old man attempting to purchase a Nintendo Wii from the online resale site Craigslist instead received a telephone book in a box, according to the Madison Police Department.

On April 12, the man arranged a meeting to purchase a Nintendo Wii on the 300 block of East Mifflin Street through Craiglist. He gave the seller cash in exchange for what he assumed was the system, only to find the telephone book, which according to a release from Public Information Officer Mike Hanson, "did not plug into a Nintendo."

The victim initially requested a test to ensure the equipment worked, but when the means to conduct the test could not be found he "trusted the package contained the Nintendo and that it worked."

"With sites like eBay and Amazon, there are stronger safeguards in place to ensure that something like this doesn't happen," Assistant District Attorney Mike Verveer said. "The owners of the website should do everything possible to ensure that fraud like this is not perpetuated."

Hanson said of the Internet scams he's seen with his work at the MPD, this is the first one involving Craiglist.

Neither of the two suspects have been apprehended. Hanson and Verveer commented on the difficulty of closing cases like this because of the nature of Craiglist, and this specific transaction resulted in a lack of any substantial leads.

"Of course we will investigate, but it's tough to follow up without any evidence beyond a fairly generic eyewitness description," Hanson said.

Verveer said if apprehended, the suspect would be prosecuted.

In order to avoid fraudulent transactions, especially involving Craiglist, Hanson suggested customers "always inspect the product both visually and mechanically, and be cautious of buying from strangers."

This is not the first case of fraud nationwide that has involved Craiglist. Earlier this month in Tacoma, Wash., a residential house was gutted and vandalized because of an anonymous Craiglist advertisement asking people to take whatever they wanted from the home.