He told her
he was a Connecticut contractor. She was a 67-year-old widow. After they met
last year through www.ChristianMingle.com,
an online dating site, he sent her a photo and wooed her with romantic words. Three
months into the relationship, she began wiring money to help him. He had gone
to Nigeria to oversee a project, he explained, but ran into one emergency after
another. She sent $15,000, she says, before realizing the suitor was a scammer.
"I had lost my husband of 40 years; I was just looking to find love like
everybody else," says Pat, a Missouri businesswoman. "You are lonely,
so you fall for it."
In San Jose, Calif, a
66-year-old woman dipped into her retirement savings and refinanced her house
to invest $500,000 in an online suitor's fictitious oil rig, according to the
Santa Clara County District Attorney's Office. The woman sent the money in
allotments, ending with $200,000 transferred to a Turkish bank. When she contacted the district attorney's office, it
requested that the bank freeze the funds. An accomplice of the perpetrator, who
is still at large, was arrested when he tried to withdraw the funds, and
remains in jail in Turkey. The bank returned the woman's money. Santa
Clara County prosecutor Cherie Bourlard says it was a miracle anyone was
caught. The victim is likely to lose her house because she won't be able afford
to pay the mortgage after the refinance, she says.
In another report, Pat, a widow who was
scammed, said her suitor's plot was so elaborate that even the
"nanny" of his children called to vouch for his character, speaking
in American-accented English. When she realized she had been duped, Pat says,
"she did not want to talk to anybody about it, because she feels so
stupid."
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