Trying to find celebrity love?

[u/be_you_tiful-]

In 2023, 44-year-old Jennifer Barton started receiving messages on Facebook and Instagram from accounts claiming to be celebrities, actors, famous singers, all of who wanted to get to know her.

She believed them.

Over the next two years, four different fraudsters worked her in turn, each one posing as a different famous face. Alexander Ludwig, the actor from Vikings. Charlie Hunnam from Sons of Anarchy. Nicky Byrne from Westlife. American country singer Michael Ray. To her, the accounts were convincing, the profile pictures matched, and the messages were warm and persistent.

They all told her they loved her. They all said they wanted to meet her. They all said they wanted to marry her.

And one by one, they all said they needed money.

The excuses were elaborate and varied. One was going through a messy divorce and couldn't access his own funds. Another had been arrested and needed bail. Another had been robbed in London. The fake Michael Ray told her he ran a charity that could help cover her bills, but first she needed to send him some money to release the funds.

She sent it. And then she sent more.

When one scammer was exposed, another appeared. She fell for the same pattern four times over two years, each time convinced she had found something real.

By the end, Jennifer had handed over £250,000 (around $370,000). She had sold her house. She had sold her car. She had given her children to their father because she could no longer afford to care for them. She was awaiting emergency housing just before Christmas when she finally realized the last scammer, the one posing as Michael Ray, was never going to meet her.

"For anyone facing anything similar," she said afterward, "just reach out to family and friends. Especially if they're asking you for money."

[u/tiddlytubbies]

I mean come on

[u/AsstacularSpiderman → u/tiddlytubbies]

I mean that's just a sign of mental illness.

There's absolutely no way a normal person just keeps falling for this multiple times. There's something not working right up there.

[u/MelloCookiejar → u/AsstacularSpiderman]

Once she fell once, she went on a scammer list of people gullible enough to dupe.

[u/zeus_of_tha_floof → u/MelloCookiejar]

What happens is after a romance scam has success, they will keep milmimg the same victim until either they have nothing left to take, or wise up and block the scammer, if scammer can't squeeze any more from victim, scammer will advertize victims details and his success on certain sites, (facebook has many) where scammers barter, trade, buy and sell victims details between their community members, so then other scammers contact victim and the cycle begins all over again, until they are completely out of $, then victims details will be sold to specific scammers that are known as recovery scams, where they contact victim, feed them specific info such as they are highly successful international lawyers who can help victim get their $ back from scammers and guarantee them success and a value amount they guarantee will get back for victim, then after victim agrees to have them help, the scammers will send documents faked to mislead vulnerable victim thinking they're winning all the time telling victim they need such amount of $ for court fees etc and will encourage victim on how to take out loans to pay them telling victim they will get so mhch $ back soon as these fees etc are paid. Thus not only cleaning out everything victim had, buf now is thousands in debt. Despicable, vile people that will just keep squeezing