Pamela Viles of Sarasota told WWSB News she was looking for companionship and she thought she met a nice man online but eventually discovered she had been scammed.
The 69-year-old Viles said the man wooed her on Match while posing as an Australian-born business owner with citizenship in Canada. She said he texted daily and called twice a week.
“This was intimate, love, details, dreaming, so so deep,” she said during an interview with WWSB News on Friday. “I felt like I really knew him closer than anybody that I had known.”
The man began asking Viles to lend him money to run his business. From 2016 through this year, she withdrew money from her bank accounts and took cash advances on her credit cards. It’s estimated she wired him roughly $1 million. She said she’s now approximately $350,000 in debt.
The FBI says romance scams, which are commonly referred to as catfishing, have been around for years and are responsible for millions of dollars in thefts.
The pictures in the personals ads are “likely phony” and the profiles fake, typically crafted to cater to the individuals they are targeting, according to the FBI.
Viles said she has a “little bit of dementia,” which contributed to her falling victim to the scam. She’s expecting to lose her home. Her daughter started a campaign on GoFundMelast week in hopes of getting some money for her mom.
The campaign reads, in part:
She does not understand social media and other technology, including smartphones and has made a lot of mistakes. These people have scammed and coerced my mother to drain everything she had in savings and IRA’s, maxed out credit cards and taken loans against her own house to send to a man she was convinced was real and she was in love with. She wanted to have a relationship with someone and a happy life like her peers. They took advantage of how caring my mother is and she sent all her money to help him.
Viles told WWSB News she came forward because she wants others to be skeptical if a story sounds too good to be true.
“Now I don’t think anything’s true, anything at all,” she said.
article by huffington post.
If they check well, it is nija man that duped her. It is well
ReplyDeletesame thought i had...
Deletehe must be disguising his location.
He may not be a 9ja but maybe one of dis African countries though
DeleteDesperate ugly women. I'm sure she hasn't learnt her lesson, she will be scammed again.
DeleteThere are more Nigerian scammers in Toronto than we have in Nigeria right now...
DeleteHe could be european as well
DeleteNigeria is the first country that comes to your head whenever any evil is mentioned. You need deliverance!
DeleteEyah, pure heart met an evil heart and was cut into pieces.
ReplyDeleteEeyah! Poor woman, these guys are hard sha. see how dey turn her life to square zero Pele granny.
ReplyDeleteVery sad. I thought that there would have been more awareness about these scams online, yet people fall for them everyday
ReplyDeleteyahoo plus is not ordinary eye oh.
DeleteHian
ReplyDeleteOnce a male mentions marriage, the female brains fail!
ReplyDeleteEven if na mkpi says "marr..." before he completes the word
the legs are open everything is naught.
I really feel for this woman. It’s jazz because manipulation can’t work without physical meeting and body languages. When I was into dating scam and I got about $500k from one woman, I had wanted to stop but each time I login to my email, I see many messages from her begging. I had to go and undo the Jazz. This woman will be crying on the phone and it was heartbreaking and now that I’m in the USA and I have made even more money, I get tempted to want to reach her anonymously and pay back the money but yankee is not like that, they will trace the money back to you.
ReplyDeleteI wish I could just talk to people to stop this but young Nigerians have so lost faith in Nigeria. I regret all the tax money I made, money from wire, money from dating.
I know jazz that men do to hold women is more potent than the one women do to hold men. That’s why it’s mostly women who fall into dating scam more. Most of these scams wouldn’t have happened if the women were married or close to their families from my experience.
I guess you've scammed me before, you had better sent my money across or else....the real uncle Sam will....
DeleteHaba uncle Sam find a way of getting across to that woman and anonymously wire her some money.
DeleteYou are even a scam artist. You can make her believe she won some form of lotary or she got it from a charity.
If you can use your smarts and jazz and claim you once scammed usd500k you can do this.
How do you people even sleep at night. I pity your wives and kids. Hope no generational curse on them.
Let me go anonymous before you jazz my enemy. 😂😂😂😂😂
Thank God it's not a Naija man this time
ReplyDeleteIt might even be a Nigerian in conjunction with another oyinbo who does the calling. I read about one which it was even a fellow woman scamming her and anytime she calls she gets a man to do the calling. They are all syndicates.
ReplyDeleteI hope the girlfriend following a Yahoo boy feeling he is doing nothing wrong can see the impact. They have wrecked an old woman's life. All her sweat and life savings. She may go into deep depression and never recover. Some may contemplate suicide. These is what the "magas" they are talking about experience. Sad
This happened to me here in Nigeria. It was not online. I lost N10M. I'm still in debts, I was heart broken. He walked straight up to me at the altar in a church. It looked too good to be true. It wasnt true but I learnt after losing all. I've sold all i had...
ReplyDeleteOh no. So sorry. God will restore all you have lost in double fold
DeleteAwww he came as a heaven sent husband while u were praying!
DeleteNa devil send that one
10M see the way am cry for you ooooooo..Madam Sorry ooo,
DeleteWhen you all will put mind in God that is what happened. You better take action and knack better pigeon or you go through serious midnight prayers and nack better on his head. Don't allow your money to go free. I feel for you and feel the pain
DeleteMadam you don't the way to EFCC in Lagos ikoyi ?
DeleteIf you have evidence they may help. That is if you're naija based.
Eyahh! Poor woman, looking for love in the wrong place
ReplyDelete#Events can’t always be controlled. Our responses to events can always be controlled, though. Stress is a waste of energy*
ReplyDeleteHahahahaha... One guy don hammer ontop dis woman... Humans sha... I pray she recovers from d ache...
ReplyDeleteIs it possible to send the money to someone in Nigeria ask them to transfer it to her?
ReplyDeleteSo that he can send it to u to snd to her ba? As the *737# that u r.
DeleteHahahahahaha GTB
Delete63 years still looking for love wetin she dey take Love do..instead of her to use the money to be enjoying her life. Pele o granny..
ReplyDeleteWhy don't these women find love with their age bracket. No they want stud.
DeleteA 70yr old man will not even you.
Issa pity..
ReplyDeleteOr even asian in my very little time in london i have come to see the 419 they every race
ReplyDeleteRemember Restitution and return all you stole before you are free and your sins can be forgiven. Once it comes to love , the whites are gullible. They should learn like me to love yourselves and use your God given money to enjoy yourself. If any man comes your way listen oo and smile but once he mentions any thing like you loaning him money,run 40-40.
ReplyDeleteA woman that would count money and give to any man that is not your father, son or brother , OYO is that person's name.
ReplyDeleteHow can a woman give a man money cos of love.I never see that man wey i go count my hard earn money give if no be my papa or brother(even the brother self no be always, you self go hustle)
ReplyDelete