by ZiolaPaprika
Thu Nov 18, 2010 6:54 pm
Hello,
I have registered on your site and found it very informative and the reason of me posting is that my mother was scammed.
My mother resembles the typical preferred prey of romance scammers.
She is currently in her early 50's, single, is very lonely, has a strong sense of altruism and is somewhat religious.
Let's talk a little bit about her past: She married in her early 30's to an attractive man and gave birth to a child (me). Unfortunately, her husband turned about to be an alcoholic which she tolerated for 2 years of marriage until it was too much for her. She divorced and I grew up without a father.
After that, she had a boyfriend in her early 40s with which she had a relationship for 6 years. It turned out to be a romance fraudster who lived on my mother's behalf for 6 years. My mother paid for the rent, food, clothes and lots of presents. Through this incident she lost $20000 and was never refunded a cent. I was very young at that time and didn't know what was going on so I couldn't intervene. Luckily she broke up with him after 6 years of relationship because she couldn't take it anymore that he was living on her behalf.
After 1 marriage and 1 long-term relationship my mother was rather heart-broken. As if it was not enough, she now had health issues and was infected with Hepatitis C and had to undergo treatment. It was an arduous and lengthy process because the treatment lasted 12 months. It was a very hard time for my mother because she had to lay in bed everyday and suffered great pain.
It was because of this that I started suffering under depression and my grades in school were deteriorating to the point of where I had to repeat 1 school year. Fortunately, my mother's treatment was successful as was the treatment of my depression and it looked like we were starting a new life.
Our life was cherishing up until the point when I graduated from school. After graduating, I started studying abroad at a university. This left my mother lonely because I could only visit her once a month or two. She started feeling lonely and registered herself on an online dating site.
After a couple of weeks, she met this man that seemed like the "prince of her dreams" with which she started chatting and sending e-mails and later communicated via telephone with each other. His name was Ernest Clapperton Nanka Bruce.
I wasn't too unsettled by this matter because I thought the man seemed legitimate. I was suspicious of his profile because his picture looked like that of a model and it didn't suggest that such a handsome man would visit online dating sites. His voice was accent-free which probably was the primary reason I forgot about my suspicion.
One day she left her e-mail account "open" and I was nosy enough to check through it. To my surprise I saw that she had transferred $6000 dollars via Western Union. I was furious and angry and warned her that he was a scammer and told her to cease contact with this man but she sadly didn't listen to me. She later lied to me that this man refunded her $6000 but I couldn't be sure because she doesn't permit access to her bank account.
On the contrary, she was angered at me because she didn't want me to mix with her private affairs and told me in tears that she was very lonely and was seeking a man with whom she could have a long-term relationship. I forgave her but still warned her not to send money to this man.
1 1/2 years into the relationship they had still not met in person but they were communicating daily and sending mails to each other. I didn't take interest in this because I myself was suffering under depression through unrelated causes. My own problems were much more important to me than that of my mother's which I realize was very egoistical from me.
In the meantime I moved back to my mother's apartment because I wanted to take care of her as she was suffering under kidney disease to the point of where she lost her job. Now I had to ditch my abroad studies because we could not afford it anymore.
She was half-dead because of a kidney disease and lost her job which probably contributed significantly why she led more intense conversations with the romance scammer.
Several times I eavesdropped my mother's conversations but I couldn't really find anything suspicious. It was until my mother left her computer open again that I recognized something was really foul.
I found an e-mail where the scammer was asking when my mother had access to her retirement funds to which I was shocked. I confronted my mother with these e-mails and asked how much she sent this man to which she replied "$54000".
In that moment I was dazed and could not realize the extent of this. We were under financial turmoil and still are because of mortgage payments but these additional $54000 topped the whole thing off.
I swear that in the moment I confronted her I wanted to beat her up and slit her throat and slaughter her. These are extreme thoughts but it corresponds to the psychological state that I am in because I am still suffering under depression. She even did not believe me when I first confronted her saying that this man was definitely NOT a scammer. She was so naive and believed in him ardently.
I later found out in the e-mails that she pretty much risked her life for this man. In one e-mail she was complaining and begging for the scammer to return her money as she gave everything to him. My mother needs a kidney transplant soon or else she could die because of her ongoing kidney disease.
The problem is that the insurance only pays 80% of the kidney transplantation costs and the remaining 20% must be paid by her. If it can't be paid then she can't get a kidney transplant and could die. She was literally risking her life for a man that she never met in person. This angered me even more and made me wrathful. I mean who the hell transfers $54000 to someone you never met in real life?
With $54000 right now we could be very well off. We would pay all our debts, my mother could afford her kidney transplant and I could study abroad at a very renowned university.
You can't imagine how much damage this scammer and my mother have done to me and to us. She has not only ruined her own life but also that of her son. My former classmates are studying all around the world at very well known universities in London, Antwerp and Berlin while I am stuck at a "loser" university because it is cheap. My mother has humiliated herself and me and left us in ruins with significant amounts of debt.
I think I have prevented further damage because she was going to dissolve her retirement funds to send even more money to this scammer. She could've possibly dissolved her own insurance and that of mine and additionally sold our own apartment to send even more money to this man...
I can't believe how stupid, naive and egoistic my mother is. I will never forgive her for what she's done because she has misused my trust. She trusts a man that she has never met before, more than her one and only child.
On the one hand I do understand that she is lonely and desperate and doesn't want to die alone but on the other hand I can't understand how she was blinded by fake love and lost her common sense.
To this day I don't talk with my mother anymore because I simply think she is not worthy of it. I might get a tattoo with $54000 written on it to remind me how I shouldn't trust anyone. I have been disappointed by many people in my life: teachers, headmaster, friends and now my own mother.
$54000 might not seem a lot to some people but for us it means a fortune.
My mother literally worked her ass off for 15 years and risked her health for us to attain so much money and in one wide sweep she just throws it away.
It has made me indifferent to my mother. She could die in a shithole right now because I couldn't care.
I'm sorry for the long story but the stuff my mother did had a prequel to it and probably wouldn't have happened had the prequel had a more desirable outcome.
I do not ask for compassion because nor me nor my mother deserve it. Dishonest people are everywhere but it is because of our own unawareness and lack of common sense that we constantly get scammed.
I guess mistakes don't help certain people, for instance my mother who has been frauded the second time.
Please please please, be careful of any person you meet and I hope you can avoid any fraud by just avoiding online dating sites altogether. Additionally you should install a decent anti-virus software to keep your computer clean of any viruses or spyware.
I have registered on your site and found it very informative and the reason of me posting is that my mother was scammed.
My mother resembles the typical preferred prey of romance scammers.
She is currently in her early 50's, single, is very lonely, has a strong sense of altruism and is somewhat religious.
Let's talk a little bit about her past: She married in her early 30's to an attractive man and gave birth to a child (me). Unfortunately, her husband turned about to be an alcoholic which she tolerated for 2 years of marriage until it was too much for her. She divorced and I grew up without a father.
After that, she had a boyfriend in her early 40s with which she had a relationship for 6 years. It turned out to be a romance fraudster who lived on my mother's behalf for 6 years. My mother paid for the rent, food, clothes and lots of presents. Through this incident she lost $20000 and was never refunded a cent. I was very young at that time and didn't know what was going on so I couldn't intervene. Luckily she broke up with him after 6 years of relationship because she couldn't take it anymore that he was living on her behalf.
After 1 marriage and 1 long-term relationship my mother was rather heart-broken. As if it was not enough, she now had health issues and was infected with Hepatitis C and had to undergo treatment. It was an arduous and lengthy process because the treatment lasted 12 months. It was a very hard time for my mother because she had to lay in bed everyday and suffered great pain.
It was because of this that I started suffering under depression and my grades in school were deteriorating to the point of where I had to repeat 1 school year. Fortunately, my mother's treatment was successful as was the treatment of my depression and it looked like we were starting a new life.
Our life was cherishing up until the point when I graduated from school. After graduating, I started studying abroad at a university. This left my mother lonely because I could only visit her once a month or two. She started feeling lonely and registered herself on an online dating site.
After a couple of weeks, she met this man that seemed like the "prince of her dreams" with which she started chatting and sending e-mails and later communicated via telephone with each other. His name was Ernest Clapperton Nanka Bruce.
I wasn't too unsettled by this matter because I thought the man seemed legitimate. I was suspicious of his profile because his picture looked like that of a model and it didn't suggest that such a handsome man would visit online dating sites. His voice was accent-free which probably was the primary reason I forgot about my suspicion.
One day she left her e-mail account "open" and I was nosy enough to check through it. To my surprise I saw that she had transferred $6000 dollars via Western Union. I was furious and angry and warned her that he was a scammer and told her to cease contact with this man but she sadly didn't listen to me. She later lied to me that this man refunded her $6000 but I couldn't be sure because she doesn't permit access to her bank account.
On the contrary, she was angered at me because she didn't want me to mix with her private affairs and told me in tears that she was very lonely and was seeking a man with whom she could have a long-term relationship. I forgave her but still warned her not to send money to this man.
1 1/2 years into the relationship they had still not met in person but they were communicating daily and sending mails to each other. I didn't take interest in this because I myself was suffering under depression through unrelated causes. My own problems were much more important to me than that of my mother's which I realize was very egoistical from me.
In the meantime I moved back to my mother's apartment because I wanted to take care of her as she was suffering under kidney disease to the point of where she lost her job. Now I had to ditch my abroad studies because we could not afford it anymore.
She was half-dead because of a kidney disease and lost her job which probably contributed significantly why she led more intense conversations with the romance scammer.
Several times I eavesdropped my mother's conversations but I couldn't really find anything suspicious. It was until my mother left her computer open again that I recognized something was really foul.
I found an e-mail where the scammer was asking when my mother had access to her retirement funds to which I was shocked. I confronted my mother with these e-mails and asked how much she sent this man to which she replied "$54000".
In that moment I was dazed and could not realize the extent of this. We were under financial turmoil and still are because of mortgage payments but these additional $54000 topped the whole thing off.
I swear that in the moment I confronted her I wanted to beat her up and slit her throat and slaughter her. These are extreme thoughts but it corresponds to the psychological state that I am in because I am still suffering under depression. She even did not believe me when I first confronted her saying that this man was definitely NOT a scammer. She was so naive and believed in him ardently.
I later found out in the e-mails that she pretty much risked her life for this man. In one e-mail she was complaining and begging for the scammer to return her money as she gave everything to him. My mother needs a kidney transplant soon or else she could die because of her ongoing kidney disease.
The problem is that the insurance only pays 80% of the kidney transplantation costs and the remaining 20% must be paid by her. If it can't be paid then she can't get a kidney transplant and could die. She was literally risking her life for a man that she never met in person. This angered me even more and made me wrathful. I mean who the hell transfers $54000 to someone you never met in real life?
With $54000 right now we could be very well off. We would pay all our debts, my mother could afford her kidney transplant and I could study abroad at a very renowned university.
You can't imagine how much damage this scammer and my mother have done to me and to us. She has not only ruined her own life but also that of her son. My former classmates are studying all around the world at very well known universities in London, Antwerp and Berlin while I am stuck at a "loser" university because it is cheap. My mother has humiliated herself and me and left us in ruins with significant amounts of debt.
I think I have prevented further damage because she was going to dissolve her retirement funds to send even more money to this scammer. She could've possibly dissolved her own insurance and that of mine and additionally sold our own apartment to send even more money to this man...
I can't believe how stupid, naive and egoistic my mother is. I will never forgive her for what she's done because she has misused my trust. She trusts a man that she has never met before, more than her one and only child.
On the one hand I do understand that she is lonely and desperate and doesn't want to die alone but on the other hand I can't understand how she was blinded by fake love and lost her common sense.
To this day I don't talk with my mother anymore because I simply think she is not worthy of it. I might get a tattoo with $54000 written on it to remind me how I shouldn't trust anyone. I have been disappointed by many people in my life: teachers, headmaster, friends and now my own mother.
$54000 might not seem a lot to some people but for us it means a fortune.
My mother literally worked her ass off for 15 years and risked her health for us to attain so much money and in one wide sweep she just throws it away.
It has made me indifferent to my mother. She could die in a shithole right now because I couldn't care.
I'm sorry for the long story but the stuff my mother did had a prequel to it and probably wouldn't have happened had the prequel had a more desirable outcome.
I do not ask for compassion because nor me nor my mother deserve it. Dishonest people are everywhere but it is because of our own unawareness and lack of common sense that we constantly get scammed.
I guess mistakes don't help certain people, for instance my mother who has been frauded the second time.
Please please please, be careful of any person you meet and I hope you can avoid any fraud by just avoiding online dating sites altogether. Additionally you should install a decent anti-virus software to keep your computer clean of any viruses or spyware.