A Scam Artist? Your Mom!

Submitted by Jeff:

In my early days of online dating, I chatted with Dana online for about two weeks without first seeing a picture. Not recommended, but I was young(er) and more trusting of people's descriptions of themselves.

Two of the things she told me prior to meeting was that she had a young child and that that she had just gotten out of rehab for a drug issue, but was 100% off of them now.

We finally decided to meet in person and as much as I'd like to say she had a face like a bucket full of smashed arseholes... she didn't. She was okay-looking, but just not my type. I felt nothing.  No movement.  No connection.  We still had a good time talking and decided to stay friends.

About a month after our one and only date, she called me and we talked and caught up again.

During that conversation, she received another call three times and each time she came back to talk to me, she seemed more frustrated. I finally asked her what was wrong and she told me that she still owed this drug dealer money from the past, and that he was harassing her constantly for it. Having a young child, she didn't have the money to pay him off.  She lived for free in a basement apartment in her mother's house, and her mother wouldn't help her pay it off. I asked her how much she owed and she said $180.

I said, "If I give you the money to get rid of this guy, will you promise to pay me back?"

She said that she could not take my money but thanks anyway and she would deal with it. I now felt that it was my duty to help her out... if not for her, for her young child. So after some persistence on my part, she finally agreed and said that she would pay me back when she went back to work.

She lived about 30 minutes away and asked if I would drive her the money that night. I told her that it was too late but I would definitely do it in the morning. Her other line beeped again and she said it might be best if we could close this deal immediately because this guy was getting nastier to her all the time. I really didn't want to go out at this point, so she suggested giving the drug dealer my address to come pick it up if he called again.

Umm... no! I don't want that loser to know where I lived! So she suggested that I send it to her in a cab as a package. She said that her mom would cover the cab. I thought that was an okay idea and told her I had to run down to the bank machine and get the money, which I did.

On my way back upstairs, it hit me.  Why would her mom pay for a cab to allow her daughter to borrow money from somebody to pay off a drug dealer ? That didn't make any sense...

When I got back upstairs she had already called me twice and left a message asking what cab company I was using to send it. She sounded too excited for my liking.

When I called her back, I asked to speak to her mom. She said her mom just left to go to the convenience store. I told her to get her mom to call me when she got back because I wanted to make sure her mom was okay with me sending money.  To me, of course, I wanted to see if my suspicions were correct.

Ten minutes later, my call display showed her mom's name and the voice on the other end sounded exactly like Dana, but higher pitched. I told her "mom" that she sounded exactly like Dana and she laughed and said they have been told that before.

I then asked "Mom" where Dana was and she told me that she was downstairs in her apartment. I told her that, no offense, but I wanted to hear the two of them talk at the same time.  Something wasn't right. She chuckled and said I was being ridiculous and that everything was on the up and up. I told "Mom" that to make me feel better, I'd like to hear them at the same time or in the same room together. She told me that she'd get Dana to call back.

At that point, I was done with this and ignored the next five phone calls until she finally left one on my answering machine.  It went something like this:

"Hi Jeff, It's Dana... not sure why you're not answering your phone but my mom is going to pick up now..." *click* "Dana tell your friend to send the money.  I don't have time for all this drama and..."

This was non-stop rambling for about two minutes.  The entire time her mom was talking, Dana was saying, "Mom, it's an answering machine"  "He's not there!"  "Mom!"

What she didn't seem to realize was that I could hear a little "beep" prior to her mom talking.  She had actually tape-recorded herself talking in her mom's voice and talked with her own voice over top of it to make it seem legit. Ah, drugs.

 

I didn't call her back and she ended up calling me months later to apologize about her scam because she was again in rehab and doing her 12-step program. I made up rules for Internet dating after that: must show a picture and if sombeody admits to a past drug issues... no thanks.