35 LONG-TIME SCAM

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WOMAN SCAMS FRIEND FOR 12 YEARS, POSING AS ONLINE BOYFRIEND

A Chinese woman has been arrested for pretending to be a man on social media and tricking her own friend into falling in love with “him” and sending “him” money.

Shanghai police recently announced that it had cracked one of the most bizarre online romance scams ever. The victim, a middle-aged woman, had been scammed for 12 years by someone posing as a well-known TV news anchor on social media; she was defrauded of around two million yuan (USD$290,000) over that period of time. The craziest part of the story is that the scammer turned out to be a good female friend of the victim who had come up with the plan as payback for something the victim’s mother had said when the two girls were very young.

The fraudster, identified only as Ms. Yu, admitted her guilt and told investigators that everything had started 12 years ago. She and the victim, Ms. Li, had been friends for a very long time, and their parents also knew each other. One day, Li’s mother jokingly told Yu that she would have trouble finding a husband because she was not very pretty and her family did not have a good financial situation.

It was a cruel thing to say to a young girl, and Yu really took it to heart. The more she thought about what the woman had said, the more she wanted to take revenge, so Yu came up with a plan. If she would find it hard to find love, then so would her friend Li.

Years after being insulted by her friend’s mother, Ms. Yu approached Li’s mother to brag about being friends with a well-known TV news anchor who just happened to be single and in search of a suitable wife. As expected, the friend’s mother pleaded with Yu to match him up with her daughter, and Yu’s plan was begun.

Sneaky Ms. Yu started by creating fake social media profiles of the news anchor, and Yu approached Ms. Li online, pretending to be this charming, successful man. She knew her friend better than almost anyone else: what she liked and didn’t like, her passions, and her romantic expectations. Soon, Li and the fake man hit it off. The only problem was keeping the relationship online.

Every time Ms. Li asked to meet her online boyfriend in person, he would find an excuse. He was either too busy with work, away on business, sick, or simply too tired to meet her. But, he continued to charm her and declare his love, which was enough to keep Li interested.

The money was not originally part of Yu’s scam, but by 2018, Yu had fallen on hard times and was in desperate need of money. Knowing that her friend was head-over-heels about the online man Yu had created, Yu started asking Li for financial assistance, inventing all kinds of pretexts. After she got Li to pay once, she was hooked and continued to use her charms to bleed her dry.

Despite recovering financially, Yu continued to ask her friend for money, pleading, lying, and even threatening to break off the relationship whenever Li asked too many questions or appeared reluctant to pay the money. Whenever her friend complained to Yu about the situation, Yu always encouraged Li to do whatever it took for love, claiming that the news anchor was worth it.

Earlier this year, after Li had spent all her savings and started going into debt, things became more complicated for Yu. Her friend came to her asking for help with contacting the news anchor, finally expressing concerns that something was wrong. Li wanted to confront him and ask for all the money back, and despite Yu’s best efforts to dissuade her, Li had made up her mind.

Sensing that her scam was finally at an end, Yu told her friend everything: how she had lied about knowing the news anchor, how she had created the fake profiles, and how Yu had defrauded Li over 12 years. It is unclear whether Yu hoped that her friend would not go to the police. Perhaps Yu just wanted to see the look on Li’s face when she learned the truth.

However, Ms. Yu was arrested after her friend filed a complaint, and an investigation into this case is still ongoing. The whole story sounds like the plot of a movie, and there are some details that don’t add up, such as why the victim sent two million yuan to someone she had never actually met and why she went 12 years without actually meeting her online boyfriend in person. Still, most of the details come from the Shanghai police department, so there must be some truth to the bizarre story.

© odditycentral.com

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