Most news teams just scratch the surface, but Fox 25 Special Reports go beyond the headlines to give you the whole story.
Costly Love
It's been said-- love makes people do crazy things, and this Valentine's Day was no different. Millions of Americans visited online dating websites in search of their other half. But, as Fox 25's Kisha Henry shows us-- millions more also hit up those sites-- not in search of love, but rather... a victim.
In 2012, more than 6,000 Americans reported being scammed on dating websites. But, the FBI's Internet Crimes Complaint Center thinks there are thousands more, suffering in silence, too embarrassed to share their stories.
"It is so embarrassing, it's not even funny," says a man we'll call "Vinny." He doesn't want to be identified, but says he was the victim of a love scam. "I just got so caught up. I didn't even realize it until it was too late," he says.
Vinny lives out of state. Using a dating website, he virtually "met" and fell in love with an Oklahoma woman online. "She was a beautiful, beautiful woman. She was a 10," says Kathleen Close, owner of Kaisen Investigations in the Metro. A few months, an engagement, and thousands of dollars later, Vinny hired Kathleen to make sure the woman of his dreams... wasn't just a dream.
"There was a time she was supposed to take a trip and come down and meet me. She said she was stranded in New York," says Vinny, remembering when he started to see the signs. He says he never met her in person and she always had an excuse. Her calls would drop or she had to rush off the phone-- all things the FBI calls "red flags."
"The people who do this are very cunning," says James Finch, Special Agent in Charge for the FBI's Oklahoma City division. He says the scammers will start by grooming their victims, gaining their trust and appealing to their online profiles. "Many will send flowers; they will send candy," he adds.
"We talked almost every night, for hours at a time," Vinny recalls how his scammer groomed him.
Once the scammer gains the victim's trust, they go after what they really want. "They ultimately ask for money," says Finch. Many times, the scammer will play the character of a soldier or someone working overseas, and it seems they always have the "worst luck." Excuses have ranged from cancer to an unfair prison sentence-- all requiring money. "Oftentimes, the victim will get a call from an individual who claims he's a doctor. He will say the person you've been talking to has been in a car accident and they have medical bills that need to be paid," says Finch.
Vinny's case was no different. "He had been sending her money. She needed this; she needed that," Kathleen says. But, she adds, it didn't add up. Vinny's online love had previously mentioned a "booming career." "It didn't make sense why someone that had a big company would be asking for pockets of money here and there," she adds. But, Vinny was blinded by love.
"You lose all senses. You really do," says Vinny.
"They will send photographs of other people-- not of themselves-- that they've taken from glamour magazines or from other sites," says Finch.
Vinny says she sent pictures almost daily-- of both herself and her alleged "family." "I remember one time getting a picture and it was like-- 'Hi, I'm laying in bed thinking of you.' And, there's a shot like someone's holding a camera, you know, laying in bed," says Finch. Vinny says it all seemed so real, but Kathleen's investigation found it was all a lie.
"She was later arrested and is serving two life sentences for child abuse. She had kept her 14-year-old child locked in a closet and had burned him and starved him," says Kathleen.
"It hink it was one of those-- I didn't think it could happen to me kind of things," says Vinny, remember the heartbreak and shock. "But, it did. By the time I realized, wait a minute, this is a scam, I was already too deep into it."
Vinny may have lost thousands of dollars and got his heart broken, but it doesn't have to happen to you.
"Dating can be fun, but it can also be really, really dangerou. There are a lot of physical, financial and emotional dangers involved," says Maria Coder, author of Investidate. She lives in New York, but helps folks across the Nation navigate through the physical, financial and emotional dangers of dating-- all through tips she's learned first-hand. "I was dating someone who I thought was great, and then one night I discovered he was soliciting about three-dozen women online via Facebook," she says.
In Maria's case, she's lucky all she got away with was a broken heart. The FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center says thousands of victims lose much mroe every year.
"We have had many people in romance scams who have traveled to these foreign countries and they have come up missing, been injured, and some... decease," says Finch.
"The first thing I suggest people do when they're dating someone new is to check if the person has a criminal sex offender past," says Maria. She recommends free websites like familywatchdog.us and criminalcheck.com-- which allow you to type in someone's name or zipcode.
Another tip-- spydialer.com. It's another free website where you can type in someone's cellphone number. It dials into their voicemail message anonymously. If you're planning on meeting someone off the internet, this is a great way to make sure they wound like they're in the age range they say they are.
"If you know where they work, it's a good idea to call that number after hours and dial by name, and make sure that person actually works there, and that the voice that you hear is actually the person you've been speaking with," says Maria.
"You can gauge a person's body language; you see sometimes by their facial expression sif they're lying or they won't look at you. You can't see any of that on the Internet," adds Kathleen, who agrees-- dating can be dangerous, especially online. "The Internet is a very dangerous place. I could sign up on an account today, set up a Facebook, use somebody else's picture, use a fake name," says Kathleen.
In Vinny's case, his scammer used a number of fake pictures. "She was amazingly gorgeous," recalls Vinny. But, those pictures were not the face of the woman on the other side of the computer, but rather-- stolen from someone else. "Where did she get those pictures?" asks Vinny. "How was she able to do this?" he adds, in disbelief.
If you want to make sure the person you're dating online isn't pretending to be someone else, take one of their photos and upload it into Google Images. "It will show you if that photo is being used somewhere else," says Maria.
And, the number one tip? Keep your eyes open. The experts say, love is NOT blind. "If you try to set up a meeting and you can never meet them, there's a problem," says Kathleen.
"If they're not willing to meet you anytime soon, then walk away," adds Vinny.
By having the right tools and being prepared, you can avoid dating disasters. "Don't be afraid to rock the boat," says Maria. "If it's going to tip over, let it happen now when you have less invested and less to lose," she says.
Costly Love
Posted: Friday, February 15 2013, 10:17 PM CST
