Facebook Friend Tricks Woman Out Of $20K
A New Jersey woman was allegedly tricked out of almost $20,000 by an old friend she reconnected with on Facebook.
According to reports, the 38-year-old woman reconnected with a Florida man she’s known for 20 years on the social network. However, this man certainly didn’t act like a real friend. He asked her to wire him $19,933.24 as an investment in a marketing company he owned in Palm Beach, Fla. In return, the man was supposed to repay her with $28,500 in about 10 days when a deal went through. The woman complied but never saw the money again despite multiple promises the man made to repay her. This lead the woman to file a civil lawsuit in January.
According to the woman, who spoke to other people who knew the man in question, she wasn’t the first person who was tricked. Many of the man’s friends had fallen for similar schemes. During the hearing, the Palm Beach County judge ruled that the man owned her $83,700.36; however, the suspect’s location is still uncertain. The woman believes that he’s residing somewhere in New Jersey, but at the time of this writing, he has not been located.
Sadly, Facebook is an excellent venue to trick people you might know. The service helps users develop trust, which can then be used to extort money. In May a Malaysian woman was cheated out of $366,000 USD when a con artist claimed to be a British man on Facebook who needed her help to cash a $1.53 million contract.
It blows my mind that people are stupid enough to let this happen! I’m suspicious by nature thank God… but even if I was naturally trusting I wouldn’t hand over my money to anyone!
lol they went from Emails to Facebook lmao
It goes to show how stupid people are. I hope it teaches them a lesson!