The Geese That Lay The Golden Eggs

The fog begins to clear in Luciana’s mind

Many women would have paid, just as they pay in other Romance Scams, but Luciana starts hearing little alarm bells ringing, and she begins asking things, asking, asking: a photo of the run-over child, his name and details, the address and bank coordinates of the hospital where the money is to be transferred.

Vincent is a little offended by her mistrust. He tells her so. Then he patiently explains that the hospital does not accept bank transactions from Europe. The only way to pay is by Money transfer.

The fog clears in Luciana’s brain and she emails the embassy in Abidjan asking for information about the self-styled Vincent, she provides his FACEBOOK profile, and little else. She discovers the man is an impostor who is known to the police because he is part of a gang specializing in romance scams.

The little alarm bells

Luciana starts adding all the information in her possession together. The alleged Vincent pretends he is French because Ivory Coast, a former colony, uses French as its official language. He’s never left Abidjan and has pretended to go there, to be able to receive the cash payment in his homeland.

Luciana doesn’t send him the money and she’s clever to realise, in time, that it’s a scam. The request for money sets off a little alarm bell inside her. Intuition and reason prevail over her emotions, and the scammer loses the match he has so laboriously played.

Any woman, anybody - when asked for money - should awake from their romantic obfuscation. The automatic reaction should be: Money = Wake up!

Then tell the unscrupulous looter to sod off. But it’s not easy to let go of the dream. Luciana cries for days on end, after reporting the scam. She says she felt completely stupid, an idiot:

«He used such psychological violence - Luciana explains during an interview - as to literally bring me to my knees. He even used to ask me if I’d slept well, if I’d eaten and if I’d had a good day at work! It’s obvious that if I’d been thinking straight I would have understood that it was impossible that there was such a nice polite man who was going to fall in love with someone like me, neither beautiful, nor young; but unfortunately, as the saying goes, love is blind»6.

Mary

Mary’s story is told by her son Lucien. A nasty story, but with a happy ending, if it can be called that when you get your own money back.

Mary has just turned 59 when she’s contacted by an American sailor who wishes her a happy birthday and asks her to be friends. The man says his name is Michael Miller and he’s 53.

She’s been living in Italy for a decade. French by birth, she used to be married to an Italian journalist from whom she’s divorced. She has a son Lucien, born of her marriage, who is a high school mathematics teacher and who lives in Rome, like his mother.

Michael’s first contact happens on her birthday. He asks her to be friends, she accepts. He sends her (a photo of) an enormous bouquet of red roses with a happy birthday message in English.

«What did you do for your birthday?» Michael asks her the following day, in bad Italian.

«It was nice! I had dinner with my friends and we had a lovely evening.»

«Do you have a lot of friends? Who do you like? I'm jealous.»

«Do you speak French? - asks Mary - my English is not very good.»

«Avez vous beaucoup d'amis? Qui aimez-vous? je suis jaloux,» he repeats admitting he’s translated the phrase on Google, then he continues the conversation with copy and paste from an online translator.

«Well if you’re using Google just choose Italian - Mary urges him - because in French I feel like I want to correct all your mistakes.»

«Do you have many friends? Who do you like? I’m jealous.»

«Don’t talk nonsense!»

«I can’t stop thinking about you. I saw your photo a month ago, but I’m shy and I only found the courage to contact you with it being your birthday!»

«Really?» asks Mary flattered. «What did you find so attractive in me? I’m just a normal woman.»

«Normal? Say normal is false. Saying you’re normal is just not true. You’re beautiful.»

«How old did you say you are?»

«53, and you?»

«I’m 59, I’m older than you. Men always look for young girls. What attracts you to such a mature person?»

«Your photo shows me an elegant lady, you're a beautiful woman. Mary, you mustn’t underestimate yourself Mary. Look at yourself with love’s eyes, as I see you, and you’ll see you’re beautiful!»

«Love? You’re going rather fast now!»

«Yes, I’m going fast, but I’m following my heart that’s going even faster than me!»

A week after her birthday Mary has the sensation she’s known Michael for a long time. He contacts her every day at the same time, and his requests to love her are increasingly persistent. He says nice things, and although his Italian is only approximate, he confesses to her that he’s never felt such overwhelming feelings before. He’s had other affairs, but nothing important, because he’s always believed that to build a sincere relationship he had to find his soul mate. He believes that God has created an ideal lover for every being on earth, and he’s lucky to have managed to find her and fulfil his dream.

To live together, get married and lay together one beside the other as a single body; this is human happiness. There’s nothing more beautiful!

Mary is intoxicated by these words, by Michael’s attentions, as he floods her with pictures of beautiful scenes at sunset, flowers, mostly red roses, with the phrase «Je t’aime,» or «Je t’aime beaucoup,» or alternatively «I love you.»

Strangely he doesn’t send her any pictures of himself in other poses or moments of his daily life. Mary only has two pictures of Michael, one close-up and another full-length view. Both pictures show him in uniform and are of an attractive man, with a high forehead, a proud gaze and just a hint of a smile. Not much to fall in love with. However, Mary is so enraptured by his words, promises, allusions to perfect sentimental and sexual happiness, that she doesn’t ask for more. To share the dream of a soul mate is what she wants too. She believes in it. She wants nothing else. Michael’s words are a daily dose of pleasure, a spoken and virtual intuition that is the premise to their real-life meeting, which will happen very soon. Michael wants that, Mary wants it, especially after messages like this:

«Darling I miss you so much, you’ve become necessary for my soul, my heart. You’re my day and night.

You’re the sun and the moon to me. You’re my queen. I miss you so much and the days separating me from you are much too long and cruel. Oh, how I would like to cut the ribbon of time which separates us from our first meeting! Love me Mary! Make me happy and never betray our dream!».

Finally, our meeting, but first I’m going to Abidjan!

Strange the coincidences in life, because Mary’s story also has links with Ivory Coast. And quite by chance, Michael needs to go precisely to Abidjan to clinch a deal. He intends to leave the marines and plans to set up a diamond import-export business with his severance pay.

A million carats worth of diamonds a year are extracted in Ivory Coast. So, Michael, who is planning his future business and success, has an appointment with a manager from the mines who will suggest the right quantities of precious stones to export, the purchase prices and the sales prices on the European markets.

The forecast is for huge profits, so the Marine has ploughed all his savings into getting together the sum to be paid in advance to start his export business to Europe. He has a lot of money set aside because he earns more than eight thousand dollars a month. Then he’ll pay the manager of the mines the contractual balance with his military service severance pay.

Mind you! The most exciting part of the plan, as told by Michael, is that he’ll start his journey towards Europe with Italy, Rome, where he’ll stop off to embrace Mary, and plan their future together; to crown their dream of a happy union and looking ahead - why not - even get married.

After another week of online chat, with Michael’s usual loving attentions, the anticipated time of departure for the Ivory Coast comes around.

He calls her as soon as he gets to Abidjan and tells her he’s had a good journey. They’ll talk again online the following day.

Instead three long days go by with no sign of Michael. Mary starts to worry, she doesn’t know what to put this silence down to. She’s anxious. Then she finally receives a call from Ivory Coast. The person contacting her is a doctor in a clinic who tells her that Michael is seriously ill. He was taken to hospital after being attacked by three criminals. He’s having an operation on his spleen. It was Michael himself who begged the doctor to contact her, because before going under the knife (he’s very seriously injured the poor man) he thought about Mary knowing she’d be worried and asked them (we imagine in a faint whisper) to contact his woman.

The doctor talks at length to Mary (almost as though he hasn’t got much else to do) and ends the telephone call by informing her that the following day Michael himself will probably be able to call her.

Worried out of her mind Mary sends him messages, without any result. Then the following day she sees a photo of him, sent to her smartphone. His face is swollen, it looks painful. The operation has gone well he explains, speaking softly and painfully. They’ve removed his spleen. He must rest until he recovers.

He tells her that his attackers stole 90 thousand dollars off him. He has nothing now until he’s paid his severance money. He hasn’t even got the money to pay the clinic. What’s more he’s signed the contract with the manager of the mines and he must cover the cheque he paid as a guarantee. He wouldn’t want to ask her for help for anything in the world, but he’s desperate!

Mary can’t really understand why he went around with so much cash on him and she asks him. Michael explains that he was going to deposit it at the bank in Abidjan, to cover the cheque for 50 thousand dollars he paid as an advance on the diamond shipment agreement. Upset, he explains his position to her, tormenting himself because he knows it isn’t normal to turn to her to ask for help. He’d rather die, but he’s deeply distressed! He’s got to find a solution because if he doesn’t cover the cheque the deal will fall through, and he’ll also have to pay a fine.

The rest of the story unfortunately, as you can imagine, is an impoverishment of poor Mary in favour of the crook, who is not called Michael, but is a young African and part of a gang specialised in romance scams.

The story told by Lucien

«My mother had sent several remittances to Michael, in Ivory Coast, for various reasons. It began with 50 thousand dollars through Western Union‎ and Money Gram, because she was upset by the attack on the man she had fallen in love with and his serious condition. She used up all her savings to help him, because anyway he told her he would pay the loan back as soon as he was better again.

Once the shipments for the sale of the diamonds began he would personally come to Rome to bring her a cheque and start their future together. But the man had a great deal of financial obligations at that sad moment in time. We all know the cost of a clinic, rehabilitation, the expense of hotel accommodation, and the second tranche for the import-export business.

My mother even sold her apartment - says Lucien - to keep up with the constant demands of that man, who convinced her with false, urgent and unavoidable reasons. When she realised she’d been scammed, she became depressed. Sad and without any financial resources left, she tormented herself every day for having been so stupid when she should have realised it was a scam and sought advice. But she didn’t.

I sent my mother to be treated, to help her overcome her moral disorientation. But wounds like that are difficult to heal at her age…».

The providential money transfer receipts

Luckily Mary had kept all the Western Union‎ and Money Gram receipts. She also maintained contact with her scammer, while her son Lucien sought information amongst his journalist friends and went so far as to consult an Interpol branch, where an agent got to work investigating and had the members of the gang arrested.

Subsequently, after it had received proof of the sums sent, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ivory Coast took steps to return the money to her.

But Mary’s pain at having been hit like that in her feelings will last a long time yet. Every so often she suddenly awakes in the night because she dreams that someone is taking a bag full of diamonds away from her. She cries out for help and sees a man in the uniform of a Marine laughing mockingly.

Mary grieves every time she awakes and thinks about Michael again. She imagines him as he was in the photos which she gazed at so many times. She can hardly believe that Michael doesn’t exist; that his words of love were phrases copied here and there, from romantic texts or invented on the spur of the moment to lure her into a romance scam.

Her computer at home is always turned off now, a piece of equipment that she can’t even bear to dust without feeling distressed. The internet is a place of death and suffering. She wouldn’t want to go on a social networking site for anything in the world.

Silvia

The protagonist of this story does not want to give her real name. She’s a young woman of 32 who in the spring of 2016 received a friend request from a forty-year-old Frenchman, a handsome guy who said his name was Henry Dupont. We’ll call her Silvia:

«He messaged me immediately on Messenger - says Silvia - telling me I was his type and he’d fallen in love with me. He put lots of little hearts and kisses, he wrote sweet things to me. I felt a little uncomfortable, because his zeal seemed excessive, considering that I barely knew him. In fact, I didn’t know him, I’d only seen a picture of him, which although nice, was not very meaningful for me as to who this person was.

So, I ignored him for a couple of days. I didn’t want to be invaded like that in my private life by unsolicited affection.

Henry contacted me again, I answered out of politeness. I read his loving words and meanwhile I thought that perhaps I was acting unfairly towards Gianni, my companion who I hadn’t been getting along with very well lately. We were arguing for every silly little thing and going out together less often than before».

Henry turns up online again every evening, he talks to Silvia and tells her about his life. He tells her he’s a widower with two children, a boy and a girl. Then he touches on the very sad topic of his wife’s death which happened several years earlier. He speaks to her of his loneliness, with two small children to bring up without their mother. He sends her touching photos of the children with their daddy (a sad and disconsolate man!). Silvia very correctly informs him that she already has a companion and is not interested in other affairs, especially with people she doesn’t know directly. But Henry doesn’t desist, he sends her more pictures with flowers, beating hearts, endearing little teddies and phrases full of tenderness.

Silvia is cautious, and this can be deduced from her words. She’s not a woman who is used to making light-hearted decisions. If she did, she would feel guilty towards her companion because, although their relationship is a little difficult, she’s aware that he doesn’t deserve to be cast aside.

The woman’s resistance to Henry is effective, however her slightly veiled initial interest increases day by day. After all it’s unusual to be the object of so much attention and affection. There is reason enough to be flattered.

One evening Henry writes to her that the following day he will fly to Ivory Coast, where his family has a real estate business. Silvia wishes him a pleasant journey.

For two days she hears nothing from him. Then he starts writing to her again spending time chatting online to her. He tells her that those moments are the only peaceful ones of his day. He isn’t happy in the environment around him. In fact, he doesn’t go out at night, he doesn’t mix with anyone and above all he doesn’t trust anyone because he’s in a dangerous place. The roads are lined with prostitutes, robbers, pickpockets.

One evening he tells her he’s chatted to his daughter. She’s sent him a kiss writing: “SMACK!” in large letters. Silvia is moved by this and smiles. She tells him it’s beautiful having such affectionate children.

After the roses and flowers, we can expect an ill-fated event

Contact between Henry and Silvia is interrupted for about ten days. She doesn’t get in touch with him. After all, apart from the flattering declarations of love, she’s not really interested in him. Or at least, she’s not interested enough to go looking for him or get worried about his absence.

Henry suddenly gets in touch again, telling her he’s been mugged shortly before returning home. Without beating about the bush, he asks her to help him out with some money, because he’s been left high and dry. He has nothing. He tells her the details of the armed robbery that he’s suffered at the hands of two thugs. Frightened of being killed Henry gave them everything he had on him: his wallet, his credit card, his gold watch.

Silvia answers that she is sorry. Henry insists on asking her to send him money. She doesn’t have money and tells him so, but Henry continues to describe all his trials and tribulations. He says he has nothing, not even the minimum to be able to eat. Silvia advises him to make a complaint to the police. He answers he’s already done that, but all the same, he’s still without any resources. Only she can help him.

«No.» replies Silvia. «I don’t have money to give to anyone. I can barely cover my own expenses!»

«You’re heartless!» the man rants, «I need the money for my children!»

So, she starts questioning him. The usual questions that would come to mind to anyone. She asks him where his relatives in the real estate business are. She wants him to explain why his children are in Ivory Coast and not in France.

Henry gets cross, he tells her she hasn’t understood a thing of what he’s told her. He makes excuses for his contradictions. Then he changes tone and asks her for a lower figure. A thousand euros will suffice. «Can she send whatever she can! He’ll pay back every cent.»

Silvia interrupts the conversation. Embittered she does some research and discovers he’s a scammer.

She was about to fall for it too, but in this case, she’s always kept a level head. She didn’t let herself be enchanted, a little thanks to her personality, a little because basically that unknown man never really seemed completely convincing to her. To be precise, let’s say the romantic talk on his part was fake, there never was any on her part.

Daria

«It happened to me as well. Two months of really loving letters and sweet words that any woman would love to hear».

This is how Daria’s story begins; she calls the person who scammed her a shady individual. She says she used to think these things happened to old-age pensioners or to little naïve, lonely women, and she specifically uses derogatory phrases to define the individuals in this story, because she’s full of contempt for herself. She feels stupid, with no excuse, just a poor, weak woman. Daria tells her story on Massimo Cappanera’s blog, the clinical psychologist who is an expert on web scams and invites people to tell their stories of what happened to them, so those reading are warned and don’t fall into the same trap.7

I spent two months living in the clouds

Marcello says he’s Italian when he approaches Daria. But from how he expresses himself, it’s clear that he’s not. She points out that his written Italian is not very good, and he justifies it by explaining that he was born in Italy, but his mother is German. His father died when he was a child, and on the death of his father, his mother decided to relocate to Great Britain where they lived for many years.

Daria speaks several languages and she tells him to choose whichever he prefers: Spanish, English, German.

«I’m a widower, and I have a twelve-year-old daughter - he explains - I travel a lot on international business. I take my little girl and the baby sitter with me because I don’t like leaving my daughter alone. It’s just the two of us all alone in the world.»

At this, Daria starts to nourish compassion and understanding for this widowed man with his sweet daughter always at his side.

«I’m based in Bristol for work - continues Marcello - but my business takes me everywhere. I organise big expensive tenders.»

«That’s quite a demanding job!», observes Daria.

«Yes, but I’m used to the work and to travelling. I’m happy with the way business is going. The only thing missing in my life is a woman to sweep me off my feet. I’m happy because I’ve found her now, but my happiness will only be complete when I can embrace you.»

«Will that day be soon?»

«Sooner than you think!», Marcello assures her emphatically.

«When?»

«I hate talking about money, but I can tell you. I chose a tender for 7.5 million instead of 12, because the first is shorter and we can see each other sooner. I can’t wait to meet you. You’re so beautiful, lovable (the man starts to list her qualities and the feelings he has for her). Sweet Daria I do nothing but think of you!»

Marcello goes on to explain his plans for their meeting which will take place on his return from a trip by ship to Cyprus where he’s about to go to buy equipment that will be used for the construction of a bridge.

«Everything was going marvellously well - says Daria - even if there were a few small contradictions in his words which however, having decidedly thrown caution to the wind, I didn’t pick up on».

And here are the incredible aspects of this story

Marcello often speaks of the mystical dimension of their meeting, it was without doubt God’s work. It’s the fate of two hearts which resemble one another and seek each other to achieve happiness. They meet with divine intervention and love each other for life.

All fine, then! But here too - as in a tried and tested screenplay - a catastrophe occurs. Daria is informed of something unexpected and unusual. Marcello is in the port of Cyprus when pirates storm a ship that left before theirs. The captain is dead, having been killed, while shots ring out wildly, and blood flows everywhere. The pirates take some hostages. Marcello has a container full of cash and the precious documents for his tender.

«My darling - he tells her - you know I’m alone in the world without you. You’re the only person I trust. Do me the immense favour of looking after the package I managed to hide, until I arrive in Italy.»