Peaches Stergo, a 36-year-old Florida woman also known as Alice, was arrested Wednesday on one count of wire fraud for allegedly duping an 87-year-old man out of over $2.8 million that she used to buy Rolex watches, a boat and other luxury items, the U.S. Attorney’s Office of the Southern District of New York announced on Wednesday.
The Federal Trade Commission said losses from romance scams hit a record $547 million in 2021, more than six times the $87 million lost in 2017.
On Monday, the AARP issued a warning to members to be on the lookout for romance scams, which it said has hit the elderly community harder than other age groups.
Stergo, according to the indictment, met the unidentified victim, a then-Manhattan resident, on a dating website six or seven years ago.
By 2017, she asked him for money to pay her attorney so she could receive settlement funds she claimed were owed to her, according to prosecutors.
The settlement, prosecutors said, didn’t exist.
Over the next five years, prosecutors allege, Stergo fed the victim continuous lies to receive almost monthly checks often in increments of $50,000.
She impersonated a bank employee, sent fake invoices, and created a phony email account to reassure the victim that he would be repaid if he continued to deposit money into the account, according to the indictment.
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