Original subtitles

We're still rolling, right?

Sí.

Okay, so my name is Mariana van Zeller,

and I've been covering black markets for more than 20 years.

Tell us about this new idea.

Yeah. You know, I've done so many stories on scams,

and I've interviewed dozens of scam victims.

They had access to all of my life savings.

It was a little over 24K.

$1,080,762.

$2.8 million.

When I tell people about these scams,

often the common response is,

"Oh, my God, how stupid could they be?

How is it possible that that person fell for that?"

And I really think that people don't get it.

Particularly when it comes to romance scams, which are huge.

They're everywhere these days.

Romance scams on the rise this morning.

Australians are falling victim to romance scams.

Romance scams.

Romance scams.

It may be fake love,

but the fraud is very real.

In my experience,

these are truly the most devastating scams out there.

Last year, 2025, over a billion dollars were stolen

from Americans by romance scammers.

I've reported extensively on these,

but I don't actually know what it feels like

to be on the inside of these scams, to be the target.

What does it look like? What steps do they take?

What do they do to try to gain your trust?

So I started kicking around this idea...

what if I intentionally try,

very hard, to be romance scammed?

My number-one goal is to eventually, hopefully,

meet my romance scammer face-to-face.

This is, I think, going to be the wildest journalistic

experiment of my life,

and I have no idea where it's gonna lead me.

But I think it can be really revealing,

and I think it could be really fun.

Yeah? Is that good?

Okay. Thanks, guys.

Good luck.

Hi, I'm a talking cat.

That should already tell you something

about this world we're living in.

Do you know that perhaps 10% of profiles

on dating websites are fake?

It's getting rather difficult

to know for sure what's real these days.

Maybe you've noticed.

Or maybe you're one of those people

who think you're too smart to be fooled.

That's adorable.

Hi.

Hi, how are you?

Mariana.

Hi.

Hi. It's so nice to meet you.

You too. Hi, Pete!

-Hi, how you doing? -Good.

And you've met Tess.

Hi. Nice to meet you. How are you?

Hi. So nice to meet you.

I'm excited about this.

And you have my nose?

Yes, I have your nose. I got your nose here.

Have you ever been undercover before?

Yeah, many times.

Yeah?

Usually with my actual face.

Yeah?

Not with a fake face.

So, like, who is she?

The woman that I'm becoming?

Yeah, yeah. Tell me about her.

So, yeah, so she's a 50-something-year-old divorcée

who lives in Phoenix.

Two older kids who just left to college.

She's kind of lonely.

Empty nester.

Empty nester looking for love.

I just don't think people realize

how many romance scammers there are out there.

Oh, yeah.

It's totally out of control.

I mean, one in seven adults

say that they've lost money to one of these scams.

I think they don't target young women as much

as they do middle aged and older women,

because they want somebody

that they can squeeze money out of, right?

I mean, we actually thought about putting my photo

on some of these dating sites as myself.

My fear was that they would do a reverse image search of me

and then would find out

that I was actually an investigative journalist,

and that wouldn't go well.

♪ I wanna be your girlfriend ♪

♪ I promise not to hurt you ♪

More consumers than ever

are falling for romance scammers.

♪ I promise not to hurt you ♪

Scammers will sift

through your social media platforms,

finding out every detail about you

to pull at your heartstrings.

♪ I wanna be your girlfriend ♪

They will seek to isolate the person

from their family and friends.

They are so dangerous

because they can feed on your emotions.

♪ I wanna be your girlfriend ♪

Oh, my God.

Whoa!

So different.

Look at you, Mary Zell, you sexy beast.

Okay, let's do this!

Okay.

Middle-aged women commonly post a mix

of clear solo portraits and action shots

that capture their lifestyle and personality.

So, first shot, I'm drinking some wine.

Eharmony, tinder.

What are some other dating websites?

Starting an Instagram account.

TikTok.

I would say between 35 and 40 and 50?

This isn't you, this is Mary Zell.

40 to 60.

Yoga.

Come on. Mary Zell is frisky.

Occupation. What do I do?

Antique Dealer.

Annual income, oof.

More than $250,000?

Yeah. Casual, serious.

What am I looking for? Not sure.

Serious. What?

How do I go back?

Your ideal partner should, share my interests

or be adorable to me?

Be adorable to me.

15%? Oh, my Lord.

This is exhausting.

I just love to bake.

I'm recently divorced and looking for a soulmate.

Life has been a journey.

Love always,

always wins.

Mary Zell is live and looking for love.

Okay, so day one.

Here we go.

Oh, wow. I have like 38 likes on here.

I think that's good?

The thing is, I have actually no idea who's a scammer

or who's not.

But, the thing is, a lot of these scammers actually

have very similar backstories.

I was contacted by a gentleman,

he was a widower.

You know, they're often divorced,

or their wife has passed away.

He had been married.

He just said,

"Well, I lost my wife in a car accident."

He told me that he was in the military.

Or they're a military officer who's overseas

in places like Syria and Iraq and Afghanistan.

An American working overseas.

He was from London.

He was an international contractor.

Or a successful medical professional

or a businessman who's also traveling internationally.

He was supposedly a portfolio manager

for private equities.

He was gonna be leaving for about a month

to go to the Far East to move hardwood trees

from Malaysia to India.

They're in these remote exotic locations,

which explains why we can't actually meet them in person.

And they all sort of share these very common threads,

and that's essentially what I'm going to be looking for here.

Let's see if I'm popular with the men on here.

Oh, wow, like, tons of messages.

Oh, my God, this guy says,

"Hi, Mary. Do you prefer younger men?"

I sure do, Zack.

There's a lot of young men out there looking for older women.

The future is looking bright.

Ooh, Chris likes the spa photo.

Should I tell the guy who asked me

if I want to have a wine night with him,

should I say I'd love to?

No, right? 'Cause he's obviously not a scammer.

Someone that's not a scammer,

I think you should just unmatch them and get them off your app

so that we're not playing with their dating life.

Yeah.

Okay, so I just got an Instagram message

from a guy with a very, very strange handle.

It's genturturmrk.

Um, he only has two posts on his Instagram profile.

A photo pointing to a Sam's Restaurant,

and then this video.

It's basically when I clean

out the refrigerator,

get some buffalo meat, some rice noodles,

make a dinner, and then also have salmon.

I'm not entirely sure how he found my Instagram page,

but he sent me a heart on my baking photo,

which is a good one.

And then he immediately DMed me.

And he said that he's a general

serving his last tour in Syria,

which is a very scammery thing to say.

He says that he has two kids, his wife died of cancer.

And then he immediately asked if I could move onto WhatsApp.

Which is something that we hear is very common.

You know, these scammers want to get you off social media

and onto these encrypted chat rooms.

He's single, he's abroad, he's very good-looking.

He's this badass soldier.

It, it sounds very, very promising.

What's the weekend been like?

I mean, it's been the weirdest weekend.

All weekend long, this guy's just been sending me

photos and videos of himself.

Things are escalating really, really fast.

We've been talking for three days now,

and he already says he's madly in love with me,

he can't imagine a life without me.

I mean, it was sort of weird,

you know, my husband's in the other room

and this guy is sending me shirtless photos of himself

and lots of heart emojis, and, you know,

love bombing me, essentially.

Yeah, and again, I'm not even sure, I think,

I'm quite sure he's a scammer, but not 100% sure.

So now what I'm going to do

is I'm going to download the photos to my computer

and, and see if I can reverse image search these photos

and see if they in fact correspond to Mark Turner,

who he says he is.

So here we are.

AirDropping images

to the computer.

Ta-da-da.

Okay.

Search.

Oh, wow. Oh, so, okay.

So we have a real person, but his name is not Mark Turner.

His name is actually Sam Havelock.

He's an entrepreneur, venture developer,

and investment banker, and a former Navy SEAL.

I mean, this really explains the military photos

that Mark's been sending me all weekend.

And let me just see if he's on social media.

Yeah, okay. There he is.

He has an Instagram account, which is very, very public,

and he has a lot of photos of himself on there.

Yeah, there's even a video

of him combat training or something?

So, there's an endless supply of videos and photos out there

that he can use to essentially pretend he is who he says he is.

Fraud investigators tell us

one big red flag is if the person

wants to profess their love very quickly

and they want to move the relationship along

very quickly,

never meeting in person.

This guy is all about love bombing,

which is very, very common with these scammers.

It sort of creates this sense of intimacy,

but also this sense of dependency.

When you're being showered with affection,

your brain releases dopamine.

It creates this high that actually makes you

more dependent on that love and on that affection,

and that's exactly what they do so well.

It's really wild to see how this all works,

but in many ways, you know, I'm just flirting with danger.

I'm not actually going to pay this guy any money,

but there are thousands and thousands of victims

out there who are right now embroiled in these scams.

In fact, just this morning,

I got a text from a woman who's desperate.

So I'm in Shreveport, Louisiana,

heading to meet a woman called Leslie.

I believe she's fallen victim

to a certain type of romance scam called a celebrity scam.

She's been in a relationship with a very famous person

who she hasn't actually met.

She has sent him quite a bit of money.

I'm never gonna know what it feels like

to actually lose money to these guys,

and so I think it will be really powerful to talk to somebody

who's going through this right now.

Leslie?

Hello.

Hi! How are you? So nice to meet you.

Nice to meet you.

Who have you been talking to since February?

Jon Bon Jovi.

I watch your movies. I watch your series.

And I had emailed and Facebooked and messaged

everybody that I could possibly message,

and one of your reels popped up, and I said,

well, I mean, she writes stories about stuff like this.

Who have you been talking to since February?

Jon Bon Jovi.

And how did it start?

Instagram.

So you made a comment.

I made a comment on Instagram on one of the posts.

It wasn't on his verified page.

And he messaged me.

That's how it all started.

And what did he say?

I'm trying to reach out

and, you know, talk to my fans and...

And you've been a Jon Bon Jovi fan

for a long time?

Oh, had him on my closet door since 1985.

♪ All night ♪

♪ Underneath the stars, rocking all night ♪

I mean, literally.

So it's a dream come true to me to see, "Hey, fan!"

And even though he wasn't messaging you

from a verified account...

Right.

...you thought this is probably...

Oh, yeah. Because they, you know, he told me

that I opened this account

outside of my management's account

so I could openly talk to my fans.

My management would not typically allow this.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. What would you talk about?

Just life in general, what his life is like,

my fascination with him as a rock star,

you know, his nerves, my nerves, his kids, my kids.

Was there anything that made you

really believe that it was him?

Want. Just wanting it to be?

I was lonely, bored.

And maybe I thought this was, you know,

God being nice and having my fairy tale come true.

I mean, I have a video of him talking to me.

Hey, you.

I just finished recording something for you,

and I hope you enjoy watching it.

After you're done,

I'd really love to get a video from you, too.

It would mean a lot.

Also if you're interested,

we could hop on a call sometime.

Just say the word,

and don't worry,

your info stays safe with me, always.

This sounds like it could have been him, totally.

Without a shadow of a doubt.

So, when you got this video,

you thought, "Oh, my God, this is actually him."

Fell out on the floor. I mean, like, literally.

When did he start asking you for money?

And what was the pretense for that?

Um, I wanted to see him.

In person?

In person.

And he said the only way you could do that

was to pay management for a meet and greet.

How much was that initially?

3,000.

3,000? Wow.

Yeah. Nothing was ever enough.

He needed more, more, more, more, more.

And I got deeper and deeper into it.

I know you don't like this question.

Oh, please, don't make me say an amount.

I completely understand,

but why is it hard for you to say the actual amount?

It's astronomical.

And so, what's the situation right now?

They're deciding on whether or not,

I mean, I'm in foreclosure.

Because you haven't been able to pay your mortgage?

Right.

At what point did you realize

I have to be open about what happened to me

and I want to speak out?

Um, well, still, I mean, nobody knows.

I mean, my kids don't know.

Um...

it'll be devastating.

You know, I've been a mortgage lender for 30 years.

I know math, I know finance.

You know, I'm a smart person.

And to be stupid enough to fall for this

and spend that kind of money.

Yeah, I mean, there are thousands of people

out there who have fallen for very similar scams.

-Right. -You're not alone.

And in all honesty, that's comforting and great,

but it doesn't, you know, help my situation.

Okay. So I just left Leslie's house,

and I just want to say it is so up

how devastating these scams can be

and to know that they're happening all around us.

I mean, it should be totally okay for someone like Leslie

to go online and start following her favorite musician.

You know, she's loved this guy,

she's been his number-one fan since she was a teenager,

and she's never actually seen him in person, in concert.

And yet, because she followed him online,

she's possibly going to lose her house.

And I know how good these scammers are,

because just recently, and I haven't even told you guys this,

but as Mary Zell,

I started following all these George Clooney accounts.

I'm a huge Clooney head, fun fact.

But immediately I started getting messages back

from people pretending to be George Clooney,

including this video.

Hi, Mary Zell, how are you doing?

I just want to let you know that I will come soon,

hoping to see you there, okay?

And any time I'm less busy,

I will call you so we can talk better.

Unfortunately I've been told

this is not the real George Clooney.

I wish it was, but I mean, this video is pretty good.

And these videos are only going to get better.

Someone got a delivery.

They arrived this morning.

No way.

Are these flowers for me?

From Mark.

No way.

Oh, my God, I can't believe he actually sent these.

This is so crazy.

"Every petal of these flowers

"carries a piece of my heart to you.

"I wanted you to have something beautiful to hold on to

"until the day I can place my arms around you myself.

"You are the sweetest part of my days,

"the gentlest thought in my nights,

"and the reason I look forward to every tomorrow.

With all my love, Mark Turner."

This is crazy.

He's investing in this, you know, money pot

that's coming his way,

essentially, is what he's doing.

He's manipulative.

So it's been several hours now since the flowers arrived,

and I haven't actually checked my burner phone yet.

I know that the second I turn this thing on,

I'm gonna see all these messages from Mark.

So let's see what he said.

"Good morning, my beautiful love."

Oh, my God, it's so long. Okay, and there it is.

The second message.

"The general's wife that assisted me with $1,000

to activate my phone service needs her money."

He wants $1,000 right now that he's "borrowed"

from the general's wife

so that he can call me more often.

He even sends me a YouTube link

that teaches me how to use a Bitcoin ATM machine.

Sorry.

I mean, I don't even know how to use a Bitcoin machine,

and he probably, you know,

he's probably talking to a lot of people that don't,

which is why he sends them that information.

It's like he's holding my hand

while stealing my money, essentially.

But, yeah, he wants $1,000,

so now I don't know what we're gonna do.

I mean, if I don't send him $1,000,

there's a chance he'll just disappear.

Definitely.

Yeah, so I'm not sure what to do.

So, with the initial idea of having that money bank,

that amount of money

that we were going to dispense

as part of one of our rules

of engagement with the scammers,

that's an absolute no?

That we can't pass on

any money to them, correct?

That's right. Yeah.

There's no, the money thing is

a real, that's a big no-no.

Okay.

Okay. It's just gonna

make our lives

much more difficult, but.

Okay, so we just had a conversation with Nat Geo,

in which they told us that we cannot give any money to Mark.

Which is, again, very frustrating

because all these guys want is money.

I really think that eventually, if we keep talking,

I'll be able to meet him face-to-face.

Or at least that's what I hope.

And if I tell him I don't have any money

or I'm not willing to give him any money immediately,

I'm afraid he's just gonna cut all communications with me.

So I have to figure out a plan

of how to keep stringing him along

while not giving him what he really, really wants.

This is the kind of thing that I think I need help

with people that understand this more.

Me again.

Did you know that 94% of people

who lose money to romance scammers

never see that money again?

Sure, they can report it to law enforcement.

But the stolen funds often end up in another jurisdiction

on the other side of the planet,

so most victims are, shall we say, living on a prayer.

See what I did there?

We're here for the annual DEF CON convention

that brings in hackers, experts in combating those hackers,

so black and white hats.

I'm looking for somebody that could sort of help me

turn the tables on the scammers.

I do malware development for scam-baiting.

And so the majority of those scammers

that you're finding are located where?

They're in India.

You can get them in Russia, you get them in Brazil.

Let's see what's happening here.

Do you have any tips for me?

Um, don't give out

your Social Security number? Right?

That's a good one.

Okay, video diary time.

Today went great.

Met a bunch of really, really interesting people.

I am Naptonium.

But I didn't really think I'd met my wingman

until we were literally leaving DEF CON

and I came across these two guys.

So, what do you guys do?

Okay, well, I'm a cybersecurity expert.

That's what I do.

-Now? -Yes.

And you?

I'm his personal assistant.

He helps me with it all.

I think it was the keyboard vest

that really piqued my interest.

I'm a reformed ethical hacker.

So, I got in trouble as a kid hacking into Microsoft,

around, like, age 18.

You hacked into Microsoft?

That's correct.

One, two.

So, are we good?

One night, I decided that I was gonna break

into Microsoft's campus.

To do what?

To steal a prototype Xbox.

When a group of teenage hackers started

to infiltrate Microsoft and

its Xbox video game division,

it may have been a challenge

and a thrill, but it didn't

end so innocently.

I got a prototype, hacked the Xbox.

Replicated the Xbox.

Thank you.

And you did time in jail?

So for that, I got pretty lucky.

I got off with probation, but it didn't end there.

I lost my job. I had no job.

Just kind of decided to hack the world.

Hack the planet!

How do other hackers make money?

A lot of that is fraud.

Everybody's seen Catch Me if You Can

where they write the bad checks.

I looked into it.

Didn't like the checks thing.

So I get into carding.

I get hit with many felonies out in Nevada.

Apple products. Apple products were really easy to sell.

I stole sneakers from a minor. It's a funny story.

I met up with somebody that was a minor

and stole sneakers from him,

and it turned out that his dad was a cop.

Three strikes, you're out, right?

I mean, I got in trouble three times,

so they just shipped me straight to jail.

Yeah.

Definitely don't recommend it. It sucks. It's terrible.

And I told myself, if somehow, if someway I get out of this,

I would use my powers for good, permanently.

If you guys are looking for scammers,

the best person that's gonna help find them is me.

Jackpot. I found my man.

And it comes at a great time, because Leslie really wants

to find out who the person she's talking to is

and where he's located.

She wants proof that it's not Jon Bon Jovi.

Leslie, Arman.

Hi, nice to meet you.

Arman is here to try to help us figure out

who you've been talking to.

I'm sure these scammers are asking for cryptocurrency

is usually how they ask for money.

Bitcoin.

Okay, perfect.

Yeah. He wants Bitcoin.

Why don't you tell him at the gas station

next to your house you found a Bitcoin machine.

Yeah. He's told me to do those.

Yeah. Ask him if it's okay if you buy it there.

Okay.

What I'm gonna do here is I'm gonna create the receipt

that that machine would print for somebody.

Okay.

So, what we're gonna send to him is the receipt

that that machine would essentially print

for him to redeem.

And then from there, he's gonna be like,

okay, well, I got to redeem it through this website.

Right, right.

But what's actually happening here

is that's our website.

Oh.

When he goes to redeem it,

what we're getting is their information in exchange.

We're gonna find out where they are exactly.

We get whatever name they're willing to put.

And, wait, you built this just for this purpose?

This is just for this.

Nobody has access to something like this,

like, freely available.

This is something tailored for this.

Looks even more professional

than the real Bitcoin.

I'm happy. I'm happy it is.

I'm gonna create this fake receipt.

Oh, wow.

So perfect.

This is what somebody would ideally want to see

because this is what would come out of a Bitcoin machine.

Oh, my God.

Yes. So you would send that to them.

Here's what I got.

Is this what you need?

On my side, we're gonna see everything

that he's doing while he's doing it.

He registered. He's gonna redeem the code.

Oh, my God.

Does it have a name, or what is he saying?

Yeah, he put Moneke?

Moneke?

Moneke. That is so crazy.

They have to allow the location.

If you click "not allow,"

it's not gonna allow you to redeem this.

You are forcefully have to click this.

This is nerve-racking, guys.

I'm at the edge of my seat here.

Wait, did you get something?

I did.

Oh, my God. Oh, my God.

Okay, okay.

Wait, where is it?

Oh, my God.

Okay, okay. I got a ping.

Wait, where is it?

In Nigeria!

Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Oh, my God.

Let me see where it is.

Oh, my God, down to the house?

That house!

That house right there is where it's at.

Oh, my God.

Oh, my love, I'm so sorry.

I'm sorry. I'm sorry.

I'm really sorry.

I want to cuss him out.

I mean, I just want to say,

"Why are you in Africa, bro?"

Why, why do people do this to people?

It's just mean.

Mm-hmm.

It is mean.

It is.

I'm sorry, Leslie.

I didn't know it was gonna be so emotional for you. I'm sorry.

Well, I just know that this is it.

I mean. I mean, this is what I wanted, a...

A "for sure."

Final. You know?

I'm so happy we can stop this now

and more money doesn't have to go into it, right?

Right. And that's what I want to prevent

other people from doing.

Yes. And that's what we're here to do, as well.

So today is the day

that we're gonna flip the tables on Mark.

I'm supposed to send him money today,

and he's been getting very suspicious.

He wants to see a photo of me.

He's asked me to send him photos of Mary Zell this morning.

Yeah, I've been talking to this guy for weeks and weeks now,

and I really want him to take the bait,

so I'm getting a little nervous.

I'm hoping that if he believes

that I'm actually sending him money,

that I can finally get him on a call.

So, I've got the photo of me.

Okay.

Sending it to Mark right now.

Can I take this off real quick? Sorry.

Mark sent me this photo of Mark and me that he created.

It's so good!

It's so funny!

This is amazing.

It's the frame.

It's the frame for me that kills me.

Yeah, it's totally the frame.

He can stop scamming people

and just start being a graphic designer.

He wants his money so he can call me,

so he can reactivate his internet in Syria.

Oh, he's gonna get his money today.

He says I can send him Bitcoin.

This is the same kind of fake Bitcoin receipt

sent to Leslie's scammer, right?

Yeah. Try to include the top

so he knows it's legit, you know?

Make sure the QR code is fully visible.

Just like that.

Okay.

Mark. Nothing from Mark yet.

Nothing.

He's not replying.

Okay, so I finally heard from Mark,

now that we're at the airport and about to fly out.

He received our fake Bitcoin receipt,

and he actually thinks that we sent him some real money.

So he's finally giving me a chance to do a video call

with him, which, you know, I've been waiting for for so long.

Glasses on there.

Good, good.

Yeah?

Yup.

Okay, Mark.

Hello?

Hello, sweet Mary.

Mark, is that you?

Yeah, that's me. How are you doing?

I'm doing good, how are you?

I'm so fine, I'm so happy to see you.

Because I want to see your beautiful face.

I miss you so much.

Oh, I miss you, too.

Wait, so wait, so did you,

I'm so happy that

you were able to connect.

But wait, Mark, can I ask you a question?

You don't sound like I thought

you were going to sound.

You don't sound like you were

born and raised in America.

No, I wanted to tell you.

My mother is from Italy.

I grew up in Italy.

I stayed here several years.

No, I don't speak it.

That is why my accent is like this.

My dad is a military general.

Okay. That's why.

I just was expecting somebody

with an American accent. Sorry.

Well, you don't have

problem with that. Okay?

The most important thing

is that we love each other.

We understand each other.

We want to start life together.

That is more important.

Okay. Thank you, Mark.

Thanks for calling me. So good to see your face.

It's so good to see your beautiful face, my sweet Mary.

Thank you, Mark.

You make me blush.

Bye.

Bye.

Oh, my gosh.

That was amazing.

That was awesome.

Was that not what we wanted right now?

That was exactly what we needed.

I mean, he's not even, this is what is mind blowing.

Some of these guys are very sophisticated.

This guy obviously is not American,

but he did have a deepfake,

or not even a deepfake, it was like AI.

It was. I believe it was some type of face filter,

deepfake, some type of low tier,

because when he would talk,

you could see his real teeth kick in.

I could see that.

You saw that.

That's bananas.

Hey, Arman. Did you try calling me?

Yeah. So, you know our scammer, Mark?

Yup.

He's been trying to redeem the Bitcoin,

like, several times.

I have him here trying to redeem it

four different times on our website.

Wait, did he share a location?

He shared the GPS location each time.

Okay.

They're just centimeters away from each other,

which tells me he's at different points

in the house redeeming it.

It's not a spoof location.

It's app... so wait, where is it?

It's in Accra, the capital of Ghana, I believe.

Wait, he's in Ghana?

Yeah.

-No way. -Yeah.

He's trying to redeem the Bitcoin,

and he's sharing his location.

Yes.

And it's all sort of in the same area.

You are 100% sure that's where he is, in Ghana?

I am I, 000% sure.

Mark is texting me furiously.

He just sent me the photo

of the soldiers injured.

I hadn't heard from him all morning, which is strange,

because he usually texts me immediately in the morning.

And then he sent me that first photo of the soldiers.

It's American soldiers.

It looks like it's American soldiers injured.

And then the second photo here.

So I'm gonna reverse image search this photo he just sent.

Yeah, I mean, it's a photo taken at a training exercise

in Colorado Springs eight years ago.

But this is it.

I mean, this is very common in romance scams.

It's the crisis moment.

He had a "car accident."

He showed me pictures in the hospital and everything.

He said to me, um,

"We were under attack. One guy was shot,"

and he goes, "I'm really scared."

He was in Sweden,

so the country that he was in

you can't make payments, you have to make,

pay the bill before you can get out of the hospital.

He said, "I thought if maybe

you could pay half or even 10,000 of it."

And you know that little feeling

you have inside of you that says, "I shouldn't do this,"

but I went on anyway.

And people say,

"Don't send money to a stranger."

Well, he wasn't a stranger by that point.

You know, this guy knew more about me

than probably any man had ever known.

All the weeks that Mark has spent love bombing me,

sending me flowers,

building trust, it's all leading up to this moment.

I know it's all BS. I know that he's not in Syria.

I know he's not in any sort of danger,

but I'm going to play along.

I want to actually meet this guy face-to-face,

so I have to keep this relationship going.

Yeah, I want to get him on the phone.

Hello.

Hey, Mark, how are you?

Hello, my Mary.

I'm not too fine.

What's happening?

I'm being targeted here, like,

these terrorists are after my life.

I need to leave this place.

Are you there?

Are you hurt?

No, not at all. I'm tired right now.

I'm tired and stressed.

Stressed out.

Are you back home?

Yeah, I'm home.

Well, it's going to take you up to 10 minutes

to mail the money today.

Mark, I can't mail it today.

I'm gonna try and mail it tomorrow, okay?

Alright.

Okay. Okay. Please stay safe.

Alright, love you.

Okay. Talk to you later.

Yeah, I mean, he wants the $17,000.

My fear is that if we don't send this money fast,

he will then disappear on us.

He's agreed to me sending him cash, instead of just Bitcoin.

Because I'm hoping that with cash, he'll give me a US address

and I can actually, we can travel there

and see if, you know, who'd be receiving the cash.

But we'd have to send the money from Phoenix,

or the fake money.

That's right.

We would have to send the money from Phoenix

because that's where he thinks I am. Not LA.

He also wants an overnight delivery,

so we have to be ready to go.

So when he gives us an address,

we have to be ready to basically get on a plane and go.

Okay, so big news.

Mark sent me an address and a woman's name in Houston, Texas.

I'm not sure who the woman is, but we're gonna find out.

He asked me to put the money in a cookie box

and then to send a photo of the money inside the cookie box.

This is actually fake money, FYI.

It's for motion picture purposes,

so it's fake money, but it looks very real.

So we're gonna pretend

that we're gonna send this money,

but in fact, we're sending a box without the money.

The problem is that that box

needs to come from Phoenix, and we're in Los Angeles.

But we found someone in Phoenix who's willing to go

to the post office and send a box to Houston

so that we can give

a tracking number to Mark.

He's gonna be very happy,

and he's gonna keep talking to me.

Today is the day.

The package was sent to a woman who's apparently in her 60s,

but we have no idea if it's actually her who's gonna be

waiting for the package or if there's someone,

one of the associates that works with Mark here.

This is it, right here on the left.

Yeah. Okay. So this is it.

Hello!

Hi, how are you?

I'm good.

How can I help you?

Are you?

Yes, I am, ma'am.

Okay. My name is Mariana.

Okay.

And I'm a journalist.

Um, I have been talking to a man for over a month.

Okay.

And I know he's a scammer.

He's been tricking me, but I'm doing it purposely

because I'm filming a story about scams.

Okay.

And he thinks I'm sending him

a large amount of money, and the address,

the name of the person he gave me

to deliver that money to is you.

Oh!

Which means that I believe you are...

Uh-huh.

Being a victim of a scam.

Mm-hmm.

I can tell you more

about what I've found out about this person,

where he is, and what he's doing.

Okay, where is he?

He's not in America. Where is he telling you he is?

Russia.

Yeah, he's not in Russia.

He's in West Africa.

And have you... I am so sorry.

It's fine.

Are you okay?

Yeah.

And how long have you been in a conversation

with this person for?

Three years.

Oh, my God.

How much money did you give him?

Oh, too much.

Way too much.

Um, yeah.

Very sad.

She's been talking to him for three years.

Three years.

She says she's given him over $100,000.

She's still expecting the package to arrive tomorrow,

and she says that he told her he will let her know

what to do with that package once she has it.

I told her, whatever you do,

do not talk to him,

do not tell him any of this happened.

I hope she doesn't.

Because that could be the end of this whole thing.

She's agreed to meet with me later so that I can figure out

if she's also been talking to the same guy that I have.

Hey, honey, um,

sometimes you are very sweet.

But other times,

there is a stubborn side of you.

So, this is not the voice

of the guy I've been talking to.

It's interesting.

I mean, in my experience, they usually work in groups.

And so right now, they're using you for other purposes, right?

They're using you as a money mule.

Right.

Your guy trusts you enough

that you will deposit this money.

Mm-hmm.

And it's also very dangerous because you can be

sort of an accessory to a crime, right?

Yeah.

How often did this happen?

How much money do you think went through that?

Quite a bit.

I mean, $50,000 check.

Oh, yeah.

Oh, wow.

25,000.

Did you also receive packages with cash?

Yes. Usually 5,000.

$5,000?

Yes.

And then you'd put it in his Bitcoin wallet?

Yeah, it was Bitcoin.

And what did he tell you

that that money was coming from where?

For his company.

They were investing in his company.

And they were all women.

They were all women.

Yeah, and I asked him about the women.

He says, well, I associate with their husbands.

So, did you ever suspect at the time

that maybe they were also scam victims?

Yeah, I was, yeah.

The FBI warns that criminal networks

are targeting their victims for a new purpose,

to turn those victims into unwitting money mules.

And they're basically used

by these criminal organizations

to move funds from one place to another

to both hide who the criminal organization is

and also to make it harder for law enforcement

to trace those illegal funds.

Can you just tell us where we are?

Yes, we're in front of the location

where the package is being delivered today.

The delivery, we've been tracking the number,

and it's about to happen.

Obviously, there's nothing inside the box.

I am so, so nervous right now.

I don't know how he's gonna take it.

I mean, I've been talking to this guy for weeks now,

and I'm gonna tell him that I'm actually not who he thinks I am,

that I'm actually a journalist,

and he's not gonna take it well.

Hello.

Hello, Mark?

Hello, my darling Mary. How are you doing?

Good, Mark. Can I talk to you real quick?

Yeah.

So, the money that I sent you in that bag,

in that package, the box,

so there's no actual money in there.

The box is empty.

The box is empty? Why?

Because, Mark, I am not actually Mary Zell.

I'm a journalist. My name is Mariana van Zeller.

You've been spending many weeks communicating with me.

I know that you're not, in fact, Mark Turner.

I know you're not a four-star general in Syria.

I know you're in Ghana, and I know that you've been trying to,

that you've been trying to scam me

and that you have been possibly scamming lots of other women.

I don't really know what you are talking about.

I'm General Mark Turner.

I don't know what is going on.

Is this Mary I'm talking to?

Okay, Mark, can you do,

can you do a FaceTime with me right now?

And I can see your face and you can see my real face?

Why are you doing all of this?

Mark, can you turn on your FaceTime

so I can see your face?

I'm not really happy right now.

Okay, and is this a good time

to start calling you by your real name, which is?

I think your phone has been cloned.

This is not the woman I met, I fell in love with.

Your phone has been cloned.

I cannot be more clear than I am.

I am not Mary Zell,

and I am not a person who's falling in love with you.

I don't really care what your name is.

The most important thing is that I fell in love with you

and I'm coming to meet you right now.

I'm going to see the general.

I'm gonna focus with the general.

I will get back to you. Right now, I'm not really happy.

I am sure you're not happy.

But do you know who's also not happy?

Is the thousands of women in the United States

and around the world that are scammed... every day.

He hung up.

It's kind of incredible.

It is kind of incredible.

He's, like, refusing to accept the fact

that I know who he really is.

He's even saying he's gonna talk to his general.

It's bananas.

Yeah, I think he just needs some time to figure out next steps.

You know, I've met many criminals in my life.

But I think the big difference here

is that usually I don't know them.

But in this case, I've spent months talking to this guy

and getting to know him.

I know he's a scammer, but we text and talk all the time.

You know, of course I've been lying to him all these months,

pretending I'm somebody I'm not.

So I know he's really pissed off at me right now.

I have a thorny little question.

Do you know why English is the official language of Ghana?

If you guessed slavery and the extraction of gold,

cocoa, timber, diamonds,

and anything else the British could cash in on,

you are correct.

And in the age of the internet,

that fluency in English has certainly been helpful

for the scammers of West Africa.

So let me give a quick hat-tip to the British empire,

the unlikely architect of a love story

between a scammer in Accra and an American divorcée

halfway around the world.

Kwesi, I can't believe I'm back here with you.

Yes, yes.

It's what, our fourth time working together?

Yes, it is our fourth time.

So I gave you an address and a name.

Right. One of the locations

is to, like, a neighborhood.

Now, that neighborhood particularly is known

to have a lot of scammers.

Huh? Really?

Yes. Yes. And so that makes me believe

that he's actually within that, you know, location.

Do you think we should just go

around those neighborhoods and see if we can find him?

Because I actually have something really funny

that we can put in some of these neighborhoods.

I'll show you when we get there.

Alright.

♪ I wanna be your girlfriend ♪

♪ I promise not to hurt you ♪

♪ I wanna be your girlfriend ♪

♪ I promise not to hurt you ♪

♪ I wanna be your girlfriend ♪

♪ I promise not to hurt you ♪

♪ Let me be your girlfriend ♪

You know, the only two people

that know what this means.

Yes?

Is basically me and him.

Right, right.

So if he sees this,

he'll understand what this means.

♪ There's something in the way that you move ♪

Yeah, I mean, I really want to understand

his whole operation,

how many people he works with, how much money he's making,

how many other people he's scamming.

Have you seen this person?

Have you seen this man? No?

More than anything, I just want to look him in the eye

and explain to him the damage he's doing

to all these people's lives.

Okay, so I have some amazing news.

Mark, who I've been trying to track down

for days here in Ghana, finally got back to me.

And he's agreed to meet with us.

It's all happening this afternoon, I hope.

I'm very nervous, but I'm also very, very excited.

So let's see what happens.

He's here.

-Yes. -He's here.

Hi. How are you?

Yeah. Mariana?

Yes. Nice to meet you. Come on in.

So we're disguising your face,

we also are not going to say your real name.

Okay.

So from now on,

what would you like me to call you?

Shall I just call you Mark?

No, Mark is not good. Call me, call me any other name.

Peter?

Okay, Peter is good.

Okay. So from now on, you're Peter.

And, so what do you do?

Hmm. Firstly, I'm a Bitcoin vendor.

I buy, I sell Bitcoin online.

Mm-hmm.

That's just how it is.

I believe you.

I believe that you are a Bitcoin merchant.

I also know that you scam people

and that you were trying to scam me.

That is what you think?

Yes.

I wasn't the one you met.

You are not the person

pretending to be Mark Turner?

No. No.

You are not the person

that I've been in a relationship with for three months.

I was talking to somebody else that whole time.

Yeah.

I spoke to this person for three months.

I spoke to you for three months.

So I know, I know it's you.

How do you know it's me?

You saw the person on video and see it's me?

Like, I don't really know.

Do you want to hear your voice?

Alright.

This is why I'm absolutely sure it's you.

I'm doing really good today.

The woman I love, the woman I prayed for and God gave me,

I'm coming over to be with her.

I can't wait to have you in my arms.

Cuddle up with you all through the night,

kiss your sweet, beautiful lips.

Look into your sweet, beautiful eyes

and tell you how much I love you.

So?

It's you.

But it's okay.

I don't, again, I don't want to get you in trouble.

I just want to understand from your perspective,

what was it like to talk to me?

Okay,

actually, I'm the person you were talking to,

the one pretending to be Mark Turner.

So the whole time it was you?

Yeah. My intention wasn't to scam you

of your money because I'm living good.

It's the relationship part that I was most after.

Mm-hmm.

Not the money part.

So you were saying your intention

wasn't to get money from me?

It wasn't to get money.

So your intention was...

It was just to, because I was the one who first sent,

used my money to send you gifts.

Mm-hmm.

But that's a common tactic, too.

People... scammers who want money, that's something they do a lot.

Why did you want to have a relationship

with a woman in America?

My heart choose you,

like, when I saw your profile in the first place.

Like, I fell in love with your profile.

Like, you.

You fell in love with Mary Zell?

Yeah. So I decided, okay, let me talk to you,

get to know you and...

Um, can I just say something?

Even though you say your intentions

weren't just about the money,

that you wanted to eventually meet me in person,

we met victims who've lost everything,

including the woman that you told me to send the box to.

She's lost all her savings. She's in debt.

I mean, people have committed suicide because of this.

How does that make you feel?

That is very, very bad.

I did not even know that the person

or the address of the person he gave me is a lady,

so I don't know about the story of the address.

Peter.

Yeah.

A lot of people are going to see this.

They're going to hear your explanation

that you've never done this before.

Do you think people are going to believe

that you've never scammed women before?

I think, my story,

that is what they are going to follow.

Because,

in any story, there's always a different story.

For now,

this is where destiny keeps us,

so we have to live life one day at a time...

until destiny take course...

It was shock.

...the way we are going to.

It was shame.

I felt so stupid.

I just felt like I was falling down

a big black well, you know?

That you can't see anything

and you just keep falling and falling and falling.

I was just paralyzed.

Every morning I woke up for months asking myself,

"How am I gonna go on?

How am I going to live with myself?"

So, yes, I'm super happy that we eventually met.

I'm super happy that I convinced him to talk to me on camera.

I wish he would have been more honest with me.

But he finally admitted that he was, in fact, Mark Turner.

He's the guy who's been talking to me for months now.

But he insists that I was the only woman

he's ever tried to scam.

I mean, what are the chances that the only woman

he's ever tried to scam happens to be an undercover journalist?

What have you learned from this whole adventure?

Well, I'm glad it's over.

You know, it's a really scary future when it comes to scams.

It is so easy for people to pretend

to be anyone else out there,

and it's only going to get worse.

But the part about this world of scams

that people aren't talking about

is the loneliness epidemic.

There are millions of people out there that are extremely lonely.

When you are depressed, when you're stressed,

waking up in the morning to a text

with lots of smiley emojis,

or having somebody that you can talk to about your day,

having somebody out there that's thinking about you, that's huge.

These scammers are really good at exploiting that.

If you're not paying attention to your mom or your dad

or your grandpa or your grandma,

believe me, somebody else out there is.

The cure for scams, in many ways, is community.

It's building connections,

it's creating human relationships,

which is why I have one more thing that I want to do.

Hi, Leslie!

-Hey. -How are you?

I'm good. How are y'all doing?

You look so good!

Thank you!

So, I wanted to ask you a question.

Yeah.

Do you want to go with me

to the Jon Bon Jovi concert in New York in July?

Are you dead serious?

I am serious, yes.

Mariana.

Leslie, you're making me cry, too.

I know it's been your dream for so long,

and it makes me so happy to be able to do this.

My God, I'm gonna hyperventilate.

Oh, my God.

So, is this a yes?

Yes. Oh, my God. My God. My God.

Never a bigger yes in my life.