Later, the mark met Jess when she was apparently being threatened by two scumbag journalists (Alex and I were particularly good at this). The mark gave up his own money to buy the pictures to both protect Jess and avoid himself being splashed all over the front page of the tabloids. This was a strong facsimile, but a real hustler would genuinely seduce the mark, break into the hotel room at the most embarrassing moment, and take pictures that his mother should never see, let alone his wife. This blackmail scam depends on hooking the mark through a compromising situation, then making him pay to avoid embarrassment or ruination. Another scam plays on the same human needs but can have a much more powerful and devastating effect on the victim.
Whereas sexual blackmail scams begin with sex, romance scams also create the promise of love and friendship. These con games can be more damaging than any other type of scam because they depend on cultivating genuine feelings of love and attachment from the victim. Over time the mark is groomed to believe he is in a real relationship and these emotions are manipulated and directed toward the hustler’s ultimate goal, which is usually money but—once someone is tangled in this type of web—can be almost anything. Today, victims don’t even have to meet their dream partner personally. The Internet has allowed scammers to pull this con remotely, sometimes even pretending to be the opposite sex using Internet chat and photos of someone else as bait (a con called “catfishing”).
The Russian Bride scam employs girls to run a con on multiple people around the world, using video conferencing, Internet chat, e-mail, and snail mail to keep the mark on the line. Along the way the victim is asked to pay for all sorts of “gifts” and help cover the cost of travel and visas so the girl can meet the mark in his home country. All of this money goes to the hustlers, while they continue to stall the mark with excuses of more bureaucracy, sick relatives who need medicine, legal problems, necessary bribes, and even ransom demands after the prospective bride has been supposedly kidnapped.
Romantic or sexual leverage is a powerful weapon that has been used for centuries by spies, foreign governments, politicians, kings, queens, organized crime, tabloid journalists, and anyone seeking to manipulate someone into a compromising situation. Whether these cons are large-scale professional operations or played by lone fraudsters, the effect on the victim is the same. Shame, regret, and genuine feelings of loss usually consume the mark and very few ever report being conned. Scams like these can last for months or even years before the mark either gives up or loses everything. The aftermath of this type of con game can be particularly damaging to the mark, who may never fully get over the experience.
The Hope Factor
With many con games, I have observed a strange and surprising thought process that allows the mark to buy a bogus story. I learned to use this logic against people in many of the most outlandish scams we pulled, but it also proved useful in more mundane swindles. If you’ve ever seen a TV show exposing con games or read other books that hope to protect the public, no doubt you have come across the following well-worn phrase: If it seems too good to be true, it probably is.
This is fantastic advice, and I have given it many times, but in the heat of the moment, when desire and hope are ignited, a more powerful logic works in the con artists’ favor: This is so crazy, it must be true!
Hustlers have employed this angle for centuries, and it rarely fails to have a powerful effect. If the victim himself doesn’t begin to think this way, it’s relatively easy to introduce the idea. My experience has led me to believe that the more incredible the story, the greater the so-crazy-it-must-be-true logic. Remember, once someone is on the hook, he is searching for ways to believe. Even if a mark is negative and openly doubtful—even aggressive, the very fact he’s talking to me proves that he’s interested; and if he’s interested then, somewhere inside, he hopes the story is true.
It’s surprising to me that even the most difficult target can quickly become a victim to this form of confirmation bias. Anything which supports the mark’s hopes is given greater weight and importance, and the more they want the scam to be real, the easier it is to influence them. In a classic scam like the Pigeon Drop, the whole idea might seem absurd from the outside. However, once someone is on the inside, and has a chance to take the money (and run), emotion can turn doubt into belief.
A Bigger Bait and Switch
Let’s take a moment to consider another simple scam, similar to the ticket swindle, where we are offering something of value for a very low price. On Scammed, we re-enacted a clever version of this con by presenting our mark with a brand new iPad in a box as if it had just come from the Apple store. I arrived with two boxes, one of which was sealed, and let the victim examine the real device and pay for it. My fellow hustler, Robin, arrived to buy the other iPad and also examined the pre-opened tablet. The mark paid cash, which I placed in an envelope filled with more money. Robin then asked if she could take the opened tablet to show to her boyfriend who was waiting nearby in their car. I agreed to follow her, but as soon as she left I asked the mark if he would take care of the money while I took the opened tablet to show Robin’s shy boyfriend. This would leave the mark with the still-sealed box and an envelope stuffed with cash. He agreed, comfortable that I would definitely return and happy because he still had the other iPad that he’d paid for. Once I left with the real iPad, all we had to do was wait and watch until, eventually, the poor mark opened the shrink-wrapped iPad box to find nothing more than a ceramic bathroom tile inside. And the money? I switched that for a duplicate envelope just as described in the ticket scam.
The hook and the sinker are the easy part of this scam. The iPad is a desirable object so there are plenty of people who’d want one, and the reason for walking away and the money switch are well-proven methods. However, in order to get the money, we needed a line that could be tested by the mark. Why am I selling iPads for almost half their value? How can this deal be legal or the iPad be real?
What would you say? What would you believe?
I had to say something believable but I had greater latitude here—thanks to the twisted logic of the hope factor. Even the most cautious buyer wants to score a cheap tablet—or else he wouldn’t be there—but I can’t take my story too far in either direction. If the story was too simple, then the mark might think I was hiding something, and thus walk away. If my story was too crazy, then the mark would resist because hope and belief can only be stretched so far. I needed something that made sense but was suitably out of the ordinary because, after all, iPads don’t fall from the sky.
Here’s the story I used for Scammed:
I work in marketing and we have meetings with clients all over the country. I’m in town to meet real estate developers and, as part of my company’s hospitality package we give away iPads to potential clients. Five people didn’t show up so I have five spare devices to sell before I fly back to New York.
Why sell them and why so cheaply?
If I take them back, I have to return them to Apple but if I sell them for the same price we pay—plus a little extra—then I don’t have to carry them back and I don’t have to tell my boss that five potential clients didn’t show up.
I then talk about the economy, complaining that people don’t invest like they used to. None of this matters to the mark, but it gives my story depth and buys me some time while the idea sinks in. The more the mark wants the iPad, the more my story makes sense to him.
Let’s pull a little harder on that line and imagine the mark asks how a company can afford to give away expensive devices so easily. My comeback might go something like this:
iPads? That’s nothing. If the deal is big enough I’ve given away Rolexes just to get fifteen minutes in the room with these people. Development deals are thin on the ground but the money for my firm is huge if they get the deal. In California I hear they’re giving away Toyotas. Twenty iPads—a hundred iPads—is chicken feed.
This is all a fantasy, but it answers the question and allows me to
give the mark some room to maneuver. If he comes back then I’m almost certain to get his money.
Look, I understand the question, I get it all the time but my flight is in a few hours. I have two other people interested and only two iPads left so don’t worry if you’re not comfortable buying it.
That’s the get-out option. If the mark is starting to use common sense or worry is beginning to take over his desire, this is where he will jump ship. However, most people see this as further proof that my story is genuine and continue with the transaction. It’s an “all-in” move, but if it’s timed correctly, the mark rarely folds.
There are countless ways for a mark to rationalize an attractive proposition like cheap iPads. For some marks the suggestion that the item is stolen is enough; the seller sees any money as profit so its retail value doesn’t matter. Then again, the criminality could scare off a mark as well. Or I could appear to be working a scam on my own company, and so long as the mark doesn’t perceive any danger to himself, he’ll bite. I might even claim to represent the manufacturer, or a competitor. Perhaps I found them on the street or picked up the wrong luggage at the airport that just happened to be filled with high-end merchandise. The reasons are endless so long as I can back it up with enough logic to give the mark confidence in the deal.
On The Real Hustle we once sold an Aston Martin for five thousand pounds (about $8,500) after convincing the mark that a scorned wife was getting revenge on her estranged husband by virtually giving away his nearly two-hundred-thousand-dollar car. A few convincing documents, some amateur dramatics, and a rented car were all we needed to take down several marks.
The Long Game
The line is often the journey between getting the mark hooked and taking their money, but it can also be the core of a great con when the story encourages the mark to invest, spend, or give money continuously. A clear example of this is the well-known Ponzi scheme, named after Charles Ponzi. Ponzi built upon a scam that was introduced in the United States by W. F. Miller, but while Miller made over a million dollars, Ponzi’s scam took many times that amount because his story captured the imagination of the public, who mortgaged their own homes for a chance to invest.
Ponzi’s idea was based on an imbalance between the value of return postage coupons that were bought overseas for small amounts but could be exchanged for postage stamps of a higher value in America. The purpose of these vouchers was to facilitate the return of documents sent from Europe, but the fact that a smaller amount spent in one location could be exchanged for a larger amount in another gave Ponzi a million-dollar idea. He used his story to attract investors, whom he quickly repaid along with the profits he had promised. Many immediately re-invested and word soon spread about the success of Ponzi’s system. As new customers handed over their money, Ponzi used these funds to pay earlier investors. So long as new money kept coming in, old money could be rewarded; the scam grew so quickly that in a matter of months Charles Ponzi was a millionaire several times over.
Within a year, Ponzi’s investment scam collapsed under its own weight when financial analyst Charles Barron noted that many millions of postal reply coupons would need to exist for Ponzi’s claims to be true. In fact, fewer than thirty thousand coupons were in circulation, and once this news was made public, investors panicked, there was a run on Ponzi’s “Security Exchange Company”—everyone asked for their money back at once—and the whole affair unraveled as a financial disaster for those involved.
This will all seem painfully familiar to victims of Bernie Madoff, who took billions of dollars from people. Madoff used new money to reward old investments until he could no longer attract enough fresh capital to meet his commitments. When Madoff’s version of the Ponzi scheme collapsed, investigators found a history of bogus trades that were used to explain how profits were being generated. Over the years, money was constantly being re-invested by victims, unaware that their rewards were nothing more than phantoms being generated by Madoff’s staff. Whenever people cashed out, they were paid from billion-dollar accounts where their money had been sitting all along. Bernie Madoff succeeded in creating a scam where victims were inclined to keep their money invested and watch it appear to grow under his care. By banking almost everything he received, Madoff built an enormous fortune from which he managed his victims’ expectations until suddenly, the wheels came off the bus.
The line is where the story can either fall apart or lock everything into place. If the story makes sense to the mark and doesn’t raise unexpected questions, the chances are good that he will be satisfied. The Ponzi scam and Bernie Madoff’s hugely successful variation illustrate just how powerful a story can be when playing a con. Ponzi’s story simply couldn’t stand up to scrutiny (which it quickly attracted), while Madoff’s scam was built upon stronger foundations; he was able to run it for many years before it became impossible to maintain. In the end, when the house of cards falls down, the scam might seem obvious, but from inside the bubble, it’s much harder to see past one’s desire for the prize.
The principal objectives of the line are to satisfy the mark’s concerns, feed him information, control his options, manipulate his perception, and overall, to give him confidence. The line is a relationship between con artist and victim that builds toward the moment of the sting or is skillfully abused to gradually extract money or resources; while on the line, the mark often becomes isolated from the influence of family, friends, or colleagues who might intervene. The simplest way to do this is to build the need for secrecy into a scam, but con artists also employ emotional leverage to cause the mark to ignore people around them.
When trying to con someone for television, time is short and what would normally be accomplished over weeks or months must somehow be squeezed into a matter of days or hours. The advantage is that risks to production become easier to manage, but it severely limits how much I can take from the mark. The more time a mark has to raise money, the more I can steal. A scam requires enough time for the mark to get involved, take a few risks, and perhaps accept something on faith, but not enough time to let the idea mature in his mind. Here the con artist must depend on the story to both distract and engage the mark quickly. In real-world scams, the more time a con artist has, the more money he can take. This can happen over an extended period of time, as illustrated by psychic and romance scams, or by carefully edging the mark toward a sting. Just as some scams are over as soon as the mark is hooked, some are all about keeping the mark on the line until the well runs dry. With scams like the one I tried to pull on Uncle Barry, the line builds toward a moment of commitment, where the con artist convinces his mark to drive over the cliff.
Footnote
* In actual fact, the mark only thinks he loses an opportunity when, in fact, he probably just dodged a bullet.
THE SINKER
Uncle Barry had me on the ropes.
When he charged back into the office, the look in his eyes told me that I needed to be careful. While walking back to his hotel, Barry had been working out the numbers in his head and had a question that needed to be answered. As our hidden-camera experts quickly crawled behind the counter and producers scurried back to their hiding places, Uncle Barry and Randy were already walking through the door and I was suddenly back in character.
“How did you come up with that number?” Barry asked. “It doesn’t make any sense. Twenty percent would be a huge profit on a deal like this but forty just seems like . . . where did that number come from?”
I smiled and nodded, feigning confidence, but my mind was racing for the right answer. With years of experience I had options that I could draw from other scams, but if I picked the wrong strategy, Barry would walk away. The truth is that 40 percent had been chosen to make the deal more attractive, but for a shrewd businessman, this number set off alarm bells. On the spot, I came up with a logical explanation. The entire scam hinged on what I would say next; I had to trust my instincts. Now, it was my turn to roll the dice.
“It’s es
sential to show how much John and my other clients are paying at this end,” I explained. “In this case, 40 percent is the minimum amount to avoid paying a higher percentage at the Euro end.” I went on to explain that my system used loopholes in international law that protect investors from being “double-dipped” when moving large sums of money. If I could clearly prove that John was paying 40 percent in the United States, he would avoid losing 70 percent overseas. Had Uncle Barry known a little more about foreign investments or how money really moves between countries, we’d have been busted. Fortunately for us, he accepted my explanation.
We were back in business, but Barry needed to slow everything down. He explained that deals are built on relationships, and that even under the best of circumstances, it would be unwise for him to invest so quickly—even for such a modest amount. I smiled and agreed, apologized for my haste, and explained that I had reached for an opportunity without thinking. Barry accepted this and we agreed to meet for dinner. I now felt sure we were back on track. There was no doubt I could convince Barry to invest, but I needed to make him feel that his money was safe.
Had I been pulling this scam for real, I would have attracted as many marks as possible before skipping town, multiplying all those 20K investments into quite a score. Given time, I could have convinced people to invest a lot more than twenty grand, perhaps using Charles Ponzi’s strategy of paying investors to attract a fresh supply of suckers. No matter Barry’s personal wealth, he was not about to agree to put 20K into something until he was sure of it. During dinner, I cautiously suggested an idea that would put his money on the table without him having to fully commit to the deal.
The Art of the Con Page 9