Catch Me If You Can

by Frank W. Abagnale

“Well, perhaps I can help you/‘ he said. ”My wife and I are giving a party tonight and some of the city’s and the state’s top government and business leaders are going to be there, including the mayor and some people from the governor’s staff. I’d like to invite you, if you’d consider coming. I think it would be an enjoyable evening for you, and like I say, you might meet some people who will help you make up your mind.“

  I accepted his invitation, because he was right, in a way. It was quite possible some of his guests could help me. By letting me fleece them.

  It was a black-tie affair, but I had no trouble finding a tuxedo rental shop that was open and which could fit me on such short notice. I also had no trouble locating the city father’s home, which proved to be uncomfortably close to a certain banker’s home. I hoped she wasn’t a guest also, but I had the parking attendant position my car for a quick getaway, just in case.

  She wasn’t a guest, but the most stunning and attractive blonde I’ve ever encountered, before and since, was a guest. I noticed her moments after I joined the throng of guests, and she kept attracting my attention all evening. Oddly enough, although she seemed always to be the center of a circle of admirers, she didn’t seem to be with any one of the men paying her court. My host confirmed the fact.

  “That’s Cheryl,” he said. “She’s a standard decoration at parties like this. She’s a model and she’s been on the covers of several magazines. We have a pretty good arrangement with her. She lends excitement to our parties and we make sure she gets mentioned in all the society columns. Come on, I’ll introduce you.”

  She made it immediately known that she’d been curious about me also. “I saw you arrive,” she said, extending her hand. “That’s a lovely Rolls. Is it yours or did you borrow it for the occasion?”

  “No, it’s one of mine,” I said.

  Her eyebrows arched. “One of yours? Do you have more than one Rolls-Royce?”

  “I have several,” I replied. “I’m a collector.” I knew from the gleam in her eyes that I’d made a dear friend. She was obviously impressed by wealth and material possessions. In fact, I was continually surprised throughout the remainder of the evening that such a beautiful exterior masked such a venal and covetous interior. However, I wasn’t interested in her lack of virtues. I was attracted by her obvious vices. She was avariciously gorgeous.

  We weren’t together the entire evening. We would part occasionally and go prowling separately, like two leopards seeking prey in the same jungle. I found the prey I was hunting, a couple of fat and juicy bank pigeons. She also found her prey. Me.

  I took her aside about 2:30 a.m. “Look, this party’s about dead,” I proposed. “Why don’t we go back to my penthouse and have some breakfast?”

  Her reply was a blow to my ego. “What’s it worth to you for me to go back to your hotel with you?” she asked, eying me provocatively.

  “I thought you were a model,” I blurted, surprised.

  She smiled. “There’re different kinds of modeling. Some modeling jobs come higher than others,” she said.

  I had never paid a girl to go to bed with me. The world of professional sex was an unknown realm. To my knowledge, I’d never before met a hooker or a call girl. But apparently I had now. However, I still wanted her in my bed, and having established her true calling, I made an attempt to establish her price. What the hell, I had plenty of money. “Uh, $300?” I ventured.

  She grimaced prettily and shook her head. “No, I’m afraid $300 isn’t enough,‘ she said.

  I was astonished. Obviously I’d been cavorting in luxury for years without knowing the value of the wares I’d enjoyed. “Oh, all right, let’s double it and say $600,” I said.

  She gave me a coolly speculative look. “That’s closer,” she said. “But for a man of your means, I should think it would be higher.”

  I looked at her and was irritated. I had established and followed a certain felonious code of ethics since taking up crime as a profession. Among other things, I’d never diddled an individual. For instance, I’d never purchased a wardrobe or any other personal item with a hot check. Too many department stores and business firms held an individual salesperson responsible for bogus checks. If a salesman took a check for a suit, and the check bounced, the cost of the suit came out of the clerk’s salary. My targets had always been corporate targets-banks, airlines, hotels, motels or other establishments protected by insurance. When I splurged on a new wardrobe or anything else of a personal nature, I always hit a bank or a hotel for the needed cash.

  It suddenly occurred to me that Cheryl would make a lovely exception to my rule. “Look, we could stand here all night and argue price,” I said. “I hate quibbling. Instead of going to my place, why don’t we go to your apartment, spend an hour or so there, and I’ll give you $1,000.”

  She reached for her purse. “Let’s go,” she agreed. “But I don’t have an apartment at the moment. I lost my lease and I’m staying at a hotel in Miami Beach.” She named the hotel, which was one not too far from mine, and we were there within thirty minutes.

  She was inserting her key into the door of her suite when I turned, saying, “I’ll be right back.”

  She grabbed my arm. “Hey, where’re you going?” she asked, somewhat agitated. “You’re not going to back out, are you?”

  I took her hand off my arm. “Look, you don’t think I carry $1,000 in my pocket, do you?” I said. “I’m going downstairs and cash a check.”

  “At three-thirty in the morning!” she exclaimed. “You’re not going to get a check cashed for that amount at this hour. You couldn’t get one cashed for $100.”

  I smiled loftily. “I think so. I know the owners of this hotel. Besides, this is a certified cashier’s check, drawn on the Chase Manhattan Bank in New York. It’s like gold here. I cash them all the time.”

  “Let me see it,” she asked. I reached inside my jacket pocket and extracted one of the Chase Manhattan counterfeits I’d acquired before coming to Miami. It was in the amount of $1,400. She examined the voucher and nodded. “It is like gold,” she agreed. “Why don’t you just endorse it over to me?”

  “Uh-uh/‘ I declined. ”This check is for $1,400. We agreed on $1,000, and while $400 isn’t that important, a deal is a deal.“

  “I agree,” she said. “So endorse it. I’ll give you the $400.” She dug in her purse and came up with a thin sheaf of $100s, from which she took four and handed them to me. I endorsed the check and handed it to her.

  I have the sequel from what reporters call “reliable sources.” Several days later, when her bank informed her the cashier’s check was a counterfeit, she called the Dade County Sheriff’s Department, furious. She eventually was contacted by O’Riley.

  “Why’d he give you this check?” asked O’Riley.

  “That doesn’t matter,” she snapped. “He gave it to me, and it’s bad, and I want the bastard caught.”

  “I know,” said O’Riley. “But I also need to know how this man thinks, so I can catch him. Your description fits Frank Abagnale, but he’s never given any bad paper to an individual. He doesn’t even pass bad paper in retail stores. Why, all of a sudden, is he giving a square John, and a beautiful woman at that, a worthless check for $1,400? What was the purpose?”

  O’Riley is something of a con artist himself. He obtained the full story from her. “I don’t mind his getting a free piece/‘ she concluded bitterly. ”Hell, I’ve given it away before. But that bastard conned me out of $400 cash. That I resent.“

  I have always agreed with O’Riley’s assessment of the matter. We both got screwed.

  However, her session with me was probably more delightful and less costly than the encounters I had with the two bankers before leaving Miami. I ripped them off for more than $20,000 each. I also flimflammed the Fontaine-bleau by paying my bill with a counterfeit cashier’s check that yielded me several hundred dollars change.

  I put the Rolls in a storage garage and sent a telegram to the Califor
nia leasing firm informing them of its whereabouts. Cheryl was right. It was a lovely car and deserved better than being abandoned to the elements and vandals.

  I holed up in Sun Valley, keeping a low profile and an honest demeanor, for the winter. As spring approached, I flew back to New York, set myself up in a brownstone flat in an elegant section of Manhattan and dropped “reminder” notes to each of my prospective “stews.” The replies I received assured me that my fictional status as a Pan Am promotional executive was still believed, so I proceeded to fulfill my fleshly fantasy. I knew the name of the Hollywood firm that designed and manufactured all of the stewardess uniforms for Pan Am. I flew to Hollywood and, wearing my Pan Am pilot’s garb, called on the fashion firm. I presented a phony letter of introduction to the woman in charge of Pan Am’s account, detailed the fictional public relations tour of Europe and had my explanation accepted at face value. “We’ll have the ensembles ready in six weeks,” she said. “I presume you also want luggage for each of the girls?”

  “Of course,” I said.

  I stayed in the Los Angeles area while the girls’ clothing was being fashioned, attending to other facets necessary to the escapade. I paid a call to the Pan Am stores department at the Los Angeles Airport, dressed as a pilot, and picked up all the hat and uniform emblems they’d need.

  I’d had all the girls send me one-inch-square color photographs of themselves. I used the photographs to make up fake Pan Am ID cards, similar to mine, and listing the status of each as “flight attendant.”

  When the uniforms were ready, I picked them up personally, driving a rented station wagon with counterfeit Pan Am logos on the doors, and paid for the uniforms by signing an invoice for them.

  In late May I sent each of the girls a letter, enclosing an airline ticket for each-tickets I’d bought and paid for with cash-and telling them to assemble in the lobby of the Los Angeles airport on May 26.

  The gathering of my eaglets was one of the boldest and more flamboyant productions of my poseur performances. I went to one of the more luxurious inns surrounding the airport and booked a room for each of the girls, and also engaged, for the day after their arrival, one of the hotel’s conference rooms. I made all the bookings in Pan Am’s firm name, although I paid cash for the facilities. I satiated the curiosity of the assistant manager who handled the transaction by explaining this was not regular Pan Am business but a “special feature” of the airline’s promotion department.

  On the morning the girls were to arrive, I donned my Pan Am pilot’s uniform and visited Pan Am’s operational department at the airport, seeking out the manager of the carrier’s car pool.

  “Look, I’ve got eight stewardesses coming in at two P.M. today on a special assignment, and I need some transportation to get them to the hotel,” I said. “You think you can help me out?”

  “Sure,” he said. “I’ve got a regular crew wagon available. I’ll pick them up myself. You gonna be there?”

  “I’ll just meet you here at one-thirty and go with you/‘ I said. ”You need me to sign anything?“

  “Nah, I got you covered/ Jetman.” He grinned. “Just have one my size.”

  The girls showed up on time and were duly impressed with the gleaming Pan Am crew wagon, which was actually just an oversized station wagon. The pool chief and I loaded their luggage and he drove us all to the hotel, where he again assisted in unloading their luggage and getting the girls situated. I offered to buy him a drink after we were through, but he declined. “I like your kind of duty,” he said, grinning. “Just call on me anytime.”

  The next morning I assembled the girls in the conference room, where I passed out their ID cards and presented them with their uniforms and luggage. They squealed with delight as they inspected the ensembles and the luggage, each piece of which was monogrammed with the owner’s name and Pan Am’s logo.

  There were more squeals of joy as I outlined our itin-nerary: London, Paris, Rome, Athens, Geneva, Munich, Berlin, Madrid, Oslo, Copenhagen, Vienna and other European spas. I quieted them down and took on the air of a stern father.

  “Now, this sounds like a lot of fun, and I hope it will be, but we’re on serious business, and I won’t put up with any nonsense,” I told them. “I have the authority to discharge any one of you for misconduct or for goofing off, and I will send you home if I have to. Let’s get one thing straight-I’m the boss and you will live by my instructions and follow the policies I outline. I think you’ll find my rules eminently fair, and you should have no trouble following them, and therefore no trouble at all.

  “First off, you’ll notice that each of you is identified as a stewardess on your ID card. As far as the personnel of the hotels where we’ll be staying, and the photographers with whom we’ll be working are concerned, you are stewardesses. But we will all travel as civilians, and that includes flying or driving, and I will tell you when you are to wear the uniforms. You’re on a very desirable tour, duty that could cause some dissension and jealousy among our regular cadre of flight attendants, male and female. So if you do have occasion to mingle with regular flight crews, just say you’re with our New York public relations office, on a special assignment, and answer as few questions about your actual status as possible. If anyone presses, refer him or her to me.

  “Now, you’ll be paid every two weeks, a regular company paycheck. It’s very difficult to cash a check in Europe, so when I give you your paycheck, if you’ll just endorse it, I’ll cash it at the local Pan Am office or at one of the banks or hotels with which we’ve made arrangements.

  “Now I know some of you are wondering why you can’t just send your checks home to be deposited. There’re two reasons. First, the checks will probably be issued on one of our foreign accounts. The company likes the checks to be cashed in Europe. Second is the exchange rate. If you cash a check yourself, it will be cashed at the current exchange rate and you’ll usually end up losing money. So I’ll cash your checks, give you the cash and then if you want to send any money home, you can send a money order or a cashier’s check home. Does anyone have any questions?”

  No one did. I smiled. “Okay, then, you’re on your own for the rest of the day and the night. But get a good night’s sleep. We leave tomorrow for London.”

  We did, too, using tickets that had cost me a small fortune in cash. We landed in London in a clammy, predawn rain and I instructed the girls to change into their stewardess uniforms before we went to the hotel.

  I was, understandably, nervous and apprehensive at the outset of my scheme, but I plunged ahead recklessly. I even checked us in at the Royal Gardens in Kensington, gambling that none of the employees would associate TWA Pilot Frank Adams with Pan Am First Officer Frank Williams. I hired a van to take us from the airport to the hotel, and the registration clerk, to my relief, was a total stranger to me.

  “We’re Pan Am Flight 738,” I said. “We were diverted from Shannon and I don’t know if anyone made reservations for us or not.”

  “No problem, Captain,” said the clerk. “That is, if the girls don’t mind doubling up. We’ve only five rooms available.”

  The girls slept until nearly noon. Then I loosed them on the town by themselves, telling them I had “set up a photo session” with the local Pan Am office. What I did was to go through the London telephone book until I found what I was looking for, a commercial photography firm. I called the company and identified myself as a Pan Am public relations representative.

  “I’ve got eight girls at the Royal Gardens, stewardesses, and what we need is some color and black and white shots suitable for advertisements and promotion brochures- you know, candid stuff of the girls at Piccadilly, some of them at the Thames bridges, that sort of thing,” I said. “Do you think you can handle it?”

  “Oh, quite!” enthused the man to whom I spoke. “Why don’t I have one of our boys pop right over with some samples of our work? I’m sure we can do business, Mr. Williams.”

  The firm’s representative and I had l
unch and worked out a deal. I’d picked one of the better firms in London, it seemed. They’d even done some work in the past for Pan Am.

  “Well, this is a little different, something new we’re trying,” I said. “One thing you’ll like, I’m sure, is that you’ll be paid in cash at the end of each day. Just give me an invoice for the amount.”

  “What about the proofs?” asked the camera firm’s rep.

  “Well, chances are we’ll be long gone to another city – we’ve got a hectic schedule-so just send them to the public relations and advertising department of Pan Am in New York,“ I said. ”If they decide to use any of your pictures, you’ll be paid again at your normal commercial rate for each picture selected.“

  He whistled and raised his glass of beer. “That is a different way of doing things, and I like it,” he said, grinning contentedly.

  The next morning, a three-man camera crew in a passenger van loaded with photographic equipment called at the hotel and picked up my eight fledglings. I didn’t go with them, but simply told the chief cameraman to use his own judgment and imagination and return the girls in a reasonably sober and presentable condition.

  “Gotcha, guv’nor.” He laughed and shepherded the girls into the van.

  I had business of my own to conduct. I had embarked on this illicit odyssey well provisioned with sinful supplies: counterfeit cashier’s checks (products of my own handiwork), Pan Am expense checks and regular paychecks (Papa Lavalier’s unwitting artwork) and Pan Am reimbursement authorization forms (pilfered from Pan Am’s own stores department), the last more for bluff than effect.

  There were a lot of factors weighing in my favor. London, and most of the other major cities on out itinerary, was dotted with branches of major American banks.

  The next morning I gathered the girls in my room and explained the hotel policy on airline crews, then spread out eight phony Pan Am “expense checks” for them to endorse. Each check, of course, was for much more than the hotel bill. “I’ll need your ID cards, too, and while I’m settling the bill, you’ll all have to stand in sight of the cashier,” I said. Not one of them questioned the amount of the check she signed, if any one of them bothered to notice.