Author Topic: $400k Homeless Gofundme Fraud  (Read 3959 times)

Slee_stack

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$400k Homeless Gofundme Fraud
« on: November 15, 2018, 01:16:59 PM »

mm1970

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Re: $400k Homeless Gofundme Fraud
« Reply #1 on: November 15, 2018, 01:53:15 PM »
Not even a tiny bit!

I never give to GoFundMe's.

I sometimes feel bad about it.

Even the school Go Fund Me's, I have a problem with the fees so I'll go out of my way to write a check!

ysette9

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Re: $400k Homeless Gofundme Fraud
« Reply #2 on: November 15, 2018, 03:13:30 PM »
Is there even a legal standing here? People can and do lie all the time. Why should the president get away with it but these mere mortals get hauled to court?

CrustyBadger

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Re: $400k Homeless Gofundme Fraud
« Reply #3 on: November 15, 2018, 03:33:20 PM »
Is there even a legal standing here? People can and do lie all the time. Why should the president get away with it but these mere mortals get hauled to court?

They are being charged with "second degree theft by deception" and "second degree conspiracy" which are not crimes I have ever heard of before.  This is in New Jersey.

https://gizmodo.com/couple-and-homeless-man-charged-with-conspiracy-over-4-1830472762

Theft by deception in NJ:

https://law.justia.com/codes/new-jersey/2013/title-2c/section-2c-20-4/
Quote
2C:20-4. Theft by deception.

A person is guilty of theft if he purposely obtains property of another by deception. A person deceives if he purposely:

a. Creates or reinforces a false impression, including false impressions as to law, value, intention or other state of mind, and including, but not limited to, a false impression that the person is soliciting or collecting funds for a charitable purpose; but deception as to a person's intention to perform a promise shall not be inferred from the fact alone that he did not subsequently perform the promise;

b. Prevents another from acquiring information which would affect his judgment of a transaction; or

c. Fails to correct a false impression which the deceiver previously created or reinforced, or which the deceiver knows to be influencing another to whom he stands in a fiduciary or confidential relationship.

The term "deceive" does not, however, include falsity as to matters having no pecuniary significance, or puffing or exaggeration by statements unlikely to deceive ordinary persons in the group addressed.


TheGrimSqueaker

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Re: $400k Homeless Gofundme Fraud
« Reply #4 on: November 15, 2018, 03:34:39 PM »
It didn't help that so many media outlets picked the story up and ran with it without verifying at least some of the information. It's bad enough when stuff like that goes viral.

Re: 2nd degree charges in NJ

This could be a way to deal with a kind of crime that was difficult to pull off before the Internet made large scale fraud electronically easy.

marty998

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Re: $400k Homeless Gofundme Fraud
« Reply #5 on: November 16, 2018, 12:08:43 AM »
How utterly stupid can that couple be. The woman sent a text to her friend a couple of days after saying it was all made up. And did they really think the homeless man was not going to want his share of the scam?

kms

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Re: $400k Homeless Gofundme Fraud
« Reply #6 on: November 16, 2018, 09:08:20 AM »
Does anyone else also revel in the fact that this all came got out mainly because they started fighting over who should get what share of the surreptitiously obtained money? If they would've kept all this on the qt it's very likely they would've never had to face these charges in the first place.

Gotta love how stupid people will do the utmost to show the world how immensely braindead they truly are.
« Last Edit: November 16, 2018, 09:12:51 AM by kms »

whitewaterchica

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Re: $400k Homeless Gofundme Fraud
« Reply #7 on: November 16, 2018, 02:46:40 PM »
Sadly, these types of scams are not new and started well before Go Fund Me. I remember reading different stories where people pretended they or family members had cancer and people would donate money, food, clothing, time, etc...

Never underestimate greed and laziness :-(

soccerluvof4

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Re: $400k Homeless Gofundme Fraud
« Reply #8 on: November 25, 2018, 07:43:31 AM »
Its just amazing that people that have the creative ability to come up with this stuff, don't use it in away not screwing over other people. Glad there getting the book thrown at them. Saw it in the news and its pretty disgusting

flipboard

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Re: $400k Homeless Gofundme Fraud
« Reply #9 on: November 25, 2018, 01:53:32 PM »
Its just amazing that people that have the creative ability to come up with this stuff, don't use it in away not screwing over other people. Glad there getting the book thrown at them. Saw it in the news and its pretty disgusting
In some places, people are more amazed that a gofundme for homeless is actually a legitimate thing - like surely that shouldn't be necessary?

Or for healthcare, where fundraising seems to have become standardised:
https://twitter.com/Ocasio2018/status/1066351594843844608

If crowdfunding wasn't needed for such things in the first place, then you also wouldn't have scams around crowdfunding for these things.