Author Topic: 50 people scammed out of savings for woman to spend $5.4M on luxury vacations  (Read 3733 times)

katethekitcat

  • 5 O'Clock Shadow
  • *
  • Posts: 35
https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/legal-issues/she-scammed-dozens-into-giving-up-their-life-savings-now-she-faces-15-years-behind-bars/2019/01/20/82c039ae-19ad-11e9-8813-cb9dec761e73_story.html?utm_term=.3a4dbb380f4d

Quote
A month before Williams’s arrest in February, D’Andrade sent her his Social Security check.

“I normally use that to psy [sic] my phone and utility bills which is over due,” he wrote. “I will see if o [sic] can get a few days extension on them.”

Williams was on a trip to Italy at the time, staying at five-star hotels in Florence, Rome and Venice. Estimating she spent about $200,000 on the trip, she told a friend, “It’s worth every penny, the memories and the beauty and culture of other places is priceless.”

As awful as this is, what stands out to me is the desperation you must be in to be willing to invest in such get-rich schemes. Our culture puts such an emphasis on getting wealth that people are desperate to amass it easily and quickly. Hold out the promise of a massive return and you can get people to do pretty much anything.

SwordGuy

  • Walrus Stache
  • *******
  • Posts: 8956
  • Location: Fayetteville, NC
People who do this kind of crime should be drawn and quartered.   

TheGrimSqueaker

  • Magnum Stache
  • ******
  • Posts: 2606
  • Location: A desert wasteland, where none but the weird survive
It's easy to say something is "worth every penny" when the pennies being spent aren't yours.

To pay for just that one Italian junket required the life savings of more than one innocent person.

It seems reasonable to require restitution, and if she's too broke even after selling off her personal effects and luxury items, I propose that her organs be harvested and sold. As long as we're drawing and quartering we might as well do what we can to see if her kidneys, liver, eyes, and other organs can be used to save the life of another person who's not a predator. It isn't that this person's life has "no worth", it's that she's simply too malicious and predatory to be allowed out among the rest of us, and this could be a way of mitigating some of the damage she's done.

Just Joe

  • Walrus Stache
  • *******
  • Posts: 6721
  • Location: In the middle....
  • Teach me something.
15 years aren't enough.

Dicey

  • Senior Mustachian
  • ********
  • Posts: 22322
  • Age: 66
  • Location: NorCal
Ugh, this quote was enough to convince me not to read the article. I suppose the memories she created will be really helpful when she's in prison...

Just Joe

  • Walrus Stache
  • *******
  • Posts: 6721
  • Location: In the middle....
  • Teach me something.
Yep, maybe the memories will be her "happy place" when she's being bullied by some troll...

letsdoit

  • Bristles
  • ***
  • Posts: 405
personality disorder

TRD

  • 5 O'Clock Shadow
  • *
  • Posts: 17
People who do this kind of crime should be drawn and quartered.

Yes they should.

JAYSLOL

  • Handlebar Stache
  • *****
  • Posts: 2139
Yeah, she took away 50 peoples life savings for no reason other than her selfish addiction to luxury, she should be locked up for the rest of her life.  Hopefully she doesn't scam anyone else when she gets out, but i wouldn't put money on it. 

GrayGhost

  • Bristles
  • ***
  • Posts: 388
  • Location: USA
Our culture puts such an emphasis on getting wealth that people are desperate to amass it easily and quickly.

It's interesting, I believe you're referring to American/Western culture writ large... but MMM philosophy is all about getting wealth quickly and relatively easily.

So I don't think it's desire to be wealthy that's wrong... it's the willingness to stomp on others that is!

JAYSLOL

  • Handlebar Stache
  • *****
  • Posts: 2139
Our culture puts such an emphasis on getting wealth that people are desperate to amass it easily and quickly.

It's interesting, I believe you're referring to American/Western culture writ large... but MMM philosophy is all about getting wealth quickly and relatively easily.

So I don't think it's desire to be wealthy that's wrong... it's the willingness to stomp on others that is!

For the scammer, yes the desire to feel wealthy, because lets be honest she will never be actually wealthy with those spending habits, is wrong.  But I think they were referring more to the victims being desperate to get rich that led to them falling for such a stupid scam.  It's not a problem that western culture puts an emphasis on acquiring wealth, the problem lies in that it doesn't also put an emphasis on the skills to get there quickly the honest way, which leads to people committing crime, buying lotto tickets as a retirement strategy, or falling for scams like this for the lack of knowledge of a better way and the discipline to carry it out