How con-artist Anna Sorokin ripped off the New York elite and became a star | 60 Minutes Australia

Sydney con

artist

Melissa Caddick's brazenness was as impressive as it was horrifying; She swindled more than $20 million from her friends and family before disappearing. Katic is now presumed dead, but to understand why people like her believe they can commit her crimes, you need to know Anna Sorekin convinced the rich and famous of New York that she was a German heiress about to inherit a fortune of 60 million dollars and then used her lies to live a good life with her money Anna was sentenced to three years in prison for her scam, but she has no regrets about what she did she says there is nothing wrong with achieving it by pretending In New York City What are you going to do about it Possibly the noisy capital of the world The obstacles of audacity and shameless self-confidence are prerequisites for success, but who like you? you're about to see has more façade than bloomingdale's has taken that belief to a whole different level i don't care what you think of me i don't need your approval i don't need to impress you there's no good way to say it but little 30 year old

anna

is a big scam his dubious claim to fame has been his ability to con the rich and famous of manhattan and they don't give a damn i have no patience for people's stupidity do you feel bad for some of the people i got burned in the way Can you tell me the names of the people and I will tell you if I feel bad for them?

It is not easy to interview a skilled charlatan. You have been described as a scammer. Very good scammer. Don't know. I look like one, you don't think you've scammed anyone. Anna's refusal to acknowledge wrongdoing is disconcerting, but her willingness to talk about herself gives insight into the con man's mind; Even, without knowing it, she could help us understand ours. cons of melissa caddick and bill gibson, I'm not that person who tries to trick herself into doing things like I just asked them and they said yes or no, not only was it planned and executed by her, but it was done in a really brilliant way in the one that can't have happened, I mean, you don't create a situation like that out of thin air, you have to create it and you have to be very good Maria Konokova is a best-selling author and psychologist who is intrigued by how Anna has managed to turn deception Celebrity Anna arrives on the scene in New York City and simply arrives with a capital letter and knows exactly how to present herself so that she is immediately welcomed into New York society.

Anna's scam was astonishingly simple. She posed as the daughter of a German billionaire about to strike it rich with an imminent inheritance. Her lie was so convincing. New York society welcomed her with open arms. She in turn fleeced them in hotels and restaurants, including several in Manhattan. banks with hundreds of thousands of dollars it's like I had no idea what was going on so I just liked doing things so you weren't that calculated no I don't exactly look like a leather climber not just some kind from Doing whatever I wanted at the time, so you just wanted to go straight to the top.

Yeah, why waste time getting to know the people who were at the top? I just do not know. Sorry, knowing the people at the top. Yeah, it's like. They didn't seem too smart or too talented to me, so I felt like why do I want to be rich and I want a lot of money. Anna's drive to reach the top by any means possible began as normal. She was born in Russia and raised in Germany in a family notable for well, not very rich nor poor Anna decided that first class was better than middle class how did I find Germany?

I faced the fact that I don't know, I didn't really like it, I just dealt with it. I don't know, I guess my opinion on it is irrelevant, but her opinion on New York was relevant around 2015. Anna Sorekin reinvented herself as Anna Delvey and headed to the Big Apple very soon, the scam was in an attractive air that soon he would become rich. irresistible to the local social set, you showed a lot of cash during this, no, actually, I barely have any cash, I've never had more than a couple thousand dollars at most, people talked about you tipping tremendously well, people It's ridiculous, yes.

Tipping janitors 100 at a time, I mean, was part of the appeal that people would see a little money and think you had a lot more. If someone is impressed by a hundred dollar bill, I don't know what to say to them. One of the brilliant things she does is she hints that she herself is someone who comes from this European background, we're not quite sure where, but she's aristocratic in nature and one of the oldest disadvantages there is is that people become pass for members of the aristocracy. families looking back the act was scandalous but it worked brilliantly for

anna

maria konakova says she probably couldn't believe her luck she doesn't go for a lot of money right away it's not like she surrounds herself with hedge fund moguls she surrounds herself with the element cool,

star

ts reserving tables in trendy restaurants,

star

ts treating people so that people can have a feeling of glamour, a feeling of being close to something fascinating, it seems that people made room for the new and intriguing it girl, especially after he told them another lie: the amount of money he was about to inherit from his billionaire father 60 million US dollars.

You made them believe that you had a trust fund with millions of dollars and that you would access it when you turned 26. That led you to believe except how can I make someone believe how much money I have? Are you telling me now that you never told anyone you were a hs? Why would I tell you how much money I have first of all? Secondly, it's like no one in New York cares. You can't impress anyone with 50 million, 60 million, I don't know, maybe a billion for an offer, but then, no one cares, this is what people don't understand. a job yes she was CEO of my company as the scam progressed anna

became

even more ambitious and announced plans for her sole proprietorship to build a $22 million private art club on one of the expensive streets again York who would be called Anna.

Delvey Foundation and it would be financed by local banks that I was working on to close the lease that will be like an art center with an exhibition space and that was the foundation that you tried to obtain the 22 million dollars with fraudulently, As it turns out you seem so amused by this, Anna came incredibly close to getting the 22 million by posing as her own imaginary Swiss financier, a man who emailed banks to confirm his fortune and send proof of bank transfers. She also falsified documents to show evidence that she had. a bank balance of almost 60 million euros, I mean, you sold the story and they bought it hook and sinker because the story was true, it wasn't that difficult, since I had this project and I had this vision and I probably would have calculated if I had the money, but you didn't have the money, so the project was no good if I had gotten the money from the bank, the whole Anna Delvey foundation, your whole business was just this house of cards.

It's not real Anna, so many companies are just a house of cards, you just don't know it. Anna's art foundation turned out to be just another fake, but before it crumbled into the dustbin of unrealized dreams, she managed to convince a bank to give her a hundred thousand dollar overdraft - enough cash to set up her base of operations. in a trendy New York hotel and attract a new group of friends into her web of deception in 2017, when she checked into a hotel, Anna set up the promissory note for everything. dynamic because she didn't leave the hotel often and she would ask me to pick her up on the way to work and back and I would go out for drinks or dinner and she would sign everything in her hotel room and tell me: you work harder for your money i have never had rachel delosh williams was anna's next target with the fake rs trapping vanity fair magazine's photo editor with some fake generosity, she suggested that rachel join her on an all-expenses-paid trip to a resort in Five stars in Morocco, what could possibly go wrong on my last full day in Marrakech.

I wake up and there are two managers walking into the villa and refusing to leave without a working credit card. Anna asked me to use my card for now. They also told me the final bill. It'll be fixed when we leave, I'll be leaving before Anna, so I think she'll have to take care of this before she leaves, but when Rachel got home she discovered that her credit card had been charged for the entire bill, a whopping €62. 000. more than a year's salary, but when he asked Anna to pay it, all he got were excuses. She was constantly coming up with a variety of excuses before she could even ask what was going on, for once, although one victim had the last laugh.

Rachel turned the ordeal away from her. in a best-selling book Anna was not happy to be able to say whatever she wanted in her little book that no one reads. Don't know. Don't know. I never thought that wasn't his business. She's just a random girl. She's 20 years old, like anyone who knows me she doesn't believe any of that stuff, she's a photo editor for a fashion magazine, like it's none of her business, how much money I have, it was the beginning of the end for Anna's business, the banks and the friends he had. The scammers were starting to catch on and one night, while she was trying to leave a fancy restaurant without paying, the police were waiting.

Anna moved from a boutique hotel to a hellish prison. Rikers is a notorious prison in the United States. You are dealing with overcrowding issues. lack of supervision and violence you're dealing with security issues you're dealing with drugs and unruly detainees It's not an ideal place for anyone but it was definitely hell on earth for her, who had transformed herself into millionaire heiress Anna Delvey and ingratiated herself The fact that the New York champagne game was exposed as a fraud and then thrown into a Rikers Island prison cell was somewhat unpleasant, but in May 2018, that's where he spent his days awaiting trial on charges of robbery and grand theft, a pretty tough place for Rikers, isn't it?

You could say like this, yes, did it affect you? Has it had long-term effects? Of course, yes. I never regret going there. I thought it was an invaluable experience. I could never have created something like this for myself, so I learned a lot from going there. You don't regret going there. You said no, absolutely not. I would never want to want to remove that experience from my system. Anna had scammed hundreds of thousands of dollars, but when the local media found out. about her exploits far from being dismissed as a common thief now a fake heiress a german con

artist

who posed as a rich mistake scamming hundreds of thousands of dollars from unsuspecting people anna delby

became

a sought after celebrity people who are so narcissistic deep, they don't think twice before manipulating others, taking everything from them, stealing their identities, stealing their lives because they deserve it and if you deserve it, did you do something wrong?

Why, of course, not psychologist Maria Konokova, who has written about scammers in her prime? The seller of the trust game was not surprised. Anna was applauded for scamming the rich. Why do people almost admire what she has done? I found that a lot of times people see the scammers' victims as nonexistent because the scammers' own stories are so clever and so funny in a way, you look at it and think, wow, you know you really fooled them, that's cool. , it's so funny, you did what then people just double down on victimless crime because they're like, oh, you deserved it.

I know it's okay, it's not like she came after you, you know the oppressed of the world. Do you see all of this as a victimless crime? I don't see this case as a crime at all, how about that? How can you not see it as a crime? What was that criminal thing I did in New York State? However, there is no doubt that crimes were committed and they took the case to trial in 2019, but Anna, enjoying her newfound fame, got caught up in a circus, hired a celebrity stylist and created a social network. the media and made sure all eyes were focused on what she was wearing, not what she had done, she's a go-getter, she's got guts, she's got Hootsburgh and at the end of the day she gets things done, we prepared to the worst, obviously.

I was hoping for the best for Anna's attorney, Todd Spodek, it was the perfect strategy if you're in a trial where a jury is going to decide whether you're going to go to state prison or not, of course you're going to care about what you look like, as anyone would. In that situation, a lot of people interpreted that in the wrong way, right? I mean, that's a problem. They said all kinds of things about me. It shouldn't be a surprise because all my experience is in art and fashion. Surprising, I cared about clothes by the time I went to trial, I was wet in jail for about 19 months something like that and then that's the only thing I could have, I couldn't even have makeup orhair products, clothes were the only thing.

You can get your own new clothes every night you go to trial, so I thought that's what I was going to do, that it was the only thing I had under my control, but the fans, the fanfare, and even Anna's quick chat were not. enough. to convince the jury and her false personality and lifestyle stayed afloat for years and she was indeed convicted of grand larceny and robbery and sent back to jail until February of this year, when she was released early for, believe it or not , good behavior Within days of being given her freedom, Anna reboarded the gravy train thanks in part to a lucrative and legitimate deal she made with Netflix.

Hello, my name is Anna Delvey. We're in New York and I'm out of jail. Nobody in their right mind is going to do it. I will be doing business with you in the future. They are fine? I guess there are a lot of people who are more than sane in New York, that might be the truest thing she said because when Anna took us to show her new life, it was clear that New Yorkers are crazy for enjoying all the attention, of course, As always, she is a role model. For some people, she's obviously famous people and they like to interact with her social media, so I hope she can take advantage of all this and turn it into something really positive, productive and monetize it.

I hope she can make a real deal out of it, as her attorney described. you as a role model oh thank you, I wouldn't say I'm a role model, I guess I'm trying to change the narrative right now and I'm trying to divert all this attention I'm getting and all the opportunities I've been given to something good, well that's encouraging, thank you because I would have thought that being a role model was something you certainly are not. I mean, you wouldn't want people to aspire to be a scammer, right? I'm not a scammer so I don't know.

I think you know we admire them grudgingly, but at the end of the day they are bad people, they take advantage of human bonds and connections and that is terrible and terrifying that there are people like that who don't care Do you want to stay in New York ? Of course, I love New York. Why do you want to stay there? Why not? You did something bad to me, why should I get angry at anyone? It turned out pretty well, it didn't turn out very well for you, you ended up in jail, I felt like I just did everything like I had all these amazing experiences and I'm going to write a book about this, so I don't personally regret it, but just when it seemed like life As Anna was returning to her idea of ​​normal, at least two weeks ago, U.S. immigration officials began proceedings to deport her and returned her to prison.

This scene is pretty boring, it's just not the same as it is now as she waits for a decision on whether she will be sent back to Germany, well, I hope I don't have to be here. Germany is worse than prison, only one thing is. I'm sure we haven't heard the last of Anna Sorokin coming from New York to Sydney. In Melissa's case, she was my phenomenal investing genius. Why Anna Sorrigan and Melissa Kerrick? No one will see me coming. Our sisters in arms. Proud of it, they think it's a great thing, what they've done. That's what's next.

In 60

minutes

, you're going to start telling the truth because it doesn't seem like you're being very bold. Let's try again. What are you doing? I want to restart but you can't restart your life What do you mean Yes I can I can do whatever I want How can you have a clear conscience? How could you not explain that to me? What do you want I explain to you? I just don't feel guilty and that's it, there's not much to explain. Anna Sorokin has mastered the art of the con. She might currently be sitting in a US immigration detention center sweating over her decision to be deported to Germany, but only a fool of her would rule her out.

New York psychologist Maria Konokova says her methods might have been different, but there are many similarities between Anna and Australia's newest con queen, Melissa Caddick, so the key to Melissa Katic's success was making her goals felt exclusive, it was an

elite

club and you couldn't I won't get in unless she says so. This was actually something where Melissa and Anna shared this feeling of exclusivity. I'm giving you access to something you wouldn't have access to otherwise. In Melissa's case, she was my phenomenal investment genius like Bernie. Madoff, that was exactly what he was selling too, in Anna's case, it's this rarefied social network, it's this kind of cool factor that you couldn't get any other way, but even when they're getting the money, even when they're dragging those funds in good disadvantages like melissa katic or anna delvey must know that there is an expiration date there is an expiration date on all of this they must know this in the back of their mind surely not, they don't know it in the back of In their minds many Sometimes scammers who are successful for a certain period of time basically think that there is no end date where they can keep doing this indefinitely and it's the feeling that I've already been successful for so long so I'm still going to run. more risks and I'm going to do even more because no one will see me coming and someone like Melissa makes you fall in love with the lifestyle and you start wanting to spend the money and have those wealth traps.

The job involves maintaining the story, the false narrative, it must have been exhausting for her, yes, it's a full-time job, I mean, it's basically being a spy, except you're not doing it for your country, you're doing it for yourself, you have two lives. your cover, which is something that you have to continue 100 of the time and then there's who you really are, I mean, there's that real you inside, somewhere, and there's always the risk that the real you is lost because it's really exhausting to constantly be someone else and inhabit that in the case of melissa kaddick I just find it hard to believe that between 25 and 30 million dollars goes on the books and no one else knows about the scam yes I think you are right to have a level of disbelief about that I mean, we obviously have no way of knowing what was going on and we can't ask him, but yeah, it seems like with those amounts of cash someone should have known.

Also, isn't there something about the scammer? psychology where they would like to share their successes, their victories, I mean, they would like to, you know, show how smart they are. This is true. I mean, there's that element of narcissism that wants to be the center of attention, that wants recognition. It was funny when um. When I was working on my book about scammers, people asked me how you got scammers to talk to you. I would just start laughing because they can't shut up. They want everyone to know how smart and brilliant they are, and even those who haven't been caught, some often talk happily and are very grateful to finally be able to talk to someone and talk about how smart they are, as long as they stay in the loop. anonymity and they can continue doing what they are doing, yes.

They are proud of it. They think it's a great thing they've done. Hi, I'm Tara Brown, thanks for watching 60 Minutes Australia. Subscribe to our channel now to receive new stories and exclusive clips every week and don't miss out. in our bonus minute segments and full 60 minute episodes on nine now dot com dot a u and the nine now app