Yesterday I had a conversation with a woman who was married to a con artist for over 5 years and she didn’t know it. The man she met online, had married her representing himself as a “hedge fund manager.” She helped him entertain clients who invested in his company. He also had a business partner, someone who had known him for over 10 years. That business partner was also conned and lost a great deal of money. It turned out that everything about the man other than these two very real people was a sham. Every word out of his mouth was spoken as part of some pathological lie. The man is without doubt a sociopath/psychopath and con artist.
In the aftermath of being taken both personally and financially everyone who knew this con artist is asking why and how. It is in the spirit of these questions that I recommend to you a book, Crimes of Persuasion: Schemes, Scams, Frauds. How con artists will steal your savings and inheritance through telemarketing fraud, investment schemes and consumer scams. The book is written by Les Henderson a salesman and successful businessman who studied frauds and scams for 5 years before writing this book.
There are three aspects to this book that make it a resource for all victims of sociopaths. First, it provides a good list of the typical “occupations” that sociopaths work as con artists. In that regard it describes how con artists do what they do. If you are wondering whether someone is a sociopath AND that person happens to work one of these occupations, you can stop wondering and start assuming.
The book briefly discusses victim psychology. It is not only the wives and family members of sociopathic con artists who suffer trauma. The victims of the sociopath’s financial fraud also suffer trauma that can be severe and lead to suicide. Henderson says, “Fraud crime is a personal violation. Although there is no serious physical injury many victims of con-men speak of the betrayal as the psychological equivalent of rape.” If you have been the victim of fraud, we invite you to share your story and get support here.
Lastly but importantly, the book points out in many places that con artists use other people who become their unsuspecting accomplices. People who are used by con artists in this way carry that burden for life. Henderson says, “Family members and business associates may have been financially exploited at your urging, resulting in increased feelings of guilt and blame.” Recently, I spoke with a young man who had been used in this way by a con artist. It is his goal to pay back those who by his recommendation, lost money in the fraud, to the tune of $300,000.00. So far he has earned a third of that, and has saved other victims from foreclosure by helping them financially. I gathered from our conversation that the young man stayed sane with his goal of restoring his friends/ family and helping other victims. As Henderson says, “The dread becomes immeasurable, unrelated to specifics, just an all encompassing blanket of depression.” We have all felt that.
Here are links to fraud related web sites:
Crimes-of-persuasion.com
Fraudaid.comHow to deal with having been conned
MORE
NPR is discussing con artists today– A criminal is a criminal but a con man is an artist?
Dear areyoukiddingme,
One way that helps me when I am in a nervous state in a serious situation (like on the witness stand etc) is to try to imagine the one questioning me as NAKED and wearing a neck tie! Just the energy reqired to keep that focus on them being naked helps you keep that focus off of yourself and your own emotions. LOL
When we feel attacked (and who wouldn’t feel attacked in that position) it is important that we keep as much of our cool as we can, otherwise we respond like a cat backed into a corner by a dog, rather than the cat stalking the mouse. We must if we can not feel boxed in or with no way out. I find that the silly thing if imagining my “attacker” standing there naked is so ridiculous that I almost laugh within myself and it is difficult to really see humor and be upset at the same time. Good luck.
I also noticed the lack of emotion with my ex S as he recounted the stories of how his father punched him in the face and was generally abusive toward him. But later, he told me he was battling with his “ex” wife over a will for their daughter if they ever both died. He said he insisted the daughter should be raised by his side of the family who were good, decent people. I’m wondering if he made up the story about his father being abusive just because he knew my stepfather was abusive.
For those who have court appearances with their ex S’s this week, I wish all of you strength to fight this fight. I’m also thinking of Still Standing who also had a court battle this week. Has she posted about this yet?
Hi All,
This court date went better than expected. I made a statement to the judge that I told the prosecuting atty that I was willing to work with providing they give me immunity and that I was also a victim of emotional and financial fraud, He said yes I see here you have no money for a Lawyer and I said that is true and since I don’t have a lawyer I will need a consent written up to make sure that anything I say I wont incriminate myself, he removed himself from the stand and told me to talk to the prosecuting atty and explain what I want. I sat down with the atty and the investigator; the investigator actually delivered my subpoena to my door and told me at the time not to worry. The atty talked and talked about legal details which sounded like Chinese to me and told me that as this is a administrative procedure not a criminal procedure this is really not the type of case that can grant me immunity but they called it a consent to agree to giving them information and say I don’t confirm or deny. I looked at the investigator and said you already know everything about me anyway and he nodded his head yes. ! I did not say anything other than I was a victim. They will now draw up the consent and I WILL have an atty look at that, there will be another court date and I will at that point answer there questions providing the consent will protect me and my constitutional rights.
I came how emotionally exhausted and felt very tire of fighting today.
Dear areyoukiddingme,
I am so glad that things went well today. I hope so much that your X gets the law on his case and is prosecuted.
I read yesterday in the NYtimes online that Moses Joseph, a con man who pretended to be a venture capitolist and ripped off 20 MILLION from banks was convicted, and today I read that Jack Abramoff, a lobbistied to influence peddling got 4 years behind bars, and Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick plead guilty and resigned for his sex scandal and obstruction of justice. He only got 120 days in the county jail, and a million dollar repayment for public money he used for himself, but he will not be able to hold public office and will be on probation for five years, sooooo sometimes they DO get them.
I have no doubt that the three people mentioned above are psychopathic acting and have apparently done “well for themselves” with their bad immoral and illegal behaviors until now, and they ARE getting justice. I am sure that for every one that gets justice there are 999 that don’t even get charged much less convicted, but a FEW DO, and I am hoping and praying that your X is one of those.!!!!!!
It is a shame when you can’t “trust” the law to be on your side even if you were totally bamboozled like the other victims of a fraud. It should be apparent to them that you were one of the WORST victims, because you lost not only your home, security, etc. but ALSO your heart and soul.
Glad you are having an attorney look over the “consent” or whatever the paper is called. Better to be “safe than sorry”
((((hugs)))))
hey, stargazer. after an S and an N i had to deal with myself i witnessed an S con my neighbor. that was the last straw. (actually, i am proud to say that after S and N boot camp i handled the last S pretty well. no one there seemed to think i could do it. but i was able to keep my head above water and i knew there was something wrong with him and not to trust him although i hadn’t identified him as a sociopath.)
a guy i worked with at the time commented that he’d like to know what happened to him as a child. but i already knew that it didn’t matter. no matter what happened to him as a child, he wasn’t a victim of abuse because it didn’t matter to him.
my xS said that he was molested and urinated on. i don’t really believe a word he said now. But even then (as in when I was in the dark) i did not truly pity him. He wasn’t struggling with his abusive past. He only talked about things that he wanted now.
another thing he said that when he was a kid someone pointed a gun against his head in mexico in front of his mom. Pseeessh. the drama of their claims make them more suspicious.
they lie about anything. I was talking to neighbor N once and told him i had worked in Macy’s and that i thought it would be fun to be a window dresser. He clipped back that he had done that job once for Macy’s! wow! what a remarkable coincidence! i really think they just make stuff up off the cuff because they enjoy lying.
sometimes i lie as well and i don’t like it, but i learned from S and N sometimes it is better to lie in order to protect yourself.
You know, Gennyrabbit,
I don’t feel that I owe the Ns/Ps anything so I keep my cards as close to my chest where they are concerned as I can. Try to make sure that they get as little information as I possibly can about me, my life, or anything else. Third parties that carry “tales” are problems sometimes.
As far as lying goes, except for the obvious one of “do these pants make my butt look big?” LOL (Boy, I learned the hard way to LIE LIKE A DOG ON THAT ONE LOL) but except for that one, I don’t ever lie to anyone I care about, but if it came to it, I would lie to the Ps–but since I am NC with them, I don’t even have to do that.
Yea, they can make up some crazy stories, and seem to “lie when the truth would fit better.” I think some of their lies are just for “attention” sort of like the confabulation that a senile elderly person will do, or a small child will make up tales. They aren’t really “lies” as such (in the case of the child or the senile older person) but the Ps do them just for attention I think. In those cases I don’t even thing they are malicious. The lies for the purpose of deceiving someone though, are malicious, to keep you from finding out that they are “stealing” or “cheating” etc.
In that “Rockefeller” case where the guy would tell one person he did X for a living and then a week later tell someone else (or even the same person) that he did Y for a living I think is just part of the mask and more or less confabulation, unless he was using that to bilk money out of them. It just seems to be part of their disorder.
My bio-father lied so much, even in print (news and magazine articles) that it was almost funny. When people started to notice this (as he got richer and more prominent) he tried to be “mysterious” and said that he had not told the truth because he didn’t really want people to know anything about him so he just made up stories about his personal life and back ground. LOL He was sensitive about some of his early life though, and he eventually hired some guy to do one of those “vanity” biographies of him and that was an even bigger joke.
It’s funny how in some of the Ps the N component is sooo BIG (that “Rockefeller” guy is apparently one) and that arrogance is almost laughable if they weren’t ultimately so dangerous. My P-son is so arrogant, just like my P-bio father, and of all the people in the world who has NOTHING TO BE ARROGANT about, it is my P son who has essentially been in prison or jail 20+ out of his 37 years of life. He is just another convict. What is there to be proud of about that? What is there to be arrogant about? Yet he is so PROUD of his adjustment to prison life, “putting one over on” the guards, The way he talked (I haven’t talked to him in nearly 2 yrs) you would have thought he was telling you about how he had climbed the corporate ladder to CEO of a mega-corporation.
I found a bumper sticker once that I stuck on my file cabinet that said “My son is an honor student at the corrections facility” —yea, that’s something to be proud of, he’s the smartest convict in TExas. Boy, if that’s not something to make a mama PROUD! BIG DEAL!
Here is the site that I blog on sometimes, these are Sociopaths I want to make one for Psychopaths
Well I had court again today…WOW it was completely not what I expected at all!
I got consent from the prosecuting atty so they can’t hold anything against me in the court of law prior to this meeting.
The AZ Corp Comm had a hearing about the marital community and benefiting from the 1.3 million he embezzled. I only went to see if they might question me WELL my ex was there and I had a surge of anger. My X went up to say his crap and I just couldn’t believe what came out of his mouth well I guess I should LIES!
He said he made money the first quarter from the Fund and he took his funds out and saved that money for the rest of the year to pay bills. THEN he brought his Psychiatrist to share that he was a Manic Depressive and that he was delusional HA right! Well he went on and on and I just was NOT going to let his BS continue anymore. The Prosecuting atty came up to me and asked me if I wanted to say anything and I hemmed and hawed and said YES I DO. And so I went up and told the commission I was a victim of financial and emotional fraud and that everything MR B told me was a lie for the last 7 years, I told them he had a girlfriend and that he left me homeless jobless and penniless and I had no idea what he did with all the money. I told them he bought 20,000 worth of furniture from the owners for the home and the checks bounced I told them he OK’d a 50,000 purchase of furniture he had no intention of paying, these were completely separate from what he was being charged for but I wanted the commission to know he was fraudulent in more than one way so they would realize he was a total fraud not a Manic creep.
Well this is the short of the hour of questioning but I feel like I was able to release everything that was in my body for the last 9 months and that I took my power back and was not going to let him take me down with him it felt really good and really weird at the same time, this is different for me to be honest for myself and not for someone else.
I think the board was shocked so much so that 2 of the men on the board asked with concern for me if I would be responsible for his debt to the investors and they didn’t think it would be fair as I was a victim as well. It was like I was in a movie I felt like it was, in a way out of body experience all of these emotions I have had to go through all this time got right in his face the lies disseat all of it he, couldn’t run or hide.
As I walked back to my chair I looked straight at him but he didn’t look at me but I know he saw me.
I threw him under the bus BIG TIME!
Unsure where to ask this. I’ve tried searching but oddly didn’t see a story about this topic.
If you knew with absolute certainty that a person was a sociopath and a con, would you warn someone?
I know of a person, a vulnerable person with small children to support who has come under the spell. They are in a profession that would come in contact with this type regularly. I think only a nudge would be needed.
Thoughts and advice please.
Harold,
we would need more details to be more certain.
So much depends on YOU and what kind of rejection you are willing and able to take. Also how dangerous the sociopath could be to YOU.
Harold, just in asking the question you have shown that you are very much like the rest of us here. You care about others. You invest emotionally enough to want to help and you spent your precious time investigating it. In other words, you ARE A GOOD PERSON. That makes you vulnerable. We don’t think like they do and we can barely imagine the kinds of things they do and the immense pleasure they get out of doing evil. We also can’t imagine that they could hide their true evil nature under such a perfect facade. It is the revelation of the facade that throws us for a loop and it can take YEARS to recover from. Hard to imagine but it’s true.
I’m not trying to dissuade you from helping because I doubt that I can. You have so much empathy that it pains you to see others hurt. My warnings are just to help prepare you for making your own decisions. Be prepared for drama and know how to play “gray rock”: show NO EMOTION.
That said, if I was going to warn someone, I would “think like a spath” or “backspath”. In otherwords, don’t tell them outright, but “plant a seed” as my exP would say. And let it germinate. Feed it and water it.
You might accidentally leave a book at her house, or drop a hint to someone they know. maybe send an email with a link.
Be there for that person and listen without judgement. There is a book by Lundy Bancroft, “to be an anchor in the storm” which I haven’t read but may help you. I read a different book called “why does he do that? inside the minds of angry controlling men.” by Bancroft. It was excellent.
God bless you Harold for caring. I wish someone had cared about me for 25 years, but the spath made sure to cut me off from all avenues of friendship and support. It’s part of their MO. He never could cut me off from my parents but that’s because they were spaths too.
Involving yourself with spath drama is not for the feint of heart.