Brian Ellington is convicted of credit card faud and parents bail him out
In the entire year, even though he got job number four and managed to keep that for a few months, he only paid me another $250. He did pay his own expenses for May, June, and most of July, and started contributing to buying things for the house.
By this time, my cat had died and I had missed so much work and had trouble because he was so needy, calling me constantly, depriving me of sleep—I just had to focus keeping my job. He was working, paying for himself, and staying out of my hair. I still made attempts once or twice a month to get rid of him, but they weren’t successful.
When he got the last job—vice president of sales for a technology company in the Empire State building—Brian went on what I now am convinced was a fake business trip to Texas. When he returned from the alleged business trip, he should have had expense report receipts and business papers/client contracts. He had nothing. I dumped and searched his bag right in front of him there was not one scrap of paper to show where he had been for four days.
Father’s letter
I thought I knew the full extent of what was happening. But once I was finally out of his grip, things really started to hit me and for about a week and a half, I just cried a lot.
Oh, and did I mention in February I found a four-page letter Brian’s father sent him, demanding he start paying back the nearly $17,000 he owed and threatening to garnish his wages if he didn’t? All I could think was, “Why did you (his father) bail him out???” Brian’s mother personally told me in a phone conversation that Brian owes her approximately $75,000, but she seemed unconcerned about it.
In my opinion, Brian Ellington cannot be trusted with unrestricted communication, money, or any type of motorized vehicle. Given cable, he will charge porn to you. Given a computer, he will harass (me), join adult websites, lie to people, and give your computer a virus. Given a phone, he will hide whom he talks to. Given money, he will spend it on entertainment and then have no money for rent, food or to pay his bills. I saw him do it.
Brian does not appear to have a driver’s license. He has a history of driving drunk and car accidents. Brian told me during his 2005 Thanksgiving trip to North Carolina that his mother let him drive her ten-day-old four wheeler and he rolled it, causing what Brian said was $4,000 worth of damage. In my opinion, he cannot be trusted with even a lawn mower.
No money at all
He arrived back from Thanksgiving and finally, after about another week with me getting angry on a daily basis—admitted that he has NO MONEY AT ALL. By this time, I am realizing he is unemployed also. He said that the company was going out of business and couldn’t pay him and they “really screwed him over” and he was having “tough times” as a result.
A lot of people will say, “Why didn’t you kick him out then?” I was initially very angry. I wanted to hold him still so I could get information on where to find him and evidence of what he was doing. I wanted to have control over SOMETHING— like he leaves either by arrest or after paying me.
I let him stay and I started looking for other women. He would disappear overnight more and more frequently, claiming to have slept on his friend’s couch. He had constant “phone problems”-not being able to answer when I called. He insisted his battery was always dead, and although I bought him three new phone batteries to resolve this, he still would at times not answer for hours.
Stuff in storage
In late April, 2006, I said, “Okay, you have a job. Get out.” While he was on the (probably fake) Texas business trip, I rented a storage unit in Manhattan , moved his things there and changed the locks.
My mistake was not breaking off contact 100 percent. I am too nice. I did not understand that I simply had to force him away because otherwise he will NEVER go. I let him stay while he looked for another place. Soon, he had keys again. Soon, he was slowly accumulating things in my apartment again. Every so often we had a blowout and I forced him to take his things and leave, but he would just charm his way back somehow or another.
It really is difficult to fight off when someone has you isolated from your friends and family-and yes he did that-and the someone is the only voice constantly feeding you the opposite of what you are trying to think, telling you that you are crazy, implying that you are doing something wrong or something bad will happen if he left, constantly trying to distract me from the real happenings with huge efforts to have this loving fun relationship. He was like, “I’m working so hard to change, I love you, blah blah.” He started doing housework, he started helping with laundry, and when he was working (which was very, very infrequently), he would pay for us both at restaurants.
I was just apathetic and exhausted.
Another job lost
Then, at the end of July, 2006, Brian claimed his paycheck did not cash due to insufficient funds. Then Brian claimed the FBI was in his office repeatedly. Next, Brian said his boss was allegedly gone for a week and not answering the phone. Then Brian claimed his boss was somehow affiliated with Al Qaeda and the company is going out of business and he was not being paid and he has to quit. I said to myself, “Brian is lying to me again.”
So, now it is the first week of August, 2006, and Brian Ellington is unemployed and broke again. I said, “Brian, you are not staying in my house unemployed. Go sweep floors. Get a McDonald’s job. I don’t care. I am not paying for you. Get a bartending job.” He started making like he’s trying to be a bartender only he can’t make a rum and coke correctly.
I honestly tried to help Brian and gave him EVERY opportunity to straighten out, right his wrongs, and live a successful future life. He had free food, free shelter, free train passes, free toiletries, free cable, etc., and full access to a laptop for job searching.
Given a year, he completely failed and would not stop lying. I can honestly state and cite many examples that a lot of Brian’s time and energy was devoted primarily to getting everyone else to pay for him. He would make friends with strangers and then stick them somehow with the tab. He would ride the Long Island railroad without money. He would take cab rides and not have any money to pay the cab driver. He would make plans to go on a job interview and pressure me out of the money he needed for it. He would spend his last $20 on junk and complain to me how hungry he was. I make these statements based on my personal observations, experiences, and based on Brian’s own words telling me these things.
Missing cash
It is my belief that Brian stole money from my wallet at least three times. I reported this to the police at Precinct 108 in Queens and filed a complaint. The police refused to take action.
I got money out of the ATM; it was there when I went to bed and gone when I woke up. I did not drop it; I didn’t lose it. It was zipped in my wallet. Brian was the only one who had access to it. I did not see him with his hand in there taking it; I do not have a photograph of him doing this nor any proof other than the fact that I withdrew money from the ATM and it disappeared.
Of course, the police didn’t listen to me. If he stole it while we were at a restaurant, then they said they would do something but since he’s in my house, it’s apparently okay to steal from me. It doesn’t matter when you report it either; do it immediately and you can’t find him and have little proof, do it after the fact and the police say, well you knew he’s a liar, so now we won’t do anything.
How can they not understand that I was afraid to keep him, afraid to get rid of him and I just didn’t know what to do? There was no way that I would try to report him if he still was near me or had access to my place. I was too afraid of retribution.
Cheating slut
I barely spoke to my friends or family for six months. Brian would irrationally accuse me of cheating and call, tracking my whereabouts, constantly.
Sometimes Brian would try to humiliate me in public by yelling that I am a “cheating slut,” a “whore,” and shouting to me, “You will open your legs for anyone.” He did this despite the fact that he knew I had not dated anyone else since before I met him, and despite me telling him where I was all the time and letting him look at whatever he wanted to. He looked through my purse, phone and computer constantly, and still wasn’t satisfied. Yet he NEVER unlocked his phone to let ME see it.
I came to realize that I was not getting rid of Brian for good unless I could get him to leave the state. I caught him searching for single women on the Internet and I got angry and bought him a one-way bus ticket to North Carolina to leave on September 6, 2006. He wouldn’t go.
Brian packed, but he then dragged around making me late for work, then said he wasn’t getting on the bus and was going to die homeless in the street and he said he was going to commit suicide. Brian broke down crying and sobbing hysterically and I had to get to work. I did not have time to escort him to the bus and was afraid he would stay and break into my apartment for revenge or something. I gave in.
Playing golf
Then his bartending seemed to be going better; he was coming home with a hundred or two hundred dollars from each shift. I was encouraging him but still saying, “Get out of my apartment and get your own place.” He said that his “friend Ziggy in Las Vegas ” was going to loan him emergency money to do so. Brian showed me text messages on his phone, allegedly proving “Ziggy” was going to wire him money.
I barely looked at the message he was trying to show me, as I have seen Brian research his lies and try to provide fake proof that he was telling the truth when he was not. Then Brian seemed to lose interest in getting the loan from “Ziggy” and focused on trying to romance me. He also talked about wanting to play golf.
I said, “Golf is for rich people. Golf is for employed people who pay their bills. You are still not paying for your storage unit, Brian.” I paid to store his stuff for five months and had to threaten to throw it out to finally get him to take over the $50-a-month payment. Brian said he was going to get his friend to pay his golf green fees so, it’s okay, he can go play, it’s not costing any money. I said, “You are not going to mooch off of people. If you go play golf DO NOT COME BACK.”