Bad Fortune: Two Tales of Psychic Scammers

True Crime Campfire

True Crime, Society & Culture, History

4.8 • 1.5K Ratings

🗓️ 20 December 2024

⏱️ 44 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

As Abe Lincoln once said—or possibly some guy named Peter Drucker, depends on who you ask—the best way to predict the future is to create it. But for a lot of us humans, that’s a little too loosey-goosey. We’re not big fans of the unknown, and we tend to seek out people who claim they can tell us what to expect from the future. Americans, for example, spend billions a year on psychics. A lot of these are legitimate businesspeople who genuinely want to provide counseling and comfort for their clients. But there’s also a bustling trade in psychic fraud—run by people who have no qualms about taking advantage of you at your most vulnerable and desperate. Today we’re gonna tell you about two of those cases. Case 1: The Mysterious Death of Seth Tobias. Case 2: Psychic Scammer Gina Marks

Sources:
New York Times: https://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/04/business/04tobias.html
ABC News: https://abcnews.go.com/Business/story?id=4279324&page=1
New York Magazine: https://nymag.com/news/features/43914/
The Times: https://www.thetimes.com/article/hunt-for-tiger-the-go-go-boy-after-seth-tobiass-death-5n923qml8pf
The Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/feb/12/bob-nygaard-private-investigator-psychic-fraud
NBC: https://www.nbcwashington.com/news/local/maryland-psychic-sentenced-to-6-years-for-scamming-clients/155294/
TV show "Pink Collar Crime," episode "The Psychic Didn't See Him Coming"

Follow us, campers!
Patreon (join to get all episodes ad-free, at least a day early, an extra episode a month, and a free sticker!): https://patreon.com/TrueCrimeCampfire
https://www.truecrimecampfirepod.com/
Facebook: True Crime Campfire
Instagram: https://gramha.net/profile/truecrimecampfire/19093397079
Twitter: @TCCampfire https://twitter.com/TCCampfire
Email: [email protected]
MERCH! https://true-crime-campfire.myspreadshop.com

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Hello, campers, grab your marshmallows and gather around the true crime campfire. We're your camp counselors. I'm Katie. And I'm Whitney. And we're here to tell you a true story that is way stranger than fiction. We're roasting murderers and marshmallows around the true crime campfire.
0:20.0	As Abe Lincoln once said, or possibly some guy named Peter Drucker, depends on who you ask,
0:25.7	the best way to predict the future is to create it. But for a lot of us humans, that's a little too
0:31.0	loosey-goosey. We're not big fans of the unknown, and we tend to seek out people who claim they
0:36.1	can tell us what to expect from the future.
0:38.9	Americans, for example, spend billions a year on psychics. A lot of these are legitimate business
0:44.4	people who genuinely want to provide counseling and comfort for their clients. But there's also
0:49.3	a bustling trade in psychic fraud, run by people who have no qualms about taking advantage of you at your
0:54.9	most vulnerable and desperate. Today, we're going to tell you about two of those cases.
0:59.7	This is Bad Fortune, Two Tales of Psychic Scammers.
1:18.1	Case 1. Informant. The framing of Filomena Tobias.
1:23.8	So, campers, for this one, we're in a shishi-gated community in Jupiter, Florida.
1:28.6	The early, early morning after Labor Day, September 4, 2007.
1:32.7	Philomena Phyllis, Tobias, called 911 in a panic.
1:36.0	I don't know if my husband has passed out or what, she said.
1:41.1	He was in their backyard pool, just floating and unresponsive, and she didn't know if he was breathing.
1:41.9	Please just send me somebody, she said.
1:44.8	The dispatcher heard her yell,
1:46.2	Seth, don't play with me.
1:48.1	But Seth wasn't playing.
1:50.2	When the Jupiter PD arrived at the Tobias' $5 million home,
1:54.2	they found Phyllis in the shallow end of the pool,
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from True Crime Campfire, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of True Crime Campfire and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.