French Psychic Scams the World: Part 2
The Perfect Scam
AARP
4.5 • 1.1K Ratings
🗓️ 17 August 2018
⏱️ 26 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
CNN journalists Melanie Hickens and Blake Ellis have spent years investigating psychic Maria Duval. Letters in her name were sent to millions around the globe promising psychic protection in exchange for money. In 2016, the U.S. Postal Inspection Service permanently shut down the fraud scheme in the United States, but investigators have yet to find Maria, leaving Melanie and Blake to wonder whether she even exists.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome back to part two of our story about the Maria Duval psychic scam, one of the biggest |
| 0:06.0 | cons in history. |
| 0:07.0 | Look, these mass marketing frauds are insidious. |
| 0:11.0 | They sort of, they're a death by a thousand cuts. They suck this money away |
| 0:16.0 | from victims who are least able to pay it. |
| 0:18.0 | Welcome back to AARP, The Perfect Scam. I'm your host, Will Johnson, Johnson and I'm here my co-host and the AARP Fraud Watch network |
| 0:26.4 | Ambassador Frank Abagnale as always here to give us insights and feedback and all you can offer on scams of the day. |
| 0:34.7 | Good to be here, well, thanks. |
| 0:35.9 | All right. |
| 0:36.9 | So we are back talking about Maria Duval this week. |
| 0:40.6 | Last week, if you haven't listened to part one, please do so before listening to this part because |
| 0:45.3 | you'll want to know what's going on with one of the biggest cons in history that's been going |
| 0:49.4 | on for decades. |
| 0:51.0 | Are there cons or scams you can think of that have been out there for as long as this one? |
| 0:55.2 | Well, yeah, first of all, remember that most all scams are old. They've been around for many, many years. |
| 1:00.3 | The different ways they're perpetrated now because of communications and things that have changed and |
| 1:06.0 | delivering the message. But most of these scams are pretty much the same old scams. |
| 1:10.0 | And there are some long-running scams, like in this case of this scam |
| 1:13.6 | until someone really starts complaining until somebody really starts |
| 1:17.4 | looking into it |
| 1:18.5 | it could go on and on forever because you're dealing with individuals and if |
| 1:22.0 | nobody really like the reporters took it upon themselves to investigate it it could go on forever. |
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