Queen of the Con: Johnathan Walton’s Story
The Knife: A True Crime Podcast
Exactly Right and iHeartPodcasts
4.8 • 1K Ratings
🗓️ 4 September 2025
⏱️ 79 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This week we speak with Johnathan Walton, creator of Queen of the Con and author of Anatomy of a Con Artist. Johnathan shares how he met “Mair Smyth,” grew to love her as a sister, and then was brutally betrayed when she conned him out of $100,000. Johnathan has since spoken with hundreds of other victims and built a handbook to expose the tricks con artists use to destroy lives.
Links:
Anatomy of a Con Artist: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/745592/anatomy-of-a-con-artist-by-johnathan-walton/
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This is Exactly Right. |
| 0:07.0 | Hello. |
| 0:08.0 | Summer is ending and you know what that means. It's time to put some clothes on. |
| 0:12.0 | Cover yourself with merch from Exactly Right. |
| 0:14.0 | From September 4th through the 7th, the Exactly Right store is throwing an end of summer sale. |
| 0:18.0 | Use code Summer 25 for 20% off the entire store and get merch |
| 0:22.4 | from all your favorite shows, my favorite murder, bananas, I said no gifts, and more. That includes |
| 0:27.4 | our last chance section with extra savings. That's right. Discounted items are also 20% off. Surely we've |
| 0:33.5 | gotten mad. The sale only lasts four days, so head to Exactly Rightstore.com before it's gone. |
| 0:38.7 | Log on, buy some clothes, live your truth. |
| 0:41.2 | Again, that's Exactly Rightstore.com. |
| 0:43.0 | Use code summer 25 at checkout. |
| 0:44.9 | Goodbye. |
| 0:46.3 | This story contains adult content and language. |
| 0:48.9 | Listener discretion is advised. |
| 0:52.4 | The con artist's job is to get you to love them or love the thing they're creating. |
| 0:57.6 | Because once you're making decisions on that love, you're not thinking straight. |
| 1:01.0 | You're going to get Knife. I'm Pasha Eaton. |
| 1:18.8 | I'm Hannah Smith. So we had a conversation this week that was so compelling, we decided to release it without as much editing as we normally do. |
| 1:27.4 | It's with Jonathan Walton, who talks about con artists in a way that you might not have heard before. |
| 1:32.3 | I certainly hadn't. |
| 1:33.8 | His perspective is personal. |
... |
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