Spanish scammed a small fortune by Brad Pitt impersonator. Was convinced they were dating despite never having seen each other. There may be more "victims"

WOMAN FROM GRANADA SCAMMED 170,000 € OF AN INHERITANCE BY BRAD PITT IMPERSONATOR

[About USD 340k when corrected by cost of living]

To obtain the money, the scammers posed as the acclaimed American actor, making the woman from Granada believe that she was dating him and even that they were going to get married.

Reality often surpasses fiction, and that is what the victim of the scam of up to 170,000 euros that occurred in Granada must have believed . A middle-aged woman has lost that amount of money when she was affected by a scam in which she believed she was dating Brad Pitt .

The group of scammers posed as the Hollywood actor, who will turn 60 next December, making the woman believe that he was her partner and they were in a romantic relationship. It all started with an email invitation to a supposed fan club of the actor and then followed up with emails claiming to be from Brad Pitt himself . The woman's lawyer, Antonio Estella Oroza, explains: "One day she was asked if she wanted to be friends with Brad Pitt and correspond with him. Imagine her surprise and joy!". The lawyer initially thought that the case "was a joke."

(Example of one of the photo collages sent to the victim, written in kindergarten-level Spanish. Translation: "Sweetie, I truly love you and promise to repay everything. Good, sweetie, I still love you.")

"She is not a millionaire by any means. She had recently received an inheritance and that is why she had that capital," explained her lawyer about the 170,000 euros that were defrauded from her for several months throughout 2022. "They told her that her physical features, of a woman from Andalusia, were perfectly suited for one of the characters in an incoming film script", while asking for increasingly large sums of money.

Estella Oroz said that "She became convinced that she had a relationship with Brad Pitt. In fact, she reproached him on some occasion because she had seen him at this or that festival in the company of another woman." After this, an alleged marriage proposal was going to be used to justify another large monetary sum, with the scammers using photo-montages of the actor to convince the victim.

Since there was no trace of the actor, the woman began to suspect the possible scam, going to the lawyer after the scammers suddenly changed their version after months, having taken up to 170,000 euros from her . "The complaint has already been filed, but with the successive strikes that have affected the justice system, not a single piece of paper has yet been moved. I have told my client that this is going to be long, and that she has to be aware of what is going on. It may take seven or eight years to reach a possible outcome.

"We understand that, in addition to the scam, there may be alleged negligence on the part of the banking entity. There are regulations to prosecute money laundering that may not have been complied with," commented the lawyer, Antonio Estella Oroz.

Update: there may be other "victims"