Scam victim sets up sting after losing thousands to 'Olivia Newton-John' imposter | A Current Affair

Olivia newton-john is one of Australia's most loved entertainers but Olivia's trusted name has been used without her knowledge in an international con fleecing Ozzy's of thousands of dollars what the scammers didn't count on is their target setting up a sting of his own exposing a criminal syndicate using Melbourne grandmothers as money mules here's Dan Nolan's special investigation [Music] she was sexually in the morning and lunch some nights this people are very clever poor Olivia newton-john this is hardly the type of thing she needs at the moment somebody's second it for me you know without getting furnished justice has to be done I don't know if that came Nino martinet he is an award-winning cinematographer who spent a lifetime hanging out with movie stars there's his name in the opening credits of the Heartbreak Kid with a baby-faced Alex Dimitri artists and Claudia Carvin he filmed the movie Molokai starring David Wenham Sam Neill and even Lawrence of Arabia himself Peter O'Toole his photo library is a who's who of stars Ray Liotta Rebecca Gibney Jack Thompson and Olivia newton-john I miss Olivia it was like working with any other tack said you know okay on my job it's the same I thought Megan look good which I did the movie was called the wild girls Olivia starred in it with daughter Chloe and if you look past the Mandarin subtitles you can see Nino's name up in lights I got them nice [ __ ] over there you know that's what started that pizza Nino splits his time between Australia and Italy but when covert 19 restrictions kicked in he found himself stranded at his friend Vince's house on the Gold Coast feeling bored isolated and a little nostalgic he posted that picture to an Olivia newton-john fan page on Facebook soon after someone called Dame Olivia came sliding in to his messages hello thanks for the love and support how did you feel when Dame Olivia contacted you I almost answered like you know I've been looking at this picture I've been thinking about there and yes she comes into my life you know I couldn't believe it she asks how long he'd been a fan and which songs are his favorite but Nino was so blinded by his old friend contacting him that he didn't spot anything amiss I think it was a moment of weakness you know in my emotionally I was weak and that's how they they got me once they had him hooked the messages turned into a landslide morning noon and night and we're going well this tech seed is really intense I don't know if I could keep up that level of energy taxi during the day and he kept doing it Dame Olivia had given Nino strict instructions to keep their relationship a secret meaning his friend Vince had no idea who the mystery woman was he would say things like oh look at submit the love of my life or something like that and we go wow this is fantastic she started with you're so handsome you know I mean okay all of the women told me their medicine so I believed her so that wasn't an unusual compliment for you to hear yeah that's why you know other one sound immodest but honestly Nino thought he was starring in a real-life love story and fell hook line and sinker for his dames web of deceit including lies that she was now divorced and lonely since the time we started chatting I cry a little less well half a little harder and smile all the more just because I have you so I feel sorry for her yeah she doesn't disable this human being but then came the scam Dame Olivia asked Nino to switch all communications to an app called telegram and said if he wanted to meet up he had to pay a fee to her management to cover the cost of hotels and security if you want to have a coffee with Olivia it cost $2,000 if you once the goods were dressed and I say goes five seven you know and I thought you know that must be the way out she raised money you know as weird as this request seemed Nino didn't want to offend one of his favorite celebrities he's ever worked with I was still thinking that I didn't want to be disrespectful to her you don't say okay you know can you say this often is a John I don't think so yeah you know if you work in the business and you've worked with the celebrity and they start chatting to you on Facebook I guess you would assume that maybe it's that person film and TV critic andrew mikado says fans who troll their favorite celebrities Facebook pages can be particularly vulnerable to this kind of scam if they think the celebrity is personally chatting to them they want to believe it and so that makes them real victims Nino arranged his meeting through dame Olivia's management and now had to pay $6,000 for the privilege management advised by email to transfer it to a Westpac bank account in Melbourne in the name of Mary bulletin so the management was some other $4,500 young the requests were in US dollars so Nino ended up transferring another 7 grand this time to a calm bank account in Melbourne in the name of Thelma Fiasco all up he transferred $13,000 but the meeting with Olivia never came through nino finally told his friend Vince who the mystery woman was what she's normally normally people of that calibre they pull up at the front and the limousine at that point I said I have to keep this going you know because I'm certain he'll get really annoyed now I'm a very revengeful person like if somebody does something ten times more so Nino decided to set up a sting of his own convincing the management he wanted to send more money but this time he demanded an Australian address to have it delivered to they provided one for a Mary bue settle in Craigieburn Melbourne it's a pity that we can't fly otherwise I will fly to Melbourne and wait in the street and wait for the cops to see them you know captain I've been a member for 25 years I will make those people disappear if I want to you know really but Nino wanted an arrest not a mafia hit so he printed out the 600 pages of messages exchanged with the scammers and visited a Gold Coast police station what happened when you took your evidence to the police nothing I thought they were going to Pat me on the back you've done some good work you found the people you found the house so now you're left with no option but to do a sting of your art some of these go through to do something about it I'm not some some guy that just watch and do nothing you know the scammers gave him strict instructions with how to rap the cache being delivered they say three envelopes then you wrap it with a different cloth like three cloth with the police seemingly not interested in his case Nino asked us to carry out his operation so Nino your sting is set now yeah well it looks like I hope it works when this package arrives it's gonna be more than some cloths wrapped around some envelopes it's gonna be a car at a fair there yeah that's right that's right [Music] Friday 9:00 a.m. and the parcel is delivered to what looks like an average suburban home within three minutes a woman emerges from inside to collect it and then our camera crew pounces just wondering do you know what's in that package a Current Affair producer Luc Mortimer is now tasked with unraveling how Nino was scammed so so you're Mary yeah yeah do you know anything about Olivia newton-john mm-hmm no why Jesus Inger do you know nein nein Oh Martin Eddie but the bank transfers with their own name on it start to jog her memory so you do know how do you know online it appears Mary might know a little more than she's letting on why did we know transferring the money there's a big thing I speaking to someone online yeah and he told me I need to give him I need to send the money the person Mary has been talking to online calls himself sergeant major Samuel Spencer from the US Army a stolen identity of a real soldier who has wooed her with his romantic prose loving you gives me such a feeling of fulfillment that I feel close to heaven and that's why I feel this huge emptiness when you're far away he told me that if he has enough of the money then he'll have enough for him to come and see me and I love you and I'm gonna marry him it turns out this 63 year old grandmother has been getting scammed for years transferring large sums of her own money but with his promised visit never eventuated Mary is probably the most naive person I've ever met Mary now works as a nanny for Terra Sparrow I have tried to educate her about the online scammers but she's just desperate for love and companionship I think and that's why she didn't bat an eyelid when Samuel issued some strange instructions for Nino's money and where did you transfer that sorry I put them in bitcoins that's right this Melbourne grandma was turned into a money mule tricked into withdrawing cash and taking it to a Bitcoin ATM inside a Kensington bottle shop despite the scam warnings on the screen mary perched up next to the pinot noir and punched Nino's money into an online oblivion I put four thousand two thousand one thousand you can put as much as you like Nino's money is gone and Mary's deeply apologetic I'm so sorry Tom didn't know but even she is baffled as to how Nino got tangled up in this think he was doing with Olivia newton-john the Dame Olivia scammers did make one mistake though accidentally switching their fake facebook profile to their real picture a man called Fidelis Alexei a common Nigerian name with a dazzling pair of shoes meanwhile the real Olivia newton-john continues her brave fight with cancer for the third time oblivious to the entire drama I think this guy's really sorry for the people that prey on other people based on trust and their feelings to me that the worst scam in the world ah that's so sad and we can tell you more innocent money mules have been uncovered in this scam both Nino and Mary have now filed reports with Victorian and Queensland police who have begun an investigation as a result of our story we'll let you know what happens you

Channel: A Current Affair

Views: 247,645

Keywords: A Current Affair, Tracy Grimshaw, Tracey, Celebrity, Interviews, 9 News, ACA, Entertainment, A Current Affair Australia, True Crime, Politics, Scammers, Scammer Caught, 60 minutes, 60 minutes australia, 9news, nine news, nine news australia, a current affair olivia newtown john, olivia newton john, olivia newton john scam

Id: saiUaf8ULao

Length: 13min 0sec (780 seconds)

Published: Wed May 27 2020