So I posted here about a week ago but there have been some developments
I’ve been sitting on the realization that my co-worker is involved in a scam for about a week. I decided to take a small step and tell one of the other girls I eat lunch with – Let’s call her “Elle” (there are four of us who eat lunch together: me, the girl being scammed “Kate”, “Elle”, and “Paige”). So I message Elle and ask her if we could meet during one of our breaks. We sit down in a break room and I slide her my original Reddit post on my phone. She reads it and I see the glimmer of realization set in and she says “I think you’re right!” She then lays out some additional info she gleaned from our “Kate” about the boy:
• They had a phone call once, and she noted that his accent didn’t sound European. But, she excused it as “the connection isn’t good” (not how phones work in 2025, but Ok I guess…)
• She suspects he might have her SSN, based on the tax info she has sent him
• He was supposed to come home in March, but the day before his return his aunt “tragically died” in a car accident (rumor has it that his new return date is May 10th so stay tuned)
• The rent he is paying for the diamond (STILL NOT A THING) has increased so he will need to put down a big payment on it (which to me is an indicator that he is about to ask her for money)
Anyway, we yapped a little more and she thinks that we need to tell Kate, she just doesn’t know how. We did agree that we should tell Paige (since she chats with the girl being scammed more than either of us). So I did what any self-respecting Redditor would do. I texted Paige the OG Reddit post and asked her to call me when she was done. Needless to say, she called me and told me that she felt that the stories of our Kate’s boyfriend were strange, but seeing them all written down made it seem entirely suspicious. We now have a group chat and we’re trying to figure out the best way to tell her on Monday (because preventing this before any money is stolen is a big priority). Stay Tuned!!!
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Backup of the post’s body: So I posted here about a week ago but there have been some developments
I’ve been sitting on the realization that my co-worker is involved in a scam for about a week. I decided to take a small step and tell one of the other girls I eat lunch with – Let’s call her “Elle” (there are four of us who eat lunch together: me, the girl being scammed “Kate”, “Elle”, and “Paige”). So I message Elle and ask her if we could meet during one of our breaks. We sit down in a break room and I slide her my original Reddit post on my phone. She reads it and I see the glimmer of realization set in and she says “I think you’re right!” She then lays out some additional info she gleaned from our “Kate” about the boy:
• They had a phone call once, and she noted that his accent didn’t sound European. But, she excused it as “the connection isn’t good” (not how phones work in 2025, but Ok I guess…)
• She suspects he might have her SSN, based on the tax info she has sent him
• He was supposed to come home in March, but the day before his return his aunt “tragically died” in a car accident (rumor has it that his new return date is May 10th so stay tuned)
• The rent he is paying for the diamond (STILL NOT A THING) has increased so he will need to put down a big payment on it (which to me is an indicator that he is about to ask her for money)
Anyway, we yapped a little more and she thinks that we need to tell Kate, she just doesn’t know how. We did agree that we should tell Paige (since she chats with the girl being scammed more than either of us). So I did what any self-respecting Redditor would do. I texted Paige the OG Reddit post and asked her to call me when she was done. Needless to say, she called me and told me that she felt that the stories of our Kate’s boyfriend were strange, but seeing them all written down made it seem entirely suspicious. We now have a group chat and we’re trying to figure out the best way to tell her on Monday (because preventing this before any money is stolen is a big priority). Stay Tuned!!!
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This is crazy. How is she not suspicious?? Updateme!
Updateme
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Oh, this poor girl. She’s lucky that you and your coworkers/friends have put your heads together and are trying to help her – she’s obviously not thinking clearly and she could wind up in such deep financial shit. A friend’s mom lost almost half a million dollars (USD!) in a romance scam (which is more understandable for her, in her 70s or 80s, than it is for a young woman, but I digress).
Updateme
She sent her tax information and he has her SSN? Good lord! Please talk to her and have her freeze her credit!!
Be prepared for this to go bad. As well as being hurt she’ll feel embarrassed. In her head she’s gushing about her amazing bf and how they’ll get married. She’ll feel humiliated and could go defensive and angry
I have a friend from high school that has been married and divorced twice now. The second ended about 3 years ago and the final straw happened when they came back to the state I live in to visit family and she ended up staying.
After this I learned she was talking to some guy she met online and had been sending money here and there. Right off this felt odd to me. Then I learned the guy was “in the military” and “didn’t have access to his money” which really sounded wrong. I’m an army brat, literally born on an army base and most of my family has been in the military. I started telling her gently that this all sounded wrong and no matter where he might be deployed they will make sure he has access to everything he needs, including his money.
This guy kept asking her for money and even a new phone, which I thought I had convinced her to stop but she bought and sent one. Then it got returned because of a problem with the address, told her she should just return it but she didn’t. She showed me a couple of pictures, like you mentioned the pictures didn’t quite look real and took me a bit to pick out the problem. With those he said he was Army but in one picture he was wearing a T-shirt with the Air Force logo and another was Navy. Now if you know anything about the armed forces, I’ve got family in almost every branch, you’ll know they ALL give each other hell and it’s all but blasphemous to wear the wrong gear. So big red flags to me.
Nothing I said was really convincing her of anything, she would act like I was getting through but then keep talking to him. It wasn’t until he sent a form to make the relationship “official”. So he sent her a “Relationship Application” form, which is total BS. Asked for all kinds of dumb information and a “Cheque for $900” made out to the Department of Defense. Now my daughter married her husband who was in the Army Reserve at the time of their wedding and while I knew this form was BS I got my daughter on the phone, searched the military romance scams online and presented all of this to her which again seemed like she understood but still kept talking to this guy.
I was at my wits end and was going to take her to the local Army recruitment office and have them talk to her but she backed out of that. I gave all kinds of proof of the scam and honestly I’m not sure she ever stopped talking to him and sending money/stuff but it’s probably been nearly two years since we have talked much and it got to the point that she had to choose for herself to sink or swim, I did all I could.
Hopefully having other people that are seeing the same pattern can help you convince your coworker that she is being used.
Good Luck!
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