A disability pensioner is facing homelessness after being scammed out of $40,000 over nearly two years.
Tracey Skeates, from Caboolture in Queensland, struck up a relationship with a person he believed was an American woman named ‘Charlotte’ in October 2023.
But the 63-year-old told The Courier Mail he has ended up selling his car and pawning his cherished guitars to keep up with her relentless requests for money.
Mr Skeates said he had sent $40,000, which he had received through an inheritance, to ‘Charlotte’ before realising his relationship was a scam.
He said when ‘Charlotte’ first contacted him, she said she was living in the United States and asked if he lived alone.
‘She had recently broken up with her boyfriend, she was looking for someone to talk to,’ Mr Skeates said.
The relationship progressed quickly and within just one week the trusting pensioner had sent $500 to Charlotte so she could fix her phone.
Within a month, Charlotte told Mr Skeates she wanted to move to Brisbane to live with him – and become his wife.
The pensioner ‘vividly’ remembers her wanting to spend Christmas in Australia, but Charlotte said she didn’t have enough money to relocate – so Mr Skeates started sending larger payments of $3,000 and $4,000.
The disability pensioner was being scammed by a person who had used photos of Colombian bikini model Yisela Avendano (pictured), who was not involved in the scam. The scammer said they wanted to marry the Aussie and move to Brisbane, prompting him to send tens of thousands of dollars
He said Charlotte tried to fly into Australia ‘five separate times’ to be with the disability pensioner, but there was always something that got in the way.
‘The first time she tried to fly over she said she got assaulted on the way to the airport and was in a coma,’ he said.
The excuses kept coming – another time she told Mr Skeates someone had ‘planted two grams of heroin’ in her luggage.
Charlotte also told Mr Skeates throughout their relationship that her phone camera was broken, so all their communication was carried out through Instagram and WhatsApp calls.
Every time something went wrong, Mr Skeates sent more money so he could get Charlotte to Brisbane.
‘I was sending her 80 per cent of my disability pension every two weeks. I was hardly eating, all in the name of love,’ he said.
Mr Skeates, who dreamt of travelling around Australia with the American, said because of his ‘stupidity’ he has gone from ‘having a dream’ and enjoying his last few years to ‘having no f***king hope’.
He warned others that Charlotte always insisted that any payment was sent through Apple gift cards or cryptocurrency Bitcoin – which made the payments almost impossible to chase.
Tracey Skeates, 63, from Caboolture, in Queensland , met ‘Charlotte’ through Instagram and has ended up selling his car and pawning his guitars to keep up with ‘her’ money requests since October 2023
The scammer, called ‘Charlotte’, said the camera on their phone was broken and they only messaged in Instagram and called on WhatsApp (pictured messages between Mr Skeates and his scammer pretending to be ‘Charlotte’)
The pensioner is embarrassed he was scammed out of such a large amount of money – and only realised ‘Charlotte’ was fake after he did a reverse image search on her social media profile photo.
His search revealed Charlotte’s profile had stolen images of Yisela Avendano, a Colombian bikini model who has nearly one million followers on Instagram.
Incredibly, despite discovering he had been scammed, the grandfather kept sending money.
‘I don’t know why. They get so in your head that you’re at boiling point all the time and you lose the ability to think straight,’ he said.
Apart from losing money, the scam also strained his relationship with his daughter Tamika who had told him immediately that Charlotte wasn’t real.
His daughter said she became ‘less tolerant’ once she discovered he was selling his car and said the whole ordeal has ‘damaged’ their relationship.
The Queensland grandfather said he is now ‘a few weeks away’ from living in a tent and he is being forced to give away his beloved pet parrot.
The pensioner wants people to ask for help ‘even if they’re ashamed’ and hopes because he is talking about what happened, it will help others.
Nationally, more than 27,000 people have been tricked in romance scams losing close to $20 million in 2024, according to ScamWatch.
In the Sunshine State, 656 have been caught in romance scams and have lost $3 million.
ScamWatch has warned Aussies that the festive season can see a spike in cases because scammers target vulnerable and lonely people.
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Read more at DailyMail.co.uk