Martha Cameron / Miranda Stinson / Christy Dunn from Match.com / eHarmony / POF / MatchAffinity.com is fake

I want to bring you attention to this person who poses as Martha Cameron, Miranda Stinson from Match.com and also Mira / Miranda / Mira Loughton from eHarmony.com as well as susan13830 on Skype, and claims to have lived in Teddington, London, Milton Keynes, Kingswinford and Loughton as well as other places. Claims that she is from the Bahamas and from Nassau and claims to be an artist who paints oil paintings but this person is FAKE. The first major point about this person which stands out is that she is not of Caribbean  ethnicity. The female in the photo looks more south american or Latina.

The person behind this is part of a criminal gang operating in a criminal gang near Pretoria (based on my findings but this could be incorrect – see the Skype section), South Africa to con you out of giving them money with the promise of romance. He/She has managed to get money from at least 3 people from the UK without giving back a penny.

One thing I want to tell you is that if this person contacts you, report this person to the police immediately. I have an action fraud case open with the police to stop this group. This person is still operating on sites based in the UK, and answering email telling lies about her situation. This person is believed to be a black Male in his 30’s of African decent and targeting people in the UK posing as Martha, Miranda, Mira with the surnames Cameron, Stinson (possible more) constantly changing location and trying to avoid being captured.

The person was on Match.com, then contacted me. I was tricked into giving this person money, and the match.com account was closed and the old skype account is closed. Now in March 2016, another account is back on Match.com and has been contacting other users to scam for money using the story below. However Match.com have now closed this account. There is a very high chance that other accounts are being set up on other dating web sites. He/She has now opened an account on eHarmony.com and claiming to be from Teddington, Milton Keynes, Kingswinford, London and Loughton.

The culprit is operating in a gang of at least 4 other people. 2 other men and 2 other women. There may be more people to this group and this may be a professional fraud group.

Media Representation

This has been featured in the UK within the BBC Crimewatch network. You can find the details here http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/profiles/1QGNv9mXH8mzVr14SFvPN88/christy-dunn

It has also been listed on other sites:

http://brobible.com/life/article/con-artist-fleecing-men-on-match/

http://www.bristolpost.co.uk/news/hunt-conwoman-who-used-internet-6768

https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/3025683/conwoman-match-eharmony-online-dating-fraud/

There has been no information linking the person with African scam networks which was the main IP range that was connecting to the Skype services when I was talking to her.

Also what is frustrating is the banks who held the accounts for fraud usage had all the information available to locate and catch the criminals but they took no action whatsoever.

Lets start at the beginning…

I was ready for a new relationship so I signed up to match.com to meet someone nice. This person had created a profile on match.com and told me that “she” lived in London, UK in the road Cairngorm Close, Teddington, Middlesex, TW11 8JJ.

Ok I thought, lets give this a go. We first started to email each other as she decalred “its easier than using match.com”. We swapped skype addresses and then started chatting because she claimed “its easier than using email”. She uses skipeids.net addresses when contacting people on Skype. During video chat, there were problems with the voice communication on her computer. However video was working fine so we exchanged communication via typing on the keyboard. She was talking to me from what appeared to be on a bed, fully clothed and everything seemed ok.

Her email was cameronmarth@yahoo.com but this account has been closed and now is using mirastint@gmail.com. But more than likely this will be closed and another one will be created.

Then she started to ask for money. Out of the goodness of my heart, I lent this person some money, then some more then some more. This kept happening and over time the amount of money soon started to add up.

The reasons for the money lending are listed now:

• for an art exhibition she wanted to take part in South Africa – her friend failed to give her money for this.
• for import duty at airport because of 40 paintings she took over – didnt inform SA customs she was taking things to sell to SA.
• for framing her paintings for a sale, 25 paintings to frame in all.
• for extras and spending money, food, hotel costs, shopping.
• for assumed last day in SA but it appears that police were involved because I had given her money to pay a sale tax charge and for flights, but the person who she gave the tax money to, run off with tax money apparently.
• So she had to get a lawyer involved and another ticket for the airport plus more money for the sales tax fine
• Then more money was needed for her Hotel and longer stay and she had to book another flight because she missed her first two and pay the lawyer. She finally got a flight to Nassau.
• Then finally last money was sent, she had to pay house tax which she forgot to pay, she was involved in a taxi accident on the 4th of December in Nassau (or claims to have been) and told me she was in St Marys hospital in Nassau, which does not exist.

Initially she coaxed me into sending me this money from the chat log here:

[27/10/2015 08:38:48] Martha Cameron: i received very disappointing news from my friend in Nassau
[27/10/2015 08:38:55] **********: oh dear ?
[27/10/2015 08:39:06] Martha Cameron: told you I’ve been trying to reach her right? well, she was supposed to help me with the registration fee of the exhibition
[27/10/2015 08:39:33] Martha Cameron: I’ve been working several weeks towards this and i was hoping she would lend me some money as i’m skint now
[27/10/2015 08:39:52] Martha Cameron: i saw her email this morning that she couldn’t raise the money.
[27/10/2015 08:40:01] **********: oh dear that’s terrible
[27/10/2015 08:40:07] Martha Cameron: i know she has her own responsibilities but i just wish she had told me earlier
[27/10/2015 08:40:22] Martha Cameron: it made me cry this morning, because I’ve been waiting a while for her on this
[27/10/2015 08:40:27] **********: how much is the fee ?
[27/10/2015 08:40:31] Martha Cameron: feels like my dream got crushed
[27/10/2015 08:40:40] Martha Cameron: its $1000 and the deadline is near
[27/10/2015 08:40:53] **********: what if I raised the cash for you ?
[27/10/2015 08:41:16] Martha Cameron: $1000 for regular and $1500 for VIP stands and accomodation
[27/10/2015 08:41:27] Martha Cameron: i would really appreciate it darling, it would mean a lot to me if you could do that
[27/10/2015 08:41:43] Martha Cameron: you have no idea how much it would mean to me
[27/10/2015 08:41:57] **********: I can appreciate how much it would as its the thing you do in your life
[27/10/2015 08:42:08] **********: so it will be helping you life to achieve new goals
[27/10/2015 08:42:19] Martha Cameron: yes, its a big step for my career
[27/10/2015 08:43:20] Martha Cameron: i don’t know if you can raise me the $1500 because i would have preferred the VIP stands as we are the first stop for clients. it’ll boost my chances of making sales and also better services
[27/10/2015 08:43:42] Martha Cameron: i think its £980
[27/10/2015 08:43:44] **********: so the 1500 gets you a better place and then sorts out accommodation too
[27/10/2015 08:43:50] Martha Cameron: yes darling

She claims her parents have died in a car crash and she has a house they have left. This is the conversation she passes over to you to get you to send the money:

The Taxi Incident/Accident and Phone Call

Lets take a look at the last time I sent money over. On that evening I had heard nothing at all for 2 days and then out of nowhere, I had a phone call on my work phone (she had never asked me for my phone number) from the “owner of the taxi company” claiming that his brother was the driver of the cab and the woman had suffered moderate injuries. This could be the man behind the whole scheme.

So firstly it seems like they had looked at me online and gathered my work details and contact. Secondly she had never even asked for my number so “they” must have looked up online for my company details.

The person on the phone did not have a Bahamas accent. The person had a distinct Mid to South African accent which finally made me click that this was fraud. Now I work with some people from Nigeria, and Pretoria and Cape Town. So I could more or less work out where this accent was from. The telephone number had been actively blocked so I could not see a DDI.

She wanted me to pay medical bills and when asked to produce the bills for me to see and pay me my money back too which she was supposed to be putting in the bank. Then the email account was deleted and all correspondence stopped. I then found out another email was set up in the same week linking her information to another google.com account.

This is an example of another person who had the same correspondence when challenging this person about the reality of her claims when sending her money:

Passport

Here are a few images I got from her.

Lets take a look at the passport photo above. You will notice a few things.

Obviously this is fake.

Firstly the photo does not fit with passport standards. It also looks like it has been cut out and stuck on because of the straight cuts which can be seen on the photo at the bottom and around the hair line.

Secondly the date of birth and sex, does not match up with the information at the bottom of the passport. DOB = 16, Dec 1979 however the code at the bottom says BHS651216 Meaning that the passport date is for someone born in 1965.

Thirdly you will notice that the number 7 on the bottom line, is in a different font than the number 7 for the date. Also the photo on the right in the watermark does not match with the photo on the left. Notice the neck line to the left, also the eyebrows and smile is different.

Finally, the watermark does not go through the pictures and the fonts are different everywhere and you can tell this has been modified. Anyone can tell this is a fake passport.

Pictures she has “painted”

Here are some pictures that she has painted apparently. But these pictures can be found on the internet linked to other sites with no association of Miranda or Martha. So she has not painted these and lies about this.

She claims to have sold some of these to a company in South Africa called Safika for just over $40,000 whereby she was going to head back to Nassau and give me the money back via bank transfer. However Safkia do not know about this at all following my emails to them, and being that she knows about this company then it is presumed she is from SA because they have their main office in Pretoria.

Here a fake cheque from Safkia which she apparently received.

Now I know I am no handwriting expert but how many people leave gaps when writing their name ? It almost looks like they have had to stop and think about writing the name on there. Secondly quality of the image is poor compared to the rest of the cheque. It looks like it has been blown up. The font type is different for the location compared to the order and the remitter.

The House

Here is another image she sent to another man claiming she painted these.

So you are going to think “amazing” she can paint and she can decorate her own house. Isn’t that great?

Unfortunately:

These pictures can be obtained just by searching “Arthur’s place bahamas”. This information was obtained by someone who  had been scammed by this person. It is believed that there is a possibility that Arthur may be working with this people too, or the person has used Arthur’s place to pass off as their own.

This is apparently her house which her parents have handed down to her after they died which is located near Coral Harbour Beach, New Providence.

I have been to New Providence and managed to ask numerous people if they recognise this house, it has also been reported to the police. There are no houses which fit this description or are built like this anywhere near Nassau. In face I went through hours of searching the entire south cost of the island for anything which would look remotely like the plan shown here and nothing fits at all.

She claims still to have decorated the house which is Arthur’s place, but if we look at the house design of Arthur’s place then we see that it is totally different to the house above.

Do you see a slight difference with the house?

It seems that fake accounts try and ploy you into believing that their parents have died and left them a house. They have a connection with Africa in some way, they do not have any work or are not working at the moment or employed, they need money for flights, medical bills, tax etc and try to get the money out of you to fund their criminal lifestyle.

Lets move onto Skype

Skype Details

Her last known IP address on skype

So this seems to be originating from South Africa as the IP sometimes switches to

41.146.50.73

The username on skype was cameronmarth and now it is the following:

Now if we look at the old profile which she has deleted:

You can see that the person is using the same image in there. This image is taken from a travel site which is linked to Malta and nothing to do with the Bahamas or SA. The reason why is that they do a lot of Scuba diving in Nassau, and the person wanted a profile picture which hides the face.

Video

Lets go back to the video picture(s)

 

Now the videos lasted all of  about 2 minutes. Not very long and not one went over this 2 minute mark. Now there was no sound. She claims to have a Toshiba laptop which is 7 years old. Now if you have a look at the entire line of toshiba laptops 7 years before the end of 2015 – every single one came with a webcam. But she claims she had to use an external USB webcam.

So thats a little weird. Most USB webcams come with microphones built in but not all.

Despite this information it is quite possible that this is a recorded video and a fake skype cam driver playing back pre-recorded video. There are a lot of fake skype products which allows you to plug into skype and playback anything really. This is more likely the method which they have used.

Her Story

This is the list of lies she will tell you:

Her parents have died in a car crash and she is an only child. This is a lie. She is trying to get you to have sympathy for her.

She works as an artist. This is a lie, she does not do this. The person on the account searches for pictures online of painted pictures and then sends you these.

She has a house in Nassau, Bahamas but she is lying about this. I know multiple people in Nassau and I have been there myself. This house does not exist in Nassau over there at all and is actually another stock photograph of a house in another Island of the Bahamas not too far from Freeport, Bahamas.

She will talk to you and claim to have dropped her mobile phone in her paint pot so she cannot communicate to you on the phone. This is a lie, the person behind this does not want you to contact him/her because you will find out they are fake

She will claim she is going to an Art Exhibition in SA. Actually she is already in SA, on the East side and has at least 4 other people working together with her to steal your cash.

She will tell you her ex ran off with her best friend to get you to give her sympathy.

Her best friend has failed to give her the money. Well it turns out she hasn’t really got any “friends”

She wants you to use MoneyGram to transfer a lot of money all the time – but she will never give you her correct ID because she is a fraudster. She will give you accounts and details of other people.

Associates

There are other people she is working alongside or other people who are getting her to carry out these deeds or a group of people have obtained pictures and videos of her and using this to scam you out of cash and might have compromised the following accounts.

Mr. I. Green
sort code : 20-25-19
acc nu: 40268712

This bank account was used to transfer money to in the UK. The person then drew the money out and transferred it to an account in South Africa. Name is not confirmed however the account is now closed by Barclays.

Alice Masikito
Address: No 12 Bloomingdale road
Cape Town
South Africa

This person, who probably does not exist at the address above, or the address does not exist is someone who picked up moneygram transfers that I sent to South Africa which I still have the receipts for. More than likely has fake ID.

Mr M Love
Sort Code: 20-25-19
Account Number: 30731453

This person also holds as UK bank account and the person is using the account as fraud. Again this is being used as a proxy account. The name again is probably false. The account is now closed – All dealing with these fake accounts were set up at Barclays Bank, Romford, UK with Fake ID.

Mr A. L. Quintas

Acc No :- 36599260

Sort code:- 77-91-29

Lloyds bank

it is not confirmed who this person is, however conversations on skype were leading to this person being the husband of her friend. Money was transferred into this account also but the account is still open, Lloyds will not action any closure of the accounts unless adviced by UK police thus they are allowed the person still to operate a scam.

First Name: Thandekile 

Middle Name:   Nicole 

Last Name:     Mkhabela

Address: No 7 Republic road

City:         Cape Town

 

Country:     South Africa

This was someone who received payments via Moneygram, however the address probably does not exist. This was her “associate” who was dealing with the “art exhibition” which was all a lie. Again, these people are all fraudsters and are breaking the law.

 This picture shows a transfer into Lloyds again but the bank refuses to acknowledge to victims whether any action has been taken against the person and Lloyds are lacking any proactive actions to stop this.

It could be that all of these addresses and people are fake. However MoneyGram did allow people to pick up money with the names of these people. This has been reported to MoneyGram now and people with these names have been reported.

In Conclusion

I nearly lost a business after this group of people taking me for a ride. Do not send these people money. My advice after going through this is meet the person first, get ID off them.

He will try to get your sympathy by posing as a woman or getting another woman to talk to you and trying to con you into sending money.

If anyone has any information about this woman, or the person in the photos then please contact me. I have lost all of my money because of this scam, and this has been reported to the Bahamas authorities, UK Authorities, SA fraud, SA Police and Border Control. I still not have received a penny of my savings from this person.

DO NOT SEND ANY MONEY TO THIS PERSON

What you should do

1. Comment on this and contact me. Any queries you may have then please let me know.
2. Report this to the local police
3. Report this to Action Fraud (which is part of the police but in my experience it has taken 3 months and I still have had no contact from them)
4. Contact you bank and ask for them to report the fraud account to the police
5. Report fraud to your bank (they will most likely issue you a new card and close the destination bank and block your old card)
6. Be vigilant. Do not send money to anyone you do not know or you have not met in person
7. Be aware there are a lot of scams everywhere. Trust nobody. People online are generally liars and scammers. If you take any dating website their slogan is to “sign up for FREE” but they do not tell you about the astronomical charges they have for communicating
8. Stay away from dating sites. They are full of scammers. They have no interest in protecting the customer. They allow anyone to sign up with fake pictures and a fake profile trying to pass it off as someone else.

Note: It is highly unlikely that you will obtain any of the money back which you lost. Banks will only take action if informed by the police, however Action Fraud are getting in excess of 300 requests per month with only a small amount of people available to deal with this. If you are in doubt, do not send money.

What can be done by 3rd parties and Dating Sites?

There is little legislation available to police dating sites. Although companies do their best to remove fake profiles but there are still opportunist people who will create a fake account and try to scam you. Here is a list of ideas which I think may reduce these kind of incidents.

1. When signing up for a dating site, the company should establish user identity information by using 2 factor authentication and using a mobile phone number or home phone. If they are from the UK  and using a +44 dial plan then they should only be available to be located in the UK. If they are using a foreign number for example +49 for Germany then they need to obtain a UK number before they sign up.
2. Information sharing should be passed from the company to the police. Numerous times I attempted to get the banks and the sites to provide the information to the police. It seems that there is very little effort from a company point of view to provide any information to the police without the police first requesting the data. 2 examples here: a) I had the bank account information of people who received cash from Barclays bank. Nothing was done with that customer data (to my knowledge) and b) Google Mail have a list of client IP addresses which connect to the mail servers however it is virtually impossible to contact google and ask to obtain the IP address of the host which is connecting to services to send mail. Companies do not seem to be at all proactive and without this effort, more and more people are going to be scammed.
3. Skype should display whether a valid camera video stream is being used or the user is streaming a pre-recorded video using an emulated USB cam driver or block the recorded video unless you pay to use this service.
4. Dating sites should work with email companies to validate the person who has signed up and include a clause such as “If your email account is less than a year old then this will be displayed on your profile”.
5. It should be easier to ask a company to receive information from a suspected scammer from a request of a victim and ask them to pass this over to the police.
6. Moneygram should communicate with both parties before money is picked up if the family name is different. They should also verify the person who the money is intended and have that person to attend and pick up the money.

I know that none of these are overnight and easily solutions and businesses will take the view of “why should I do that?” or “effort vs reward” approach. Indeed they may even loose money if people cant sign up to dating sites because they are operating a scam but at a least it will reduce the amount of manipulation on the internet.