.
Super drama! This super scandal will forever be included in all textbooks, and must definitely be filmed!
In 2005, a former athlete, candidate of chemical sciences Grigory Rodchenkov became the director of the state enterprise Anti-Doping Center, the main laboratory for detecting doping in the Russian Federation. In this position, Rodchenkov gained worldwide fame as the author of analyzes to detect many types of doping. But Rodchenkov lived a double life. An anti-doping specialist, he invented a new super-effective doping consisting of three anabolic drugs. And he arranged secret supplies to Russian athletes. In 2011, Russian intelligence services opened a case against Rodchenkov for selling this unique doping “cocktail.” Rodchenkov expected to go to prison. But instead, to his enormous surprise, he was acquitted.
Grigory Rodchenkov, the largest forger in the history of world sports
In 2013, the Russian court of first instance sentenced Rodchenkov’s sister, Marina Rodchenkova, to one and a half years in prison under Art. 234 part 3 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation “illegal trafficking of potent or toxic substances for sales purposes.” After a cassation appeal, the term was replaced with a suspended sentence.
And soon the Russian state itself set him an unprecedented task - to provide all Russian sports with the latest doping - all athletes who wanted to improve their results through the use of Rodchenkov’s anabolic “cocktails”!
Massive falsification of doping samples of Russian athletes began even before the 2012 Summer Olympics.
But the real triumph of Russian doping was the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, which was supposed to be one of the main achievements of President Vladimir Putin, a demonstration of the power and glory of Russia. Gigantomania was amazing - the construction of new infrastructure in Sochi from scratch, roads, stadiums, cost, according to the financial agency Bloomberg, $48 billion. It is likely that this is the most expensive Olympics in the history of world sports. Of course, at this Olympics Russia had to win - first place in the medal standings. And this had to be done at any cost. This task was obviously set by Putin himself. And who else but he could give the order to the Minister of Sports Mutko and involve the Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation in the operation?
At any cost. The Ministry of Sports and the FSB have developed not a new training system, but a new strategy for total falsification of doping tests through mass urine substitution.
The intelligence service received the task of opening the security system for jars containing athletes’ tests.
And so, fulfilling the will of the Russian sovereign, FSB scientists came up with a unique technical solution on how to open and close jars with doping samples, which were of a special design, protected from damage. The jars are numbered - according to all experts, it was impossible to counterfeit or open them unnoticed without damage. But the FSB found a way.
Then, clean urine samples were taken from all athletes participating in the program, before they received doping, and they were sent to a special FSB storage facility.
Next, it was necessary to solve the problem of access to the premises. The anti-doping laboratory in Sochi worked with more than 100 experts from different countries. The control is strict, every centimeter is monitored and guarded day and night. However, during the construction of the building, which had the highest level of security and was inspected by experts from the Olympic Committee, the FSB provided a constructive solution to ensure secret access to the building from everyone. In one of the rooms there was this small hole in the wall, covered with a cover in the form of a communications system.
The same hole in the Sochi anti-doping laboratory through which Rodchenkov and FSB officer Blokhin passed stolen jars of urine to each other and changed tests. This is where Russia actually won many of its medals.
This hole was covered by a cabinet. In order to falsify tests in the laboratory itself, Russian intelligence services equipped a small laboratory in an auxiliary room. Every night, Rodchenkov and the entire team of Russian experts in Sochi committed a crime - they took jars of urine out of the laboratory, handed them to the FSB officer in the hole, then he returned them the jars with clean urine. And Russian anti-doping experts falsified tests - they studied the results of real samples and added salt or water to the urine so that the characteristics of the tests were declared to be the results recorded in the original protocol! “Work” went on until the morning!
FSB officer Evgeny Blokhin was an important part of the operation. He was introduced under the guise of a plumber into the Anti-Doping Laboratory for one purpose - to replace doping samples. It was he who stole jars of urine from the laboratory every night through a hole in the wall - with the knowledge of all senior employees of the Russian agency. An investigation by the World Anti-Doping Agency revealed that Blokhin opened jars of urine and added clean urine not even from the same athlete, but the urine of some other people, which does not at all match the DNA of the athletes’ samples! It is possible that the FSB officers substituted their own urine for many of the tests.
Rodchenkov and his team hardly slept.
“Everyone congratulates the Olympic champions, and we sit and replace their urine,” Rodchenkov recalled. “Can you imagine how Olympic sports work?”
And if at the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver Russia took 6th team place, then four years later in Sochi, thanks to doping, the Russian team found itself in first place in the team competition. A third of all medals were won by athletes who regularly took doping. Rodchenkov, as the main creator of the resounding “victory of Russian sports,” was awarded personal gratitude from President Putin and the Order of Friendship of Peoples. This clearly indicates Putin’s personal decision to carry out large-scale falsification.
The report of the McLaren investigative commission presented a histogram of “lost” samples - this is how the commission called tests whose containers showed signs of tampering. A total of 643 such samples were identified, and in particular:
athletics - 139 trials, weightlifting - 117, non-Olympic sports - 37, Paralympic disciplines - 35, wrestling - 28, kayaking and canoeing - 27, cycling - 26, speed skating - 24, swimming - 18, hockey - 14 , cross-country skiing - 13, football and rowing - 11 each, biathlon - 10, bobsleigh, judo, volleyball - 8 each, boxing and handball - 7 each, taekwondo - 6, fencing and triathlon - 4 each, modern pentathlon and shooting - 3 each, beach volleyball and curling - 2 each, basketball, sailing, snowboarding, table tennis, water polo - 1 each.
Both A samples (for immediate testing) and B samples (which are stored for up to 10 years) were destroyed.
In 2014, the World Anti-Doping Agency finally discovered the fraud of Russian laboratories and ordered a surprise inspection of the sample storage of the Russian laboratory. And then, on December 17, 2014, immediately before the arrival of the WADA inspection commission, on the personal instructions of Rodchenkov, 1,417 doping samples were destroyed in the laboratory storage room. A huge scandal broke out. In 2015, Rodchenkov was dismissed. But then an employee of the Russian Anti-Doping Agency, Vitaly Stepanov, and his wife, athlete Yulia Stepanova, made a sensational statement for the German TV channel ARD about how the leadership of Russian sports forced Yulia to use doping to improve her athletic performance. The accusations hit Rodchenkov.
The Stepanovs, fearing for their lives, received asylum in the West and became the first important witnesses to the doping scam.
This detective story was not without death and tragedy.
As soon as the scandal received worldwide resonance, Russia began to play out the well-known scenario of denying everything: “where is the evidence,” “there was nothing,” “get it all out,” “we have the strictest control,” “Rodchenkov has already been punished and a new specialist has been appointed.” After new accusations against Rodchenkov in the Western media, the falsifier realized that the easiest way for the FSB to hide all traces of the scandal was to get rid of him himself, like an unnecessary jar of urine. Blame the whole scandal on one suspect, and then “leak it” - like he himself leaked the doping samples of Olympic athletes.
And so on January 27, 2016, Grigory Rodchenkov flies to the United States and declares his desire to obtain political asylum.
This led to immediate and terrible tragedies in Russia.
On February 3, 2016, Vyacheslav Sinev, the former head of RUSADA, the anti-doping agency of the Russian Federation, suddenly died. A sudden heart attack - according to the official conclusion, struck a healthy person who had not previously had heart problems. Sinev was the founder in 2008 of the Russian Anti-Doping Agency and was the chairman of the executive board, and undoubtedly knew everything about the doping program in the Russian Federation.
And on February 14, Nikita Kamaev, executive director of the Russian Anti-Doping Agency, also suddenly died of a heart attack.
“Unfortunately, Nikita passed away. What happened looked like a massive heart attack. I found out that he went skiing, came home and felt pain in the heart area. They called an ambulance, but they were unable to bring him back to life. I have never heard, so that he complains about his heart,” said former director of RUSADA Ramil Khabriev.
After receiving this shocking information, Grigory Rodchenkov told investigators in the USA and the McLaren Commission of the World Anti-Doping Agency everything he knew.
Here is the report of the McLaren Commission on the WADA website.
"The McLaren Report has, without a doubt, confirmed the incredible corruption in Russian sport at the state level. Our hearts now go out to those athletes around the world who have had their Olympic dreams stolen. We must unite as one international community that still believes in the Olympic spirit to make sure that such crimes will never be committed in sports again," said US Anti-Doping Commissioner (USADA) Travis Tigert.
Corruption from Russia turned out to be connected with international Olympic structures: to prevent sports officials from conducting investigations, the Russian leadership corrupted officials. The second part of the WADA report states that before the World Athletics Championships, which took place in Moscow in August 2013, nine Russian athletes were suspected of doping.
When International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) lawyer Javier Roberts reported the case to IAAF chief Lamine Diack, he said he found himself “in a difficult situation that can only be resolved by Russian President Vladimir Putin, with whom he has a friendship.”
As a result, none of the nine suspected athletes participated in the World Championships, but the IAAF leadership did not investigate this case in any way.
The World Anti-Doping Agency, given the unprecedented scale of fraud, has decided to suspend ALL Russian athletes from ALL international competitions. This decision must be approved by the International Olympic Committee.
Putin, the head of the urine falsification operation, commented on the WADA investigation in his usual style of “it’s all over,” “everything else,” “enemies all around”:
“Recent events, the difficult atmosphere developing around international sport and the Olympic movement, involuntarily evoke an analogy with the early 80s of the last century. Then many Western countries, citing the introduction of Soviet troops into Afghanistan, boycotted the Moscow Olympics. And four years later, the Soviet The union responded by boycotting the Los Angeles Games in retaliation.
We are now witnessing a dangerous relapse into political interference in sport. Yes, the forms of such interference have changed, but the essence is the same: to make sport a tool of geopolitical pressure, the formation of a negative image of countries and peoples."
He sees the interference of politics in sports not in his orders and crimes, but in the fact that WADA completely exposed him!
There was not a word about sudden mysterious deaths in the Russian Anti-Doping Agency.
August 5th is the start of the Olympics. In the coming days, the IOC will consider an unprecedented punishment for Russia: the suspension of all Russian athletes from participation in the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro.
This detective story has not yet been completed.
Yuri Butusov
“The development work of Passport has been completed. The system is currently undergoing trial operation, and in September (2016) we will be ready to launch it in full. The transition to electronic cards will allow the military to completely take control of access to protected objects and information resources, record and confirm rights to receive social, financial and other services, as well as control their actual provision to military personnel,” Bocharov explained.
However, independent experts have a completely different view of the problem of the country’s defense capability in connection with the introduction of these cards. Here is what Doctor of Military Sciences Konstantin Sivkov says about the vulnerabilities of the new system:
“The electronic card contains a microchip - a passive element. Information is collected from it through irradiation with an external device with the appropriate wavelength. Creating a device that provides remote data acquisition from almost any distance is not a problem. About ten years ago, British techies made a similar device that fit in a small suitcase, stood in front of the British Foreign Ministry and easily removed all the information from the chips of officials’ electronic passports,” Sivkov noted.
In our country, according to digital lobbyists, everything is protected extremely reliably, and therefore we need to take new cards without hesitation. Already in 2014, 250 thousand conscripts received a multifunctional electronic conscript card, having previously given consent to the collection and processing of their personal data. It was almost impossible to refuse. Although, according to the law, recruits to the RF Armed Forces, of course, are not required to give any consent to the collection and processing of personal data, no one has the right to force them.
In response to the deputies' alarmed requests, Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu received nothing but replies. But an encouraging answer came from the main military prosecutor's office: persons who do not agree to give their personal data will be sent by military registration and enlistment offices to perform military service in the federal executive authorities, where provision of electronic documents is not required. But, despite this, in practice, only children whose parents come with them can refuse the card at recruiting stations, and even then with great difficulty. Neither the conscripts nor their parents are simply notified in advance about this innovation, and then “in the dark” they are asked: “Why didn’t you refuse earlier, because there was enough time?”
If there really are no security problems, why did Israel, several years ago, issue orders strictly prohibiting state security officials from participating in the voluntary national program for issuing biometric passports and international passports? They concern two main departments - the Mossad intelligence service and the Shabak internal security service. In addition, the ban on the creation of biometric documents applies to all military personnel with access to state secrets. It turns out that in Russia, where there are no such restrictions, any data about the military, even the deployment of military units, may turn out to be the property of a potential enemy. Are Israeli specialists really that much more far-sighted and professional than Russian ones?
If the enemy sees the deployment of troops in full view, he wins the battle for the first, key pre-emptive strike, and after it, the entire war. These are the realities of modern battles. To be even more specific, before winning on land, in the air and on water, you must first win the battle in the information sphere. There are plenty of examples of this: Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Libya, etc. In addition, knowing the peculiarities of the social organization of our army (and the list of personal data on the conscript card also includes information about mental health), foreign forces receive powerful levers for forming agents of influence, their own network in our armed forces. It is also possible to competently manage the protest moods of citizens, that is, use the so-called. "soft power". Various personal electronic cards and databases for the entire population are the ideal application point for this very soft power. The security of our army and state is under great threat.
Why were conscripts the first in Russia to be “honored” of mandatory receipt of personal electronic cards with a chip? The answer lies on the surface - the trial is being carried out on the most disenfranchised, because the Russian servants of the “new world order” are experiencing significant difficulties in imposing various electronic documents on the country’s citizens. Therefore, they changed their tactics, relying on the least socially protected conscripts, so that after them they would certainly “make happy” all Russians with biometric ID cards.
It turns out to be a very tasty slap in the soul of young patriots. Our young soldiers - precisely those who strive to join the army in order to fulfill their duty to their people and the Fatherland - instead of protecting their fundamental rights and freedoms, they receive in return from soulless officials in the person of the “fifth column” entrenched in the Central Bank, Sberbank, etc. structures, an electronic document with a chip, which grossly violates their constitutional rights and makes them, under martial law, defenseless against a potential enemy and his agents.
“The electronic military card is a voluntary surrender of all our military interests to foreign spies. Each soldier required to carry this card with him effectively turns into a living target who can be tracked 24 hours a day. It is very strange that after large-scale revelations from Edward Snowden, after the leak of personal data of all Berkut fighters and internal troops into the hands of the Ukronazis who won the Euromaidan, our defense department does not see any threat in this “innovation”,” Konstantin Sivkov is surprised .
RIA Katyusha
That's how it is, ma'am
The most talented scammers who ever lived. They endlessly invented scams, had many pseudonyms, were fluent in languages, and even managed to sell the Eiffel Tower!
Victor Lustig (1890-1947) - the man who sold the Eiffel Tower
Lustig is considered one of the most talented swindlers who ever lived. He endlessly invented scams, had 45 pseudonyms and was fluent in five languages. In the USA alone, Lustig was arrested 50 times, but due to lack of evidence, he was released each time. Before the outbreak of World War I, Lustig specialized in organizing fraudulent lotteries on transatlantic cruises. In the 1920s he moved to the United States, and in just a couple of years he defrauded banks and individuals out of tens of thousands of dollars.
Lustig's biggest scam was the sale of the Eiffel Tower. In May 1925, Lustig arrived in Paris in search of adventure. Lustig read in one of the French newspapers that the famous tower had become quite dilapidated and was in need of repair. Lustig decided to take advantage of this. The fraudster drew up a fake credential in which he identified himself as the deputy head of the Ministry of Posts and Telegraphs, after which he sent official letters to six secondary metal dealers.
Lustig invited the businessmen to the expensive hotel where he was staying and said that since the costs of the tower were unreasonably huge, the government decided to demolish it and sell it for scrap at a closed auction. Allegedly, in order not to cause outrage among the public, who had already fallen in love with the tower, Lustig persuaded the businessmen to keep everything secret. After some time, he sold the right to dispose of the tower to Andre Poisson and fled to Vienna with a suitcase of cash.
Poisson, not wanting to look like a fool, hid the fact of deception. Thanks to this, after some time, Lustig returned to Paris and sold the tower again according to the same scheme. However, this time he was unlucky, as the deceived businessman reported to the police. Lustig was forced to urgently flee to the United States.
In December 1935, Lustig was arrested and put on trial. He received 15 years in prison for counterfeiting dollars, plus another 5 years for escaping from another prison a month before sentencing. He died of pneumonia in 1947 at the famous Alcatraz prison near San Francisco.
Ferdinand Demara - posed as a surgeon and cured 15 out of 16 people
The man in this photograph is named Ferdinand Waldo Demara, but is also known as "The Great Pretender". Why was he called that?
Posed as a Benedictine monk, a prison director, a ship's doctor, a child care expert, a civil engineer, a deputy sheriff, a certified psychologist, a lawyer, an orderly, a teacher, an editor, and a scientist seeking a cure for cancer. But I never tried to make money from it. All he needed was the respect of others. He had a photographic memory and a high IQ.
At the age of 16 he ran away from home and spent several years with Cistercian monks, and in 1941 he enlisted in the army. Then to the navy. He tried to impersonate an officer, and when this failed, he faked suicide and turned into Robert Linton French, a psychologist with a religious bent. He taught psychology at colleges in Pennsylvania and Washington.
Then FBI agents found him and Demara received 18 months in prison for desertion. After his release, he bought fake documents and studied law at Northeastern University before becoming a monk again. Founded a college that still exists today. In church, he met a young doctor, Joseph Sira, took his name and began posing as a surgeon. During the Korean War, he was promoted to lieutenant, a position as a ship's surgeon on the Canadian destroyer Cayuga, and was sent to Korea. There he treated patients wonderfully with penicillin.
One day, 16 seriously wounded soldiers who needed surgery were brought to a destroyer. Demara was the only surgeon on the ship. He ordered the staff to prepare the wounded and take them to the operating room, while he sat down in his cabin with a textbook on surgery. Demara independently performed all the operations (including several difficult ones). And not a single soldier died. Newspapers wrote enthusiastically about him. By chance, the mother of the real Joseph Sira read them and the deception was discovered. The captain for a long time refused to believe that his surgeon had nothing to do with medicine. The Canadian Navy decided not to press charges against Demara, and he returned to the United States.
Then he also worked as a deputy warden of a prison in Texas (he was hired thanks to his psychology degree). There Demara started a serious program of psychological reforging of criminals - and succeeded in this. He worked as a counselor at Los Angeles' largest homeless shelter, earned a college degree in Oregon, and was a hospital parish priest.
In 1982 he died of heart failure. Several books have been written about him and a film and TV series have been made about him.
Frank Abagnale - "Catch Me If You Can"
Frank William Abagnale Jr. (born April 27, 1948) at the age of 17 managed to become one of the most successful bank robbers in US history. This story took place in the 1960s. Using counterfeit bank checks, Abagnale stole approximately $5 million from banks. He also made countless flights around the world using false documents.
Frank later successfully played the role of a pediatrician for 11 months at a hospital in Georgia, after which he falsified a Harvard University diploma and got a job in the office of the Louisiana Attorney General.
For more than 5 years, Abagnale changed about 8 professions, he also continued to enthusiastically forge checks and receive money - banks in 26 countries of the world suffered from the fraudster’s actions. The young man spent the money on dinners in expensive restaurants, buying clothes from prestigious brands and going on dates with girls. The story of Frank Abagnale was the basis for the film Catch Me If You Can, where Leonardo DiCaprio played the witty swindler.
Christopher Rockancourt - fake Rockefeller
David Hampton (1964-2003)
African-American scammer. He pretended to be the son of black actor and director Sidney Poitier. At first, Hampton posed as David Poitier in order to get free meals at restaurants. Later, realizing that he was trusted and could influence people, Hampton convinced many celebrities to give him money or shelter, including Melanie Griffith and Calvin Klein.
Hampton told some people that he was a friend of their children, lied to others that he was late for a plane in Los Angeles and that his luggage took off without him, and lied to others that he had been robbed.
In 1983, Hampton was arrested and charged with fraud. The court ordered him to pay compensation to the victims in the amount of $4,490. David Hampton died of AIDS in 2003.
Milli Vanilli - a duet that couldn't sing
In the 90s, a scandal erupted involving the popular German duet Milli Vanilli - it turned out that the voices of other people, not the members of the duet, were heard on the studio recordings. As a result, the duo was forced to return the Grammy award they received in 1990.
The Milli Vanilli duo was created in the 1980s. The popularity of Rob Pilatus and Fabrice Morvan began to grow rapidly, and already in 1990 they won the prestigious Grammy award.
The exposure scandal led to tragedy - in 1998, one of the duo members, Rob Pilatus, died of an overdose of drugs and alcohol at the age of 32. Morvan tried unsuccessfully to pursue a musical career. In total, Milli Vanilli sold 8 million singles and 14 million records during its popularity.
Cassie Chadwick - illegitimate daughter of Andrew Carnegie
Cassie Chadwick (1857-1907), born Elizabeth Bigley, was first arrested in Ontario at the age of 22 for forging a bank check, but was released because she feigned mental illness.
In 1882, Elizabeth married Wallace Springsteen, but her husband left her after 11 days when he learned about her past. Then in Cleveland the woman married Dr. Chadwick.
In 1897, Cassie organized her most successful scam. She called herself the illegitimate daughter of Scottish steel industrialist Andrew Carnegie. Thanks to a fake $2 million promissory note allegedly given to her by her father, Cassie received loans from various banks totaling between $10 million and $20 million. In the end, the police asked Carnegie himself if he knew the fraudster, and after his negative answer, they arrested Mrs. Chadwick.
Cassie Chadwick appeared in court on March 6, 1905. She was found guilty of 9 major frauds. Sentenced to ten years, Mrs Chadwick died in prison two years later
Mary Baker - Princess Caraboo
In 1817, a young woman in exotic clothing with a turban on her head appeared in Gloucestershire, speaking an unknown language. Local residents approached many foreigners asking them to identify the language, until a Portuguese sailor “translated” her story. Allegedly, the woman was Princess Karabu from an island in the Indian Ocean.
As the stranger said, she was captured by pirates, the ship was wrecked, but she managed to escape. Over the next ten weeks, the stranger was the center of public attention. She dressed up in exotic clothes, climbed trees, sang strange words and even swam naked.
However, a certain Mrs. Neal soon identified “Princess Caraboo.” The impostor from the island turned out to be the daughter of a shoemaker named Mary Baker. As it turned out, while working as a maid in Mrs. Neal's house, Mary Baker entertained the children with the language she invented. Mary was forced to admit to deception. At the end of her life, she was selling leeches at a hospital in England.
Wilhelm Voigt - Captain Köpenick
Wilhelm Voigt (1849-1922) - a German shoemaker who pretended to be a Prussian captain. On October 16, 1906, in the southeastern suburb of Berlin Köpenick, the unemployed Wilhelm Voigt rented a Prussian captain's uniform in the city of Potsdam and organized the seizure of the town hall.
Voigt ordered four grenadiers and a sergeant who were accidentally stopped on the street to arrest the burgomaster Köpenick and the treasurer, after which, without any resistance, he single-handedly captured the local town hall, and then confiscated the city treasury - 4,000 marks and 70 pfennigs. Moreover, all his orders were carried out by both the soldiers and the burgomaster himself unquestioningly.
After taking the money and ordering the soldiers to remain in their places for half an hour, Voigt left for the station. On the train, he changed into civilian clothes and tried to escape. Voigt was eventually arrested and sentenced to four years in prison for his raid and theft of the money. In 1908, he was released early by personal order of the Kaiser of Germany.
George Psalmanazar - the first witness to the culture of the aborigines of the island of Formosa
George Psalmanazar (1679-1763) claimed to be the first Formosa to visit Europe. It appeared in Northern Europe around 1700. Although Psalmanazar was dressed in European clothing and looked like a European, he claimed to have come from the distant island of Formosa, where he had previously been captured by the natives. As proof, he spoke in detail about their traditions and culture.
Inspired by the success, Psalmanazar later published the book “Historical and Geographical Description of the Island of Formosa.” According to Psalmanazar, the men on the island walk completely naked, and the islanders' favorite food is snakes.
The Formosan people supposedly preach polygamy, and husbands are given the right to eat their wives for infidelity.
The Aborigines execute murderers by hanging them upside down. Every year the islanders sacrifice 18 thousand young men to the gods. The Formosan people ride horses and camels. The book also described the islanders' alphabet. The book was a great success, and Psalmanazar himself began giving lectures on the history of the island. In 1706, Psalmanazar became bored with the game and admitted that he had simply fooled everyone.
Darius McCollum isn't the most glamorous impostor on this list, but he's certainly the most persistent. McCollum was arrested 29 times. He impersonated railroad and subway employees, including becoming a New York City subway train driver when he was 15 years old. He was born and raised in New York. Suffering from Asperger's syndrome, an autism spectrum disorder, McCollum has been obsessed with trains since childhood. At the age of five, he memorized the city's subway system.
He became a cult figure, inspiring plays, documentaries and songs. Knows more about trains than any New York City subway employee.
Frederic Bourdin - chameleon
Bourdain had a lot of false identities. He came up with the first one while still a child. The boy called the police and said that he was a missing child, that he was tortured or lied, that his parents either died or kicked him out of the house. He did this many times throughout Europe. Subsequently, many were perplexed as to how and why a thirty-year-old man posed as an orphan teenager. He had no sexual deviations or material interests. Bourdain simply enjoyed it all.
The young man began his deception as soon as he left the orphanage and, as of 2005, took on at least 39 false identities. Three of them were teenagers who went missing. In 1997, Bourdain posed as Nicholas Barclay, a missing child from San Antonio, Texas, and invited his would-be parents to the American embassy in Spain to meet him. Although Bourdain had brown eyes and a French accent, he convinced the family that he was their blue-eyed son, who had disappeared three years ago. He said he was a victim of traffickers who supply minors to the child prostitution industry. Bourdain lived with the family for three months until he was suspected by a local detective of forgery and lies, which were confirmed by a DNA test. He was jailed for 6 years.
When Bourdain returned from the US in 2003, he moved to Grenoble and began posing as Leo Balet, a teenager who had been missing since 1996. A DNA test was able to refute this. In August 2004, in Spain, he claimed to be the teenager Ruben Sánchez Espinosa and said his mother had died in a terrorist attack in Madrid. When the police found out the truth, he was deported to France.
In June 2005, Bourdain posed as 15-year-old Spanish orphan Francisco Hernandez-Fernandez. He spent a month at Jean Monnet College in Pau, France. He claimed that his parents died in a car accident, dressed like a teenager, imitated the walking style of a teenager, covered his receding hairline with a baseball cap and used special creams to remove facial hair. On June 12, a teacher exposed him after he accidentally saw a TV program about his “exploits.” your ward. On September 16, Bourdain was sentenced to four months in prison for using someone else's name "Leo Ballet".
In his own words from a 2005 interview, Bourdain did all this for one single purpose - he wanted the love and attention that he did not receive as a child. He appeared on French and American television shows, but continued his deception. In 2007, after a year of courtship, Bourdain married a French woman named Isabelle. They had three children.
In 2010, based on the work of Jean-Paul Salomé “The Case of Nicholas Barclay”, the film “Chameleon” was shot, which is based on the story of an impostor. Bourdain (renamed Fortin in the film) acted as a consultant for the film. In the film he is played by Canadian actor Marc-André Grondin. In 2012, Bart Layton directed the documentary The Imposter, which is based on the story of the disappearance of Nicholas Barclay. Frédéric Bourdain plays himself in it.
Anna Anderson - daughter of Nicholas II (1896 - 1984)
Birth name Franziska Schanzkowska
According to the generally accepted version, the entire imperial family was shot on July 17, 1918. According to Anna, it was she, Princess Anastasia Nikolaevna, who managed to survive and escape.
Anna Anderson is perhaps the most successful false Anastasia, Grand Duchess Anastasia, the daughter of the executed last Russian Emperor Nicholas II and Empress Alexandra Feodorovna. According to the generally accepted version, the entire imperial family was shot on July 17, 1918. According to Anna, it was she, Princess Anastasia Nikolaevna, who managed to survive and escape.
This story began on the night of February 17, 1920, when a young woman tried to throw herself from the Bendlerbrücke Bridge in Berlin. The unknown woman was rescued - a policeman was on duty near the scene of the tragedy. At the hospital, where she was taken after drawing up a report at the police station, the unknown woman was found to have many gunshot scars on her back, as well as a star-shaped scar on the back of her head. The woman was severely emaciated - with a height of 170 cm, she weighed only 44 kg, and, in addition, she was in a state of shock and gave the impression of not being completely normal mentally. She later said that she came to Berlin in the hope of finding her aunt, Princess Irene, the sister of Queen Alexandra, but in the palace they did not recognize her or even listen to her. According to “Anastasia,” she attempted suicide out of shame and humiliation.
The young woman was sent to a psychiatric clinic in Daldorf, where she spent a year and a half. It was never possible to establish the exact data, and even the name of the patient - the “princess” answered the questions at random, and although she understood the questions in Russian, she answered them in some other Slavic language. However, someone later claimed that the patient spoke excellent Russian.
The girl suffered from severe melancholy and could spend whole days in bed. She was often visited in the hospital by various people who had ever been associated with the Russian royal court, but it was still not possible to unambiguously establish the identity of the strange patient. Some came to the conclusion that this was Princess Anastasia, while others insisted that she was a 100% impostor.
Meanwhile, the patient was recovering, but this still did not help the investigation - the stories of her rescue were always different and contradictory. So, once “Anastasia” said that during the execution she lost consciousness and woke up in the house of the soldier who allegedly saved her. Together with his wife, she arrived in Romania, after which she fled to Berlin. Another time, she said that the soldier’s name was Alexander Tchaikovsky, and he did not have any wife, but from Tchaikovsky, “Anastasia” herself gave birth to a son, who at the time of the story should have been about three years old. Alexander, according to the patient, was killed in a street shootout in Bucharest.
It was later established that none of the firing squad bore the surname “Tchaikovsky,” and none of the people whom the “princess” called as her saviors could be found.
After the hospital, "Anastasia" enjoyed the hospitality of several homes, all of which eventually refused to care for her - partly because of the lies of her stories, partly because of her bad character. However, be that as it may, everyone without exception agreed that the manners, behavior and etiquette of the unknown woman clearly identified her as a person of high society.
Soon, thanks to the press, which actively covered the story of the “princess,” Alexei Volkov, Alexandra Feodorovna’s former valet, arrived in Berlin. After the meeting, Volkov openly announced that “he cannot claim that this is not the Grand Duchess in front of him.”
By the way, “Anastasia” herself continued to be ill - she was tormented by bone tuberculosis, and her health was under great threat. In 1925, she was declared an impostor by Pierre Gilliard, a Swiss who had previously been a teacher of the imperial children. Moreover, Gilliard conducted his own investigation, tracing the history of the “princess” from her very appearance in Berlin. In addition to him, several other people also conducted the investigation.
In 1928, “Anastasia”, at the invitation of Grand Duchess Ksenia Georgievna, moved to the USA, but again, due to her obnoxious character, she did not stay in the princess’s house for long and moved to the Garden City Hotel. By the way, it was here that she registered under the name “Anna Anderson”, and subsequently it was this name that finally stuck with her.
So, Anna Anderson remained in the USA, and from time to time she had to be a patient in psychiatric hospitals. It must be said that the “last Russian princess” was received warmly almost everywhere - many tried to show her hospitality and help. In turn, Anderson accepted help without much embarrassment.
In 1932, Anderson returned to Germany, where preparations were underway for a trial that would recognize her as a Grand Duchess and give her access to the Romanov inheritance.
In 1968, she returned to the States, and, already 70 years old, married her longtime admirer Jack Manahan. It is known that by that time her character was already more than intolerable, but the faithful Manahan happily endured all the antics of the “princess.”
At the end of 1983 An
Derson again ended up in a psychiatric hospital, her condition at that time was very unimportant.
Anna Anderson died on February 12, 1984, her body was cremated, and on the grave, according to her will, it was written: “Anastasia Romanova. Anna Anderson.”
Expert opinions about whether Anderson was the emperor's real daughter or a simple impostor remained controversial. When in 1991 it was decided to exhume the remains of the royal family, two bodies were missing from the common grave - one of them was Princess Anastasia. DNA examinations did not show that Anderson belonged to the Russian royal family, but they completely coincided with the Schanzkowska family, and according to one version, the woman was Franziska Schanzkowska, a worker at one of the Berlin enterprises.
Thus, the false Anastasia is considered one of the luckiest impostors in the world, who managed to hold out in her role for half a century.
George Parker (1870-1936)
Parker was one of the most daring criminals in American history. He made his living selling New York landmarks to hapless tourists. His favorite subject was the Brooklyn Bridge, which he sold twice a week for several years. Parker assured buyers that they could make a fortune by controlling access to certain attractions. Police have had to remove naive shoppers from the bridge many times while trying to set up barriers to collect entry fees. Other public landmarks "sold" by Parker included Madison Square Garden, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Grant's Tomb, and the Statue of Liberty. George used a variety of methods to implement his sales. So, when he sold Grant's grave, he often posed as the grandson of the famous general. He even opened a fake office to conduct real estate scams. He created fake documents that were impressive in their “authenticity” to prove that he was the rightful owner of all the property that was offered for sale.
Parker was convicted of fraud three times, and the third time, on December 17, 1928, he was sentenced to life imprisonment in Sing Sing Prison. There he became incredibly popular among the guards and other prisoners who had heard about his “exploits.” They even entered American pop culture, giving rise to the famous phrase: “You probably think I have a bridge to sell you.” These words are addressed to overly gullible people who are ready to do anything to get rich.
Joseph Weil (1877-1975)
Joseph Weil, or "Yellow Kid", was one of the most famous swindlers. Over the course of his career, he is believed to have stolen more than $8 million. While working as a tax collector, Joseph realized that his colleagues, while collecting debts, kept a small portion of the money for themselves. Weil then offered himself to them as a cover, promising not to report illegal activity in exchange for a portion of what they received from it.
His many schemes involve fake oil deals, women, races and an endless list of other ways to deceive the gullible public. Weil could change his appearance almost daily and always corresponded to the role he played in the next fraud scheme. He posed either as a famous geologist or as a representative of a large oil company in order to receive cash, which he was given to “invest in fuel.” The next day he was already the director of the Elysium Development Company, promising land to gullible investors and collecting initial fees from them. He was also an excellent master of counterfeiting dollar bills.
In his autobiography, Weil writes: “The desire to earn money without doing anything was costly for those who dealt with me and my “colleagues.” The average person, in my estimation, is ninety-nine percent animal and only one percent human. Ninety-nine percent pose no problem. But this one percent is the cause of all our troubles. When people realize (which I highly doubt) that they can't get something out of nothing, crime will go down and we'll live in a more harmonious world."
Charles Ponzi (1882-1949)
Italian immigrant Charles Ponzi also made his mark in the history of the United States. Ponzi itself is not very well known to most people. But the so-called “Ponzi scheme” is well known, and is still widely used in various schemes for “making money quickly,” including through the Internet.
Ponti began his “career” by working in a restaurant, but was soon fired for shortchanging customers. His next job was a bank that served Italian immigrants. One day, after issuing another bad check, he was imprisoned for several years. While in prison in 1919, Charles Ponzi had a brilliant idea. One day he received an answer to his letter from Spain. The envelope contained international exchange coupons. At the post office, anyone could exchange these coupons for stamps and send the letter back. But the most interesting thing was that in Spain you could get one stamp for 1 coupon, and in the USA as many as six. The same situation was with other European countries. Ponzi quickly realized that he could play on this.
He bought many of these coupons at low prices due to post-war devaluation, and then resold them in the United States for a profit of 400%. It was a kind of form of arbitration transaction, and, therefore, nothing illegal. Ponzi began to involve friends and acquaintances in his business, promising them a profit of 50% or doubling of capital in 90 days. The company he founded was called the Securities Exchange Company.
However, the scheme began to fail, and money from those wishing to get rich quickly continued to be accepted. The end is known. Investors, as always, began to suspect something was wrong when “the train left.” Those who entrusted their money to Ponzi lost every cent of it. Ponzi was convicted of mail fraud and sent to prison. After an unsuccessful escape attempt, he was returned to his place to carry out his sentence, but was subsequently deported to Italy, where he died in 1949.
"Soapy Smith"
"Soapy Smith" (born Jefferson Randolph Smith, 1860-1898) was an American conman and gangster who played the role of "first fiddle" in organized crime in Denver, Colorado, Alaska and other states of the United States from 1879 to 1898. He is by far the most famous swindler of the Old West. In the late 1870s and early 1880s, Smith began his career in Denver by fooling crowds with a stunt the newspapers called the Soap Fraud Prize Pack.
On a busy street corner, Jefferson opened his “magic chest” on a tripod and placed ordinary bars of soap in its upper part, describing the upcoming miracles to the public. Facing a growing crowd of curious onlookers, he pulled out his wallet and began laying out bills ranging from one to one hundred dollars, placing them on several shelves. He wrapped each stack of money in paper. Then he mixed stacks of money with stacks containing just pieces of paper, and put them into packets of soap. Soap sold for a dollar a bar.
At this time, his accomplice, who was in the crowd, bought a package of soap, opened it and screamed loudly, waving the “won” money so that everyone could see it. The performance had the desired effect. People rushed to buy soap. Usually the victims took several packages at a time, continuing to buy until the sale ended. Toward the end of the trade, Smith would announce that there was still a $100 bill in the unpurchased pack and announce an auction for the remaining boxes of soap, selling them to the highest bidder.
Thanks to the art of manipulation and sleight of hand, the bags of soap in which the money was hidden were almost all quietly replaced by others in which there was no money. But the auction was publicly won by one of the group members.
The scam could have continued for quite a long time if one day “Soapy Smith” had not been shot by a group of gamblers he had deceived.
Eduardo de Valfierno who stole Gioconda
Eduardo de Valfierno, who called himself the Marquis, was in fact an Argentine swindler who was said to have hatched a plan to steal the famous Mona Lisa. It is unknown whether this was his idea. But he paid a group of people, including museum worker Vincenzo Perugia, to steal this masterpiece from the Louvre. On August 21, 1911, Perugia simply managed to hide the painting under her coat and take it out of the museum.
Before the robbery took place, Valfierno ordered restorer and counterfeiter Yves Chabrot to make six copies of the painting. The counterfeits were subsequently successfully sold in different parts of the world. Valfierno knew that since the Mona Lisa was stolen, it would be difficult to get copies through customs. However, copies were delivered to customers, and each of them was sure that they had received the original stolen especially for them. Valferno's goal was to sell copies, and therefore he never contacted Perugia again. And his instincts did not let him down. Perugia was subsequently caught trying to sell the original. In 1913, the painting was returned to the Louvre.
James Hogue (b.1959)
og was a famous American swindler who began by (using an advantage) to enter Princeton University, posing as a self-educated orphan. In 1986, he entered Palo Alto High School in a similar manner. This time under the name of Jay Mitchell Huntsman, a 16-year-old orphan from Nevada, taking upon himself the name of a deceased boy. However, a suspicious local reporter uncovered the deception. Hogue was sentenced to probation, but decided not to stop there. After yet another “entry” to a university in Utah, he was arrested for stealing bicycles. Under different names he joined various closed clubs.
His real identity was discovered in 1991, when Rene Pacheco, a student from Palo Alto High School, recognized him. Hogue was then arrested for stealing $30,000 from the university fund, intended for financial aid, and was sentenced to three years in prison and 100 hours of community service.
On May 16, 1993, Hogue's name again appeared in the headlines. This time, under an assumed name, he managed to get a security guard position at a museum on one of the Harvard University campuses. A few months later, museum workers noticed that several gemstone exhibits had been replaced with cheap fakes. Sommerville police arrested Hogue at his home and charged him with theft over $50,000.
On March 12, 2007, after carrying out a series of scams and being caught again, Hogue agreed to plead guilty to only one crime - theft in the amount of 15 thousand dollars, and then only on the condition that the prison term would not exceed ten years. The prosecutor agreed to drop all remaining criminal charges against him.
Robert Hendy-Freegard (b. 1971) - intelligence agent
Obert Hendy-Freegard is a British bartender, car salesman, swindler and “great strategist” who masqueraded as an agent of the British secret service MI5, responsible for the country’s security. He duped people into going “underground” to avoid being killed by the Irish extremist organization IRA, which was supposedly hunting them. He met his victims at social events, as well as in pubs and at the car dealership where he worked. Freegard revealed his "role" as a secret service agent for MI5 (Scotland Yard's anti-IRA unit) and demanded that people cut off all contact with family and friends and live alone. They believed him, he extorted money from them for valuable information and demanded that they comply with the terms of the agreement. In addition, he seduced five women, promising to marry them. Victims were initially hesitant to go to the police because Freegard convinced them that the police were double agents who were also working for the IRA.
In 2002, when real intelligence services received information about the impostor, Scotland Yard, together with the FBI, organized a special operation to capture the criminal. He was detained at Heathrow airport. Freegard denied all charges against him, but on June 23, 2005, after a trial that lasted eight months, Robert Hendy-Freegard was found guilty of child abduction, ten thefts and eight counts of fraud. On September 6, 2005, he was sentenced to life imprisonment. On April 25, 2007, according to the BBC, Robert Hendy-Freegard's appeal regarding the abduction of children was granted. The life sentence was commuted to nine years in prison.
Bernard Kornfeld (1927-1995)
Bernard Kornfeld was a well-known international businessman and financier who sold quotas to American mutual funds. He was born in Turkey. When he moved to the United States, he initially worked as a social worker. However, already in the 1950s he became a seller of shares in mutual funds. And although he suffered from a stutter, nevertheless, even then he was able to fully demonstrate his natural gift as a salesman.
In the 1960s, Kornfeld founded his own mutual fund quota trading company called Investors Overseas Services (IOS), which he registered outside the United States. However, although the accounts were in Canada and the headquarters were in Geneva, IOS's main operating offices were in Ferney-Voltaire (France), a short drive from the Swiss border. This was simply a way to avoid problems with obtaining the right to work in Switzerland for many of the company's employees.
Over the next ten years, iOS earned over $2.5 billion, bringing Kornfeld's personal fortune to over $100 million. Kornfeld attracted attention for his ostentatious consumption of luxury. At the same time, as noted, in his communication he was a very generous and cheerful person.
In 1969, a group of 300 IOS employees complained to Swiss authorities that Kornfeld and his co-founders were pocketing part of the proceeds from shares distributed to company employees. As a result, in 1973, Swiss authorities charged him with fraud. When Kornfeld once arrived in Geneva, he was immediately arrested. He spent 11 months in a Swiss prison before being released on $600,000 bail. Returning to Beverly Hills, he no longer lived on display as before. He was consumed by a passion for healthy eating and vitamins. Kornfeld completely gave up red meat and practically did not drink alcohol. After a stroke that resulted in a cerebral aneurysm, Bernard Kornfeld died in London on February 27, 1995.
This is the largest deposit of the most valuable metal in the world! Bre-X shares are rocketing up. Investors are vying to buy the company's securities.
Everyone is caught up in the gold rush. But instead of the desired wealth, investors are faced with ruin. After everyone finds out the truth that there is actually not an ounce of gold in the Indonesian mine.
It was one of the biggest scams of the 20th century.
The gold scam started on the island of Borneo. It is shared between Malaysia, Brunei and Indonesia. It was on the Indonesian part, near the Busang River, that geological research began in the early 1990s.
The initiator of the expedition was Filipino geologist Michael Guzman. This professional had a scientific degree, extensive experience and considerable ambitions. But the world of exploration at that time was ruled by giant American companies. Therefore, it was difficult for Guzman to find a job with a good salary. And he decided to act on his own.
good news
Dutch missionaries visited Indonesia 500 years ago. They carried the good news to the wild tribes. And from them they learned about a gold mine in the impenetrable jungle.
However, years passed, but no one verified this legend. Guzman decided this was his chance. In addition, he was sure that in an area where earthquakes often occur, there must be gold deposits.
He took on the job with minimal money, but with great hope of success. And soon I came across yellow metal. Guzman told an authoritative geologist from Canada, John Felderhof, about his discovery. Together they began to look for an investor.
During the course of development, humanity often encountered people whose desire to get rich quickly intersected with the ability to violate existing legislation with impunity. Of course, not all of them succeeded in this activity and many were caught in the act. However, they managed to create very beautiful schemes and amazing scams. This does not cancel their criminal intentions, but it forces us to take a closer look at their biographies. The world's largest scams have always been very interesting material for research, because often the scammers' plan was visible from the very beginning, but they still achieved success in this field. By the way, in recent years there have also been many swindlers whose actions can be regarded as the world's largest scams. However, let's start with others, less.
Selling the Eiffel Tower
Imagine a man who managed not only to sell the Eiffel Tower, but also to do it twice. This is Victor Lustig. In fact, he was a native of America, knew many languages and had 45 different pseudonyms in his activities. With his help, the biggest scams in the world have added one more item. This man sold the Eiffel Tower, but the gullible buyer did not contact the police. For obvious reasons - he was simply ashamed that he had even decided to make such a deal.
However, Lustig sold it again to another buyer. The second time, the deal did not bring the expected success and Lustig was forced to urgently move to the United States. By the way, in his new place he began counterfeiting coin activity, for which he was arrested. After receiving a 20-year sentence, Lustig died in Alcatraz prison in 1947 from pneumonia.
Architectural monuments at retail
Another representative of the list of “The Biggest Scams in the World” can be called Arthur Ferguson. He specialized in selling various English attractions to tourists. It is difficult to understand what motivated tourists when they agreed to buy Big Ben for £1,000 or the Nelson statue in Trafalgar Square for £6,000. However, they bought and Ferguson continued his activities in this field.
In 1925, he moved to America, where he continued his biography with the same projects. For example, he sold the White House, the residence of the US President in Washington, to a farmer for a ranch. By the way, the amount was almost astronomical at that time $100,000.
Over time, his luck ran out and he was arrested while trying to sell the Statue of Liberty. Why this particular tourist did not believe his right to sell, while the others believed unconditionally, is unclear.
A swindler with royal requests
For about two months, the shoemaker's daughter successfully posed as the princess of the state of Caribou, who was captured by pirates and escaped only after a shipwreck. The British, for whom origin is very important, surrounded the girl with attention and care, accepted her into high society and contributed as much as possible to her popularity. Separately, it should be noted that the girl spoke a very strange language, which served as confirmation of her words.
But the deception could not last long and within a few months she was identified as the daughter of a shoemaker. And the incomprehensible language that “Princess Caribou” spoke turned out to be just a fictitious set of words and sounds, which the girl came up with while playing with the children.
Pilot, translator, lawyer
Frank Abagnale can be considered one of the outstanding swindlers of the past. This man successfully posed as a representative of various popular professions. However, most often he presented himself as a pilot, since this provided the opportunity for free flights. PanAmerican suffered very large losses from his activities, because he flew more than a million miles with overnight stays in various hotels. However, he did not sit down even once, motivating this by recent drinking.
Of course, he was subsequently arrested and sentenced to prison, but after his release he advised various intelligence agencies on issues of document fraud. His biography formed the basis of the film “Catch Me If You Can.”
The Great Con Man - Frank Abagnale Three letter pyramid
In modern Russia, there were also organizations and people who could “The biggest scams in the world” and, first of all, this was MMM JSC. The organization appeared during the formation of the capitalist system in the country and immediately became the subject of discussion among many people. The idea was that the company would return the invested funds in a few weeks with very high interest.
In conditions of massive advertising support, many people rushed to purchase shares of the new company and even managed to receive serious dividends. However, after a short time, news of the collapse of the enterprise spread across Russia. It turned out that the so-called dividends were paid to people from new financial receipts and there was no turnover of funds to make a profit. There were a lot of deceived investors, so today almost any financial pyramid is called “MMM”.
Video about the biggest scams in the world
As you can see, even today there are projects that can add new positions to the world’s largest scams. Therefore, be extremely careful when choosing business partners and investment objects. As experience shows, the first sign of future fraud is very favorable conditions, although the ways and methods of making a profit are not disclosed.