An 82-year-old grandfather from Maryland committed suicide after falling victim to horrible scammers who stole his life savings - by pretending to be a mystery love interest on Facebook.
Mr Dennis Jones fell victim to a scam known as "pig butchering." This is when conmen try to "fatten" their victims up with a sham, online romance before making them invest in fake cryptocurrency schemes.
According to his family, Mr Jones died "embarrased and ashamed" on March 4 after falling in love with the woman named "Jessica." However, the two never met.
His children shared his final messages - where he wrote about becoming increasingly depressed about his financial losses. In one exchange, he wrote: "'I have been having dark thoughts about my life and it being over. Certainly, it looks like my financial life is done. Bankruptcy, legal and all that BS. It will be very painful and I'm not sure I can stand it."
His story comes as an increased number of Americans have been falling victim to the cruel experience. It's said to be mainly run by Chinese gangs - and the Secret Service said it was seeing a "ton of cases."
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The messages between Dennis and the scammer (CNN)Devastated children Matt Jones and Adrianne Gruner said they had planned to meet with their dad on the day he died to help him recover after he confided in them about the scam. Adrianne added he was supposed to move in with her family on her farm in Virginia to rebuild his life.
Matt was shocked to see the police show up to his door an hour after their planned meeting informing him Jones had taken his own life. The family assumed he was out for a long run - something he loved to do.
He told CNN: "Our father was, from the day I was born until six months ago, always a positive, happy person. This was literally the only thing in his life that had happened, to where it changed him, and it just crushed him."
These scammers work on several social media, dating and messaging sites such as Facebook, Tinder, WhatsApp and LinkedIn - among others. After entering their lives and making the victims like Jones comfortable, the scammers convince them to invest in fraudulent cryptocurrency schemes and even "phantom properties" that don't exist.
In messages shared by the family, Jones told the "woman" that he would "have 9000 in my trust wallet by Saturday." He wrote: "Transferring 2500 per day into uphold and had 1525 in it. So, 4000 in it now 65000 tomorrow and 9000 Saturday."
'Jessica' replied, asking if there was any limit on transferring the funds now. In another message, the grandfather explained how he felt so guilty for "betraying his family' by giving up all of his money."
Despite all of the pain her father endured, Adrianne believes that he truly cared for 'Jessica'. She said: I do believe he loved the person that he believed was behind that profile."
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