She has crisscrossed the US saying she is an Irish heiress, a psychic and good friends with a movie star so as to run scores of scams, her victims say, but now Marianne Smyth is in a Maine jail awaiting a hearing next month that would decide whether she can be extradited to the UK over a scam dating back more than 15 years in Northern Ireland.
The 54-year-old American is accused of stealing more than US$170,000 from at least five victims from 2008 to 2010 in Northern Ireland, where a court issued arrest warrants for her in 2021, according to legal documents.
She was located and arrested last month in Maine.
Photo: Johnathan Walton via AP
Her case has similarities to Anna Sorokin, a grifter convicted in New York of paying for a lavish lifestyle by impersonating a wealthy German heiress.
“She’s a master of disguise, completely changing her appearance and her grift to suit each mark,” said Johnathan Walton, who started a podcast in 2021, Queen of the Con, to warn others about Smyth after he said he was fleeced out of nearly US$100,000.
She was always dressed in designer clothes, but said she needed the money for things like a frozen bank account and to post bail, he said.
She told him she was due an inheritance of US$7 million from her wealthy family in Ireland, Walton said.
They grew close over several years in Los Angeles, when she bought him expensive dinners and luxury vacations, he said.
However, her story began to unravel when Walton realized she was jailed for stealing US$200,000 from a luxury travel agency where she worked. She was later convicted of stealing from him and briefly served time in prison.
“She has no shame, and she has no conscience,” the 49-year-old reality television producer, author and public speaker said. “She revels in casting countless victims as unwitting actors in her elaborate schemes to defraud.”
Smyth’s attorney did not respond to a request for comment. From jail, Smyth referred questions to her attorney.
The podcast has drawn tips from dozens of victims from California to New York, Walton said.
The tipsters described a fake charity for Ukraine, as well as lies that she was an emissary for Satan, a witch, a hockey coach, a cancer patient and best friends with Jennifer Aniston. She often changed her name and appearance, her victims say.
“She honed in our vulnerabilities, and got all our information and bank accounts,” said Heather Sladinski, a costume designer in Los Angeles who said she was scammed out of US$20,000 for psychic readings, fake life coach sessions and cult-like retreats that included rituals, breathing exercises and yoga.
Smyth was funny, smart, and had credentials and other documents to back up her claims, Sladinski said.
The 50-year-old from Los Angeles blocked Smyth after she wanted to do a bizarre ritual involving a chicken to win back her ex-boyfriend, who had a restraining order against her, Sladinski said.
Smyth then started making threatening telephone calls and Sladinski “was so scared” that she moved homes, but after connecting with Walton, Sladkinski filed her own police report against Smyth and testified at Walton’s trial.
Tess Cacciatore, who owns a production company and nonprofit charity, never lost money to Smyth, but met her in 2016 through a business partner who had employed her as a psychic.
Smyth claimed to be a cancer patient, even sending her a photograph of her in a hospital gown, and said she was set to get a US$50 million inheritance. Smyth also showed Cacciatore e-mails purportedly from Aniston and, at one point, invited her to join them at the Golden Globe Awards before abruptly canceling.
In Northern Ireland, government officials said Smyth stole money that she had promised to invest and arranged to sell a victim a home, but took the money.
She remains in the Piscataquis County Jail pending the extradition hearing on April 17.
“She should have been an actress,” Cacciatore said. “She would have worked a lot and not gone to jail. She is so good at what she did.”
Kehinde Sanni spends his days smoothing out dents and repainting scratched bumpers in a modest autobody shop in Lagos. He has never left Nigeria, yet he speaks glowingly of Burkina Faso military leader Ibrahim Traore. “Nigeria needs someone like Ibrahim Traore of Burkina Faso. He is doing well for his country,” Sanni said. His admiration is shaped by a steady stream of viral videos, memes and social media posts — many misleading or outright false — portraying Traore as a fearless reformer who defied Western powers and reclaimed his country’s dignity. The Burkinabe strongman swept into power following a coup in September 2022
‘FRAGMENTING’: British politics have for a long time been dominated by the Labor Party and the Tories, but polls suggest that Reform now poses a significant challenge Hard-right upstarts Reform UK snatched a parliamentary seat from British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s Labor Party yesterday in local elections that dealt a blow to the UK’s two establishment parties. Reform, led by anti-immigrant firebrand Nigel Farage, won the by-election in Runcorn and Helsby in northwest England by just six votes, as it picked up gains in other localities, including one mayoralty. The group’s strong showing continues momentum it built up at last year’s general election and appears to confirm a trend that the UK is entering an era of multi-party politics. “For the movement, for the party it’s a very, very big
ENTERTAINMENT: Rio officials have a history of organizing massive concerts on Copacabana Beach, with Madonna’s show drawing about 1.6 million fans last year Lady Gaga on Saturday night gave a free concert in front of 2 million fans who poured onto Copacabana Beach in Rio de Janeiro for the biggest show of her career. “Tonight, we’re making history... Thank you for making history with me,” Lady Gaga told a screaming crowd. The Mother Monster, as she is known, started the show at about 10:10pm local time with her 2011 song Bloody Mary. Cries of joy rose from the tightly packed fans who sang and danced shoulder-to-shoulder on the vast stretch of sand. Concert organizers said 2.1 million people attended the show. Lady Gaga
SUPPORT: The Australian prime minister promised to back Kyiv against Russia’s invasion, saying: ‘That’s my government’s position. It was yesterday. It still is’ Left-leaning Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese yesterday basked in his landslide election win, promising a “disciplined, orderly” government to confront cost-of-living pain and tariff turmoil. People clapped as the 62-year-old and his fiancee, Jodie Haydon, who visited his old inner Sydney haunt, Cafe Italia, surrounded by a crowd of jostling photographers and journalists. Albanese’s Labor Party is on course to win at least 83 seats in the 150-member parliament, partial results showed. Opposition leader Peter Dutton’s conservative Liberal-National coalition had just 38 seats, and other parties 12. Another 17 seats were still in doubt. “We will be a disciplined, orderly
RSS