BAD LUCK IN GOOD LUCK
SCAM
(Investigator No.
13,
1990 July)
Two
gypsies who obtained
a fortune of $407,000 in cash and jewellery through a
forturne telling and palm reading racket faced charges in the
Prahran (Victoria) Magistrates Court in April.
The scam which
preyed
mainly on immigrants throughout Australia was about to spread to
Adelaide and to England.
The
women claimed to have
psychic powers. Clients were told they faced bad luck which could be
prevented by handing over valuables that would then be blessed, so as
to change the bad luck to good luck when returned.
The
valuables, however,
were not returned. The women's husbands were both charged with
receiving and disposing of stolen goods. The women were arrested at
Glenelg (Adelaide) on Tuesday April 10.
An
Adelaide man, said to
run a similar operation, was arrested in the same week.
Americans
too are
vulnerable to good fortune scams also. The Sunday Mail reported:
HARTFORD,
Connecticut: A fortune teller and her daughter preyed on troubled
people's fears in a fraud scheme which cheated victims out of $361,515
a judge said before imposing sentence…The women, members of a Gypsy
community, were found guilty of cheating victims who paid large sums
for rituals to rid homes of evil spirits. (May 27 p.21)
An Adelaide
skeptic
stated: "Science knows of no physical forces or laws that control good
or bad luck. Such fraudulent claims make money because there's a sucker
born ever minute."
(BM)