Fleetwood Mac backup singer lost over $1 million in romance scam

Little did Liza Jane Likins know that a simple update to her social media profile after the death of her husband of 23 years would change her life forever.

Likins, a backup singer who has toured with Fleetwood Mac and Linda Ronstadt, fell victim to a Nigerian online fraudster and was scammed out of more than $1 million in cash and cryptocurrencies.

Within two years, Likins was involved in a “very complicated scam” run by a man who claimed to be an Australian gold prospector and who wooed her online with stolen photos of a German life coach.

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“I had nothing left. I sold my house,” Likins told Fox News Digital exclusively. “This scammer wanted me to sell my car, but luckily that’s when I saw the show ‘Social Catfish,’ so I didn’t sell my car.

“At first I wanted to kill myself, because my husband had left me in very good shape, and after two years with this crook, I had nothing left but my car and my clothes and I I just wanted to end my life, I didn’t know what I was going to do.”

Likins added: “I had no money for food. I had no money to pay my utilities. My electricity was cut off twice. I lost 40 pounds. I caught Covid. I didn’t have money for a doctor. I mean, I was in really, really big trouble.”

Her problem with the scammer started immediately after a small change to her social media account.

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“When my husband passed away, on my Facebook profile I indicated that…I was now a widow. Big mistake,” Likins said. “It’s like putting up a scam bait sign. That’s how it all started.”

Likins recalled that the scammer was a “perfect gentleman” during their first online conversations and said that even though she wasn’t yet interested in anything romantic, he would write to her “every day for six months” .

“When my husband passed away, on my Facebook profile, I indicated that… I was now a widow. Big mistake. It’s like putting up a sign saying scam bait.”

-Liza Likins

“One day he sent me some photos, and each photo had a complicated, convoluted story,” she recalls. “All the photos were stolen from the public German life coach site on Facebook. One day he sent me a photo of himself, supposedly, next to a Buddha statue, and that’s what what happened when I received this photo I thought, ‘OK, maybe this person is okay.'”

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Little did Likins know that the web of lies had already begun. She was told her online suitor was a gold mine manager and was currently in the Australian outback with a team of 20 men for his last job before retirement.

He was running out of time for the expedition and already had $8,000 left in his pocket. To make matters worse, if they wanted to communicate, she would have to send him $1,000 and some cryptocurrency so he could buy the proper Wi-Fi to use her phone so they could stay in touch while he worked in Australia.

Likins claimed he spoke via Facetime via a “very sophisticated” method using audio equipment combined with video components. When the video elements “stopped,” the scammer would say, “I can’t hear you, let’s go back to texting.” »

Each request for money became more and more complicated and convoluted, but Likins was still hooked on the scammer, who showed 24-karat gold bars and asked for his home address so he could safely send a safe -box filled with $100 bills at his home.

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“I have video of this purple helicopter taking off,” Likins said of one extravagant project. “I checked all the specs, address, email, phone number, everything checked out. And they sent me emails letting me know they were on their way to deliver this safe to my home address.

“The scammer told me that if I upgraded the logistics company’s shipping services, I would have it in three days. That’s what I did. It was the first big money money.”

Nothing was ever delivered to her house.

“I went to the airport four times to pick up this person because he was sending me pictures of his name on a boarding pass arriving on a certain day and time,” Likins said. “I was going to the airport, and sure enough… that flight didn’t exist, and neither did he.”

The scam ended by accident when Likins watched a TV show called “Social Catfish.” She “was in shock” within minutes of the program after watching a story similar to hers on television, and wrote to the producers asking them to contact them.

Through research, “Social Catfish” (a company that verifies online identities using AI reverse lookup technology) discovered the scammer’s true identity.

“I was going to the airport, and of course… this flight didn’t exist and neither did he.”

-Liza Likins

Despite losing everything, Likins found strength in an unlikely person and came into contact with the real person in the photographs sent to her by the scammer.

“It turns out the reason there’s a picture of him with Buddha is because he’s a German spiritual and professional coach,” Likins said. “He’s like the German version of Tony Robbins.”

She added: “He started doing everything he could to advise me on how to heal myself and remind me to love myself, forgive myself and keep living. And what I needed to do was “was telling my story to help others so that other people like me don’t get scammed.”

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