Our guest this week has removed her mask of shame, and is opening up after experiencing a love that turned into betrayal and financial disaster to the tune of over One Million Dollars. Yes, that's right ... $1,080,762 to be exact!
Known as "The Woman Behind The Smile", Debby M. Johnson proves that you can step out from behind the mask and reclaim your strength, confidence and power.
In this episode we discuss relationship fraud, the warning signs, the recovery process, and so much more.
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📚 Grab a copy of Debby's Books:
If you've been a victim of a scam now is the time to take action. Visit, anyscam.com for more information.
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Conversation with Debby M. Johnson
Calla: Well, let's just jump right in, because when we heard your story and terms like relationship fraud come up, it's hard to not really have like a preconceived notion in your head of what really took place. So now that you're on the other side of it, I would love to hear your version of what took place.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
You know, it's a really amazing thing, because prior to this, I never would have understood it either. I'd never heard of an online relationship scam. And that just to give you a little perspective, this happened to me in 2010. So it's been a while, and a lot has come up since then. But when it happened, my husband had passed away suddenly. And I was working, I was working my job, I was working his company, I was doing everything. And my friends said I had no life. So they just said, Hey, get a life, do something, you know, other than work. And I had been married for 26 years. So I hadn't been on a date in a really long time. And that was, is actually very scary to me to start dating again at 52. And I felt when they said, Get a life and start dating. The only thing that I felt safe would be perhaps online dating, because I wasn't ready for an in person relationship yet. I was, I was too busy. And I guess I might have been a little bit scared. So I thought online dating would be safe. I'll go to a faith based site, I'll find you know, someone that is an international businessman because I own a company. I also was working. And I was looking for like minded people, which surprised me when I was checking out the 55 to 62 year olds, because many of them couldn't write. They showed up in wife beater t shirts. They had nothing against motorcycles. But they had motorcycles with girls hanging on their on their sleeve.
Calla: Yeah, not what you’re looking for.
Leanne: Not For me.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
So I jumped on actually to a faith based sight thinking that we would have something in common, and that it would be safe. And I'd also had some friends who had found husbands or significant others through that. And I said, okay. But when I went to my mother, I figured if my mother was for or against that would for me be the litmus test. And my mom had, she was in her 70s at the time, she said, Hey, I've got friends who have found their husbands and just be careful. But this is really fun. And so I dipped my toe, but basically jumped in. And it was an interesting adventure, again, safe because I was in my home, I could chat or talk. And back then it was a little different than today. It was mostly the dating site at first. And then we moved off, I met a gentleman from England, who was an international businessman. It was in Houston at the time. And he was going to have just gotten a contract with a job in the Far East. So he said, Let's get off the dating site, because I'll have better access to talking to you and talking like air quotes. It's more like chatting was on Yahoo chat. And that was pretty new. For me, that was pretty techie. And so that was instant messaging 24/7. And we did that for two years. I actually it was very interesting. I kept a journal for through those two years. And I copied and pasted every contact I had with them every chat, every email, every everything, and I put it in my journal thinking I was gonna have family history for two years, and turned out to be 4000 pages of evidence which couldn't be used.
Calla: What a premonition, I got goosebumps.
Leanne: Why could it not be used?
Debby Montgomery Johnson: Because he's not in the States. They couldn't do anything. Oh, at least that’s what he told me.
Calla: Yeah, your book was fascinating. I could not put it down.
Debby Montgomery Johnson: And the book was loosely based on my conversations. In my journal, the journal, I still have five printed, you know, 4000 pages of printed printed books. And they're on my bookshelf, they remind me of what not to do. But I've also used them to, to warn people because it's interesting going back I look, I look at things now. Obviously, hindsight is 2020. And there are things that I call pink flags. Weren’t red flags at the time. They weren't even yellow flags for the most part, because honestly, I didn't. I didn't. I didn't know there were scammers. I wasn't anticipating and no one ever told me about them. And so there were there were times when I felt a little uncomfortable. He always had an answer to my questions. He always walked me through it and got me to that point where I would say yes or whatever I was doing. And that was even true with the money and people are like oh, how in the world because I was an Air Force Intelligence Officer. I was a former banker a paralegal I had been well trained, well schooled, educated. I was just at the right time at the right moment, my life and I had the right person to take advantage. But again, I didn't know I was being taken advantage of because it for me it was The conversation, it was a relationship that was building. It was safe because he wasn't here. Yes, it was full of ups and downs and emotional times, especially when he was supposed to get here and didn't get here. And when he asked me to help him the very first time. He asked, he asked me to one of his friends was an engineer. And I don't know where he was at the time, I can't remember. But he's having a hard time getting onto the dating site. He said, Hey, could you send a check into the dating site, and help my friend out. At that point, I'm like, sure, because the number of guys that I'm looking at are, it's pretty pitiful. And so a great way to get somebody new on the dating site, not knowing that that makes them a credible, credible scammer, because now they're a paid participant. I learned that later on. So that was a small amount of money. And I actually sent a physical check into the dating site. The next ask was, and again, I'm a business woman, I run a business, I understand that sometimes you don't get paid for your job until after the fact. So as we were getting to know each other, he had a company I had a company we discussed business, we he was really a confidant to me too, because Lou had died suddenly. And I, I was just frustrated, I had not run his company before. I didn't know all the answers. I was really good at asking clients, vendors, everybody how to keep the company going. But I needed someone to keep me going. And so we would go back and forth. And he asked me to do a business plan for his company. And it was really interesting business personal dynamic. But when he said, Deb, I'm having some trouble with certain things. Could you just help me and when I'm done at this point, I felt like he was going to be my future. I felt like he was going to be family. And that's the key. For me. It was when I knew I thought I knew that he was going to be my future family. I'd do anything for family. And so he said, We have to get a power of attorney drawn up so that when when I come over there because he was coming with this with a sudden sister from England, he said we need to have some bank accounts set up. We need some legal things done. A my attorney whose name was Peter, and I had been introduced to Peter online, said, we needed a power of attorney and it was going to cost $2,500. Well, I'm thinking when I was a paralegal, it didn't cost $2,500 For a power of attorney, but I didn't. I didn't question because now it was international law. And I didn't know what the expenses might be. So even though that was our first little hiccup, financially, because I always say that I'm one of those Damn Yankees who doesn't give money away to anybody. I did say yes. And I thought this was interesting. As a banker, going to Western Union felt a little bit off to me. And I was like, why am I doing this? But I just felt like if I did this, and we could get him home soon, he could be here for Christmas. And it there was a lot of urgency to it. Like we have
Calla: There’s loneliness and confusion. You know what I mean? So I mean, that's like a perfect cocktail.
Debby Montgomery Johnson: Absolutely. And I didn't, I didn't. I guess I didn't want to question because at that point, I'm thinking, well, this is gonna be my forever guy. I don't want to question him over something like this.
Leanne: Yeah, but trust built.
Debby Montgomery Johnson: It was built very quickly. The only thing that I felt a little odd about with him at the very beginning, was that he started to profess his feelings rather quickly. And . because I've been married for so long, my spider sense is going, you sure you want to say this to me? You sure that I'm going to be your gal. And then finally I just said, Well, this is really fun. This is great. Because I felt like I was 16 those endorphins. And you know, the hormones are raging. And it was just it was fun. And I got to the point, I don't know if you know, Yahoo chat, but there's a little ding ding ding as I call it, the little alert. And middle of the night, I could be sound asleep. And I would hear that ding ding ding on my computer, and I would up at a bed and race to my computer and be typing. For hours. Even if I had to go to work. The next morning, I would, I'd stay up because I thought he was over in Malaysia. And I knew the time change was huge. So just to be able to chat with him was really fun. And folks asked me did you ever did you ever talk to him? The I knew internet was difficult because he kept telling me that it was the internet was hard. I couldn't Skype with him. The phone calls or two or three and he had a British accent which just fed right into the story.
Calla: Oh girl, I know that life.
Debby Montgomery Johnson: But it was very distant and it was not a good connection. So we kept it pretty short. But that just cemented in my mind that this guy's he's from Britain and he's overseas and he just is having a hard time connecting. So
Leanne: Can I ask how long did he wait until the first ask asking you for financial help?
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
It was it was a couple weeks in the first ask was that dating thing. And that was that was more kind of fun. The business ask was soon after that. And again, it's, it was the urgency of it. And I thought, well, you know, he's gonna pay me back because they're always assurances that it would pay me back. Pay me back with interest, this is going to happen quickly not to worry. Well, when it dragged out, because it did. We were in this relationship for almost two years. At some point, I'm sure. My, my legal and logical brain was saying, Hey, this is enough. And I don't have any more money. Or I could, I could find it again. Because it was family, I found it. I didn't have it sitting in the bank. But I just felt like if I stopped now, if I disconnect now, I've already lost this amount of money. And I wasn't sure about the total until the very end, when I did add it up. But I had incredible bank records. I had meticulous documentation. And so I just felt like okay, this is the last time. This is the next time is the last time and we call it now chasing the money. It's like when you're gambling. Yeah. Well, the next time yeah, the next time, the big hit. And the next time didn't come until the very end.
Leanne: Did he ever say I will pay you back?
Debby Montgomery Johnson: Oh, all along. And the other thing is, it was interesting too, is he got a sister involved, I thought was his sister. And so Mary, and I got to be friends. Also, there was one night we had I had on Yahoo chat, you have little message boxes at the top. And I was talking to Mary and his son, Kenny in England. And I was talking to Peter, his attorney, and I was talking to him and typing the whole time around. I wasn't talking physically, but I was typing. And thank goodness, I'm a really quick typer. But when we had to, for instance, uh, there were there were things that came up and I didn't have enough money, but he's like, Well, Mary will help you out. And so Mary, and I would be talking about how we were going to sell our jewelry and how we were selling our stocks or our investments. And she would do half and I would do half again, making me feel like someone was helping me out in this. I wasn't doing this all myself.
Calla: The relationships were there.
Debby Montgomery Johnson: Yeah, absolutely. And, and honestly, her relationship with me was very interesting, because I would ask her questions about him to try to find out what's he like, and then I would ask him about her her life and she lost her husband and had kids. And it was very intricate. It just did incredible family story built on, on lies now, but it was very crafty, looking back.
Leanne: And now that you know the truth, do you feel like all of those people were one person?
Debby Montgomery Johnson: I actually worked with a group called S.C.A.R.S- Society of Citizens Against Relationship Scams, and we work with men and women, mostly women, a lot on this, there is no he, the he is a they. Because it's organized crime, they are not there. This is a huge organization, sitting in office buildings, or in universities in Nigeria, and Israel and England where wherever they may be, they are very well trained. And if you think about years ago, when we offshore call centers, we basically sent them to India to Nigeria, to all these places. So we've got this pool of, of individuals who may not have good employment opportunities, and they're now sitting in call centers. They're being trained in universities, and they have their own journals, their own, you know, message boards, they have their own programs where they keep track of what they're saying. And if I looking back at everything that I wrote, There is no, I love you, Debbie. It's honey, my love, my sweet, my wife. They never say your name. And if you think about that, it's because they're working 50 100 200 women, you can't keep their names straight. So it's a generic my love. And as the person on the other side, you're thinking, oh my gosh, she's talking to me. He's talking to my heart. Well, he is they and they are now knowing what the whole story is. I wondered that too, because I kept my journal. So I could always go back to my journal and read it. And then question based on what he had said, or I say he again, it's a they. And I wondered how he remember how did he remember looking after the fact how did he remember that? And that's when I was told well, you know, they keep it's like a call center now and you call it and you're talking to Netflix, or whoever and they're keeping customer information, that's what they did. It's just very professional. And if they could do what they do for good that they did for bad they'd be phenomenal.
Calla: Right? That's how it always works.
Leanne: There has to be some people in your life that It kind of we're raising eyebrows and saying like, hey, Debbie, you might want to rethink some of this. Like, did you have any of that friends or family?
Debby Montgomery Johnson: I did. I had at the beginning it was my boys. I've got four kids and my older sons were like, Mom, don't don't don't. Well, I don't know if you guys have kids. But when I hear Don't, don't, don't. I mean, I’m the adult here leave me alone.
Leanne: I don't have kids. I still don't like don't
Debby Montgomery Johnson: I didn’t either. And I think Okay, so now I'm alone. Your dad's not here. My youngest was still home, but he was very involved in football. So he wasn't around. And this was my, this was my lifeline. He was my lifeline. So when my boys said don't, and my girlfriend's were who were very excited at first started wondering what's going on here. She's not really talking about it. Then I said, Okay, guys, you either have to stop or I'm not going to tell you anything. And that's exactly what the scammer wants. They want to isolate you from friends and family, so that you don't listen to what they're saying. And you get caught up in in the whole story caught up in the emotions of it, and the adrenaline and the love and all the things that you think is going on. It's actually technically called an amygdala hijack, where your your sensories are just hijacked by all the things that you want to happen, and the relationships that you want to have. And to the point where I stopped telling my kids and my friends what was really going on. I never told them about the money, they would have just jumped all over me. Because I thought I was preparing my future with a man that's going to pay me back. He's gonna bring some good money in and we're going to have a lovely life. And that journal is going to be the history and my kids can look back on it and say, Wow, that was really cool, mom.
Leanne: Yeah, even. I mean, I can relate to that. And I think anyone who's been in a toxic relationship can relate to the ignoring the red flags and protecting this thing that you just wholeheartedly want to be your future and your truth. And you sacrifice your boundaries and your time. And maybe you're not getting treated the way you know, you should, but you just have this vision that you can't shake. I feel like a lot of people have been in that place. Even if it doesn't have to do with an online scam. So I can I can see how-
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
At the end, I got to the point when I found out it was a scam. I'm thinking well, if you can't my counsel to everybody is if you haven't seen the whites of their eyes in two weeks, it's a scam. And then I met Benita Alexander and I don't know if you know Benita’s story, but she was an NBC reporter out in New York, who was in got engaged to an international surgeon, Italian, look at it, look it up. She was gonna get married to this man and huge wedding in Rome and invited an incredible group of array of international celebrities, whatever. And it turned out that he was truly a an international surgeon, but a charlatan and a scam artist and a had multiple families and unbelievable. And she had lived with him, you know? And I'm thinking, Oh, wow. So we can all get taken at some point in our life. And so the naysayers and I had that one time when I after I came out with my story. And I was speaking to a group of women, I had one lady just look at me and I call it the stink eye. And I'm thinking, Okay, I could just, I could stop right now. I don't have to tell a soul until I looked at the woman beside her whose head was bobbing up and down. And I'm thinking, I'm talking to her. I don't need to talk to that other one because God bless her. And I hope surely nothing ever happens to her. But I found that something's going to happen to every one of us at some point in our lives. And don't be the victim blamer because the victim could be you. It could be your mother, it could be your daughter. And
Calla: None of us are immune to deceit, right? Like it's just none of us are immune from that.
Debby Montgomery Johnson: No. And the millennials are actually being taken more on the scams now. And you saw that Tinder Swindler, That's what we call that financial that well, they weren't quite in a financial thing. But the big thing taken the millennials right now its a terrible name, but it's called pig butchering. And it comes out of China. And if you think about getting the the pigs ready for slaughter, they're just they're bringing it in. And it's a short term. It's not a real romantic relationship, but it's social engineering. It's a relationship fraud, where they bring in and then within a week or two, they're saying, Hey, I've got this great investment. And typically, it's cryptocurrency. And so our dear millennials who are growing up in on the internet thinking they're so safe because they know how to work it. All of a sudden now they've got this new friend is going to teach them how to do cryptocurrency and how to invest and they bring them in, they make some money, they give it back now they invest more and within you know, all of a sudden now you've got all your investments and all your savings in this investment, and poof, they're gone. So our young men and women are not happy victims. They're pretty ticked off. Where are the older victims that have been through the relationship? long term relationship? And, you know, for me, it was two years. For most, it's four to six, eight months, maybe a year. And it's getting faster as they get better. It's just what took two years for me. They're doing it six to eight months now. Unbelievably quick.
Calla: Why do you think people are so susceptible to just that? Is it is it the loneliness? Is it
Debby Montgomery Johnson: It's not loneliness. It's, I mean, it might be, but I never, I never thought of being lonely. I liked the companionship. I liked having someone to talk to me. And one of my girlfriends who's passed away in the last couple years, she was a psychologist, and she said, Deb, when she when she got to talk to me and start pulling feelings out, she said, all those 20 something years you were married, your insides. If you think of a piece of Swiss cheese, you had a hole in you, that felt like it hadn't been listened to. Ding, ding, ding! That’s true. I had a very smart husband, bold, bodacious, brilliant, but he didn't always listen to me. And I didn't want to have any contention. So I just kind of said, Yep, then let him do his thing. And I did mine. And we had, you know, we had a wonderful family. But in that particular spot, I did have a big hole that hadn't been listened to. So 4000 pages later, guess who's been listening to me? And he said the right things, and he would send poems. I mean, there are guys, there are scammers that will send candy, they'll send flowers, they'll send physical items. Now, that didn't happen to me. But they're trying to validate who they are, and make you feel like they're for real. And so again, I thought he was my forever for real guy. And I'm sure the blinders just, you know, now looking back that of
Calla: Ofcourse, yeah, you can look back and see things that you wouldn't have been able to see when you were in it. I think that's
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
Which is true for even a relationship in person.
Calla: Correct. Yeah. Yeah.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
Talk to any of my divorced friends, and they're wishing that they had…
Calla: I’m married to someone with an accent and I still feel like I'm getting swindled sometimes.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
I won’t tell him.
Leanne: I'm so curious, though. Like, what was the the turning point where you finally discovered and had to accept, okay, this, this is a scam. This isn't real.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
Okay. On September 10 2012, he came online. We were typing and he said, Deb, how do you feel about forgiveness? Well, we've had many spiritual discussions over the years. So I put on my spiritual hat. And we start talking about this and forgive seven times 70 or seven times 7000, or whatever. And so I felt like, okay, so this is, this is a good conversation, and then we get disconnected. And a few hours later, he came back and said, revisit this, and I'm like, Have I done something wrong? Why are we talking about forgiveness? And I obviously think now, did I do something? Why do we do that fallback? And he said, I have something to tell you, it's gonna hurt you. And I just wanted to know that you could forgive me for hurting you. And I'm thinking, Well, you don't have to hurt me really need to do this. And he said, I have a confession to make. And when I heard that, it was like a gut punch. Because I had heard that once in my marriage, and it didn't turn out to be a very good thing. And so I was just on edge. And he said, I have a confession to make. This has all been a scam. Thinking, what what's been a scam? Are you sick, something's wrong. And he said, No, this is all been a scam. And I'm really sorry. And I said, now you're lying to me. Now you have to prove to me that you're telling me the truth. And he said on Yahoo chat, there's a small camera. I'd been asking for that for two years. He goes, I'm going to show you how to how to open that up. And I'm going to come on live. And I'm thinking, Oh, so you visualize this, I have dual screens on my computers. I'm looking at my handsome Brit. And up pops this little square corner in my corner. And now live, I'm seeing a dark haired, dark eyed, dark skinned young man with a big smile on his face. And I think, oh my gosh, what have I done? And for me, that was like hitting a brick wall. It was just that was the turning point. It was. I look back now and it was a blessing that it happened. Because it was that brick wall. It was that stop in the moment. And oh my gosh, now that my heart was was separated from my head. And my logical head said, Okay, pick up your phone and take a picture of him. And if you look at the book, there is one picture of him and it was that moment when he had just confessed to me. And then I started thinking, Well, I've watched a lot of shows. I know what the FBI can do, keep them going, keep him engaged, keep them and the reason I had a smile on his face is because he said that he developed feelings. Add over those two years, which may or not be true. And I've got, you know, the director of S.C.A.R.S said that’s just part of the scam. But I got to figure that over two years when you get to know somebody you know them really well. And even if a little bit of light love could have overshadowed his horrible life, then have at it. But I was just thinking that you know what he wanted to keep it going because I said I couldn't obviously. But he was a friend now. I mean, I gotten to know him really well or I thought I got to know him. And I'm thinking to that there's part of his story, which has got to be true, because you can't live for two years and to have all of it a lie. Some of it's got to be true. And at that point, I'm I'm like, okay, so how can I keep this going and get him caught? But not let him know that I'm doing that. And so I played along for a little while. It'd be even though inside I was dying. I was just devastated financially. And when he said, Can we keep this going? And I'm like, Are you out of your mind? And he said, Is it because I'm young and black? And I'm like, Well, maybe but no, it's because you lied for two years. And you stole over a million dollars from me. And I know that there's this usually this air suck. When people hear the dollar amount. I didn't have a million dollars in the bank. I found it because he was family. I sold jewelry. I sold investments on my retirement accounts. You know, I got rid of my retirement accounts, because he always promised to pay me back quickly. Because I'm thinking, Okay, I'm gonna get penalties on this stuff. You got to pay me back within 90 days, 180 days, whatever the limit was, I knew it, then I have conveniently forgotten. And he goes I promise. I promise, I promise. Well, at that point. Now what do I do? And so I, I just disconnected on that conversation. And I called my mother and dad. The reason I called them, they they kind of knew what's going on. They never knew I'd sent that much money. But I did ask them to help me on one final payment. Because we were so close. At least I thought we were we were getting the money. I was just about coming over and I needed $100,000. And I didn't have it. I couldn't come up with it. So I called my parents. And my father who's retired dentist was a little reluctant at first because I said, Dad, don't tell mom. He goes Nope. I've been married for 55-60 years. I will tell your mother
Leanne: kind of love that answer to be honest.
Calla: Yeah, I do too.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
Yeah. And so they went ahead with it, because they figure for two years couldn't possibly be a scammer for two years. Maybe earlier on Yeah, but not now. So. And I promise, we promised that we would pay them back with a really good interest as soon as he got home. And so I I was devastated on their behalf. And I didn't care. I can't say I didn't care about the money for me. But of all the money that I lost. That was the money that hurt the most. Because they trusted me. I'm the only daughter and I felt so responsible and had for tab for 10 years, I was able to actually I've remarried, that’s the happy part. But my husband and I were able to buy a home from my mom and dad. And I finally felt like I had completely paid them back. Even though I've done it probably 10 times over. My father works for me and I take care of most of their expenses. But my heart just was so heavy that I had brought them in and scammers do that they try to get you to get your friends involved. You know, find the money somewhere, ask your friends, ask your family, go to the bank. I have women who have who have mortgaged their homes, they've taken loans out, they've just and when the scam happens to them, they lose their home, they lose their retirements, they lose their friends, they lose their family, they're so depressed and many have lost their lives because they don't know where to go. And that's the that's the horrendous part about this, especially for the older women. They may be on a fixed income at that point because they've retired and they had money. But when the scammer takes everything that they have, they see no hope for the future. They seem they're so embarrassed or so afraid because now he's got their address. Even though he's is sitting over in Nigeria or somewhere across the pond is scoured, he'll never get here. They don't know that and they're afraid. They’re afraid for everything. They're afraid of their shadow. And that's the hard part about this whole relationship fraud is that it really hurts you from the inside out.
Calla: Such a violation.
Leanne: Yeah, yeah, exactly. And then there you talk a lot about the shame that comes with all that like how long did it take you to be able to feel comfortable to share what had happened to you?.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
Quite a while actually except I I don't know how I did this but I started dating within months. Online but I always I always saw them in person and the guys are like that I did Meet the gentleman that I that I married, I met him through friends and one of their friends was a matchmaker. And she had done her due diligence, and he just lived down the road. So that was really fun. On our third, I guess it was our second date, he told me something very vulnerable about him. And I'm thinking, Okay, so here's the time for me to tell you what happened to me. And I let it out on our second date. I think we were sitting at Denny's for breakfast at dinner. And hours later, it all came out. And I'm like, if you can understand what I went through, and thank you for telling me what happened to you. Because you're the first man in two years that has told me the truth. I said, I think this is this is pretty fun. And I never dated anybody after that.
Leanne: That's your husband?
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
Three years later, we were married. And we've been together almost seven years. So it was, it was extraordinary. But for me, I still hid it for a while. It was probably this happened in 2012. About 2015 is when I started writing the book. And the reason for the book is I was sitting at a women's business meeting in Fort Lauderdale with good friends. And at lunchtime, one of them's mentioned online dating, and she still tells me that I must have rolled my eyes at her. And she goes, What's that? And I told her the story. And she said, Deb, you have to tell and I'm not going to tell I can't tell. I'm so embarrassed, you know, I'm too smart, too talented to trained. And she said my mom was taken for 80,000. And then someone else came up and said they are in a Ponzi scheme twice. And then another one and another another. And I had all these women coming up saying, you know, we've been taken, we've been taken but nobody spoke up. And over that weekend, I crafted a close to a talk where I invited everyone to the world premiere of the woman behind the smile movie. And the room was dead silent. And they said, When can we get tickets? I said, I just made that up. Oh, no. Oh, no. You got to write your book. And that that got me introduced to a gentleman actually, who was the executive producer for the Larry King Show. And, we became friends. And he said, Oh my gosh, I gotta get to a seven. And so within days of meeting him he had, he had me talking to a screenwriter in California. And the first thing the guy wanted to know was So what happened when he met him when you saw him when he found him? I said,
Calla: Well, that was one of my questions.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
I didn't I didn't find him. And I wasn't because the only way that I was going to find them is if I went to Nigeria. And even after the FBI said there's nothing they could do because he's over there. I'm thinking this is dead. This is a done deal. I'll never get my money back. I'll never do anything about this. And the guy goes, well, I can't take you on to the Oprah show. And when she asked you how was it when you saw him in person? You went I didn't. She goes, there's no story there. Like, you're not seeing the picture here.
Calla: Yeah, there's a big story there.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
The big story, but it kind of went away. But after that was really interesting. There was a local, I was on a board of a nonprofit here. And I was at a meeting and we were planning something and one of the girls, I had my book with me and one of the girls was a reporter for the Palm Beach post. And she said we're going to do something. I said fine. They came out with a three page three pages of a weekend newspaper, three pages on me in the local section, like front page on my oh my gosh. Well, that's when I learned don't read what this what the riffraff to saying at the bottom. You know, when on the online stuff, all the bottom feeders. Oh my gosh, my girlfriend's called up that Don't you dare read that don't you’ll never speak again. And I didn't and I called the reporter. So we're gonna get some of that off. She said, but here's the trick. Don't read what they say because you're not talking to them. And that was the best thing that anybody could have ever told me. Because since then, I've spoken out a lot. And when I first came out, I think what happened there was this switch in me when I realized that the story is not about me anymore. The story is about so and so's mother, sister, all these other people. And I said, Yes, I was terribly embarrassed, but it happened. And a woman that interviewed me once said it happened for a reason. She goes if you believe in God, he let this happen because he knew you would speak up. At some point you would speak up about what happened. And I'm like, You know what? That's right. I never wanted what soon as the FBI said that I was manipulated in a victim like nope.
Calla: Changing the narrative
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
I did not want to have that label. I had been someone's mom, daughter, wife all those things but did not want to be labeled the victim. And I wasn't going to read the bottom feeder stuff. I wasn't going to look at those women that were given me the stink eye for me. It was more important to be there to either try to I hate the word try to strive to To protect someone from this happening to them, or to be there to help them recover afterwards, because if you can't stop them within the first couple of weeks, they're sucked into the story. And then they're going to be broken broken at some point. And that's when we pick them up. To do that, I would rather than hear the story beforehand, and because there's nothing breaks my heart more than I get an email from someone who said, I wish I had heard your story before. So thank you. I'm thanking you guys for helping me get the word out. Because it happens to our mothers, our sisters, our friends, all ages, all colors, our religion, men and women. Every Age is happening to them. And with the pandemic. The numbers have skyrocketed, around the world. And it's really sad. It's sad.
Leanne: That's what I'm so curious about, like, since you are on the other end of this, and you help people through this on their end as well. Is there like a process that you've noticed, like repetition of how these scammers work people like words that they use to coerce them are like a step by step kind of
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
I wouldn't use the word course, is total manipulation. And it's, it's something they're very good at. Like I said, if, if they could do something for good, they'd be phenomenal. If you read my story, and just change the names change where they're at. They have playbooks, they actually sell playbooks on how they do this. And the things that they say the the poems that get written, I mean, Google a poem, I did, actually, a couple of them didn't show up on one of them. One of them didn't. But I remember he sent music to me, and I would sit here for hours listening to these great songs, and I think I still have them on my desktop. And I need to just get rid of them. Because part of the past, you know, they're great stories, but I'm like, I don't have those feelings. But yes, they say very similar things. And if you get anybody Well, first off the pictures, realize that the pictures you're seeing on Facebook, on any social media, they could all be, they could all be hijacked, or their impersonations, so many of them are impersonations, if they say there were widower, careful, if they say they're single, and they're in their 50s, careful, if they say they're on an oil rig, or the ones that gripe me the most are the ones that come across as being military. I'm former Air Force, I have kids on active duty in the army in the Marine Corps, and my my nephew's in the Navy, these guys that come across as military members in Syria, in Iraq, it were asking for money to get sent home. That's total BS. And anybody that knows the military knows that the problem is most of the people that are being contacted by these guys have had no military experience had no idea that the military would never allow you to be over there and not pay for you to get home. You know, they are banking, and they're going to the bank, actually, with the military pictures for women in in the Far East, the Philippines, Malaysia, the ones that see an American and a uniform and say, Oh, he's trustworthy. I can get out of my country here. And I can go to the United States. You know, I get I get many that I'll say, Well, this guy says he's working for the UN. He's a doctor working for the UN. And he's over there and he can't get home and he needs money for his son. Bah, bah, bah. It's all mentalize. Okay. Don't believe any of it and don't believe it before. When you look at the pictures if the pictures look too good. He’s a scammer. So a reverse search, if you can, they've gotten really good. That doesn't always work. But especially if they're military, find somebody who knows a military uniform. Many times you can actually see the name tag, and it doesn't match the name on the profile. And I'm like, Oh my gosh,
Leanne: they're not even trying!
Calla: And on the flip side of it, too, you said that they will look for people that have the widowed to like that's the other flip side of it is that they do kind of prey on status, and emotions and people
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
They do and on the dating sites, there's no reason you should have that you're a widow or divorcing on a dating site. You should be single. But I just I just threaded a Google article today. I don't remember who wrote it, but they're talking about Tinder Swindler, and they're saying that most people like 60% of people on Tinder are married or in a relationship just looking around.
Leanne: I fully believe that.
Calla: Oh, yeah. That's crazy. So you came in on it. Debbie with like, when kind of the dating sites were first coming out and becoming a thing. And then Leanne , you've been you've done online dating before because that's just like your generation. I missed it all. I know I feel so lucky after conversations. like this for sure, but I mean, I just I don't have that understanding or that awareness, like, like y'all do what's really out there. So I think it's really important.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
And it is really blown up. My daughter's a single mom. And she's been doing the swiping, and all that I'm like, Jenny, just be careful, just be careful. And fortunately, you know, she knows what happened to me. So she is really careful. And so she'll call me up, or my one of my girlfriends is just recently separated, and she'll call up and she goes, Oh, this guy's wonderful. I'm like, Okay, let me see. My guidance is have a dating buddy. Don't try to do this on your own. Because you just get hijacked, the emotions just take over. And then your logical brain is just out the door, and then forget it. You don't want to hear anybody telling you no, no, no.
Leanne: Yeah. How did you gain your trust back when you were dating your your current husband?
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
When he sat down at dinner that night and said, Deb, my friends told me not to tell you this, but I'm going to, and he told me that he had been in recovery. And I like you know it. And he's been so supportive of me, because he knows, the more I talked about it, like going into recovery, the more you talk about it, the better you feel, the stronger you get from the inside out. And he's been my number one supporter, and I learned to trust him. Now. I'm not very trusting of others. I'm very careful with my company and with business too. And I've learned to many of the shiny objects, syndromes where you think, Oh, this is really good. And this is true about anything that that someone's trying to get you to buy. If there's this rush, rush rush to to do it, you got to take like your grandmother, she has to say, you know, sleep on it, take pause. And if it's still good tomorrow, then perhaps, but the dating stuff, just be really careful. I like to say beware and be aware. And do your due diligence, do your homework, because unless you want to, you know, unless you go out on the street, you give 10,000 to the guy that's sitting on the street, you don't want to be given that money away, pay yourself first. And if anybody ever asked for money, or Bitcoin or cell phones or anything, the answer is no, no, no.
Calla: Right? What about being the voice for this has been difficult to navigate for you.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
It's really not difficult now, once I started speaking about it, and was recognized as the person that it happened to and realize that, okay, it can happen to anybody. And it happened to me. So just like I said, Don't read what they say. Because, that can stop anybody from doing anything. And when I decided to not put myself around the naysayers anymore, I've lost friends. I've lost friends because of this. Yeah. Because they don't understand why I found it important to speak up.
Leanne: They wanted you to be quiet about it?
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
Yeah. Yeah. They didn't want me to say anything about it. They didn't want me to talk about what how would embarrass yourself, like, embarrass your family. I mean, when I owned up to my kids and my family, there were the most important to me. When they realized that there was an important lesson in what happened here that it can happen. It can happen to me, it can happen to anybody. And when I watched the Dr. Phil's of the world, I get what they're trying to do, but they're not helping the victim when they out somebody like that. It makes the family feel really great. And the public smile Oh, well, um, it was really an idiot. Unless you're in it, you don't understand it. And the women that get outed on those shows are leaving, they're not they're hearing it, you know, they're not believing it. They're not believing in their heart. And the one gift to me was that day that I saw him online in person there when I saw his face, because instantly I could put a face with a story and I had for me closure. Most of the women I deal with, they were ghosted, you know, they lost all their money. And all of a sudden, this they call the scammer on that the scammer gets angry, the scammer gets aggressive. And then it's over. And now they're left. Oh my gosh, what have I done? I ruined my life. I ruined you know, they're still hoping that that person will come back. There was no closure there. And there's no answer to what happened for them. And so if that had happened to me, when when my to go back a little bit when Lou died. He left here on a Wednesday and Thursday morning, he was dead. He died of a heart attack while he was traveling. We never saw him. So when this happened online, if he had just gone away, what it felt like he had died. And now I was a million dollars out, you know, and I'd participated in it. So I would I don't know how I would have gotten over that. So it was a blessing in disguise when he actually came online and confessed to me.
Leanne: Yeah, I feel like that's very rare. I only ever hear of being ghosted.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
It is very rare, unless they get angry. And here's the other thing about the “they” part of it. You have a guy that might be starting it and he's the romancer and you know, he does the beginning stuff then you have the guys that Get into the ask and the money part. And then you get into the closers who keep things going. Or if you run out of money, they turn you into a money mule. And that's the other side of the story to now is money mules package meals where they get you to not give your own money, but open your bank account up so that they can have people send you checks, or they send you packages. And so now you become the middleman. And now you're complicit. Okay, that's really dangerous for, for victims who become money mules. And so it's just, it's, there's, there's just the cycle, and it doesn't stop. But if you call them on it, and this is where it's going, if you call them on it, then they get aggressive. And then they start using these techniques where you know, if you've sent pictures, which more of the younger women do this and the older ones, they send naked pictures. Well, now they're gonna say, Well, I'm gonna show everybody your pictures. I was just reading a story about that, where it goes, you know, from this relationship fraud to extortion, because now they're holding that over you. And that is a crime. I read an article about, you know, can relationship scammers be charged with in South Africa. And it turns out that if they do that, then it's more of an extortion thing, because they're holding that against you. So it is a crime. These guys are criminals. They are organized crime, because it's it's a multibillion dollar organization around the world. And there, they don't need a million dollars from one person, they need $250 from a million people. And they get it, they get it from everybody, because everybody at some point is willing to do something. And it might not be for love. It might be a purse that you want to buy or maybe something small that you don't want to report. But we've all been taken because of something.
Calla: So what was your first step. I guess. Once you saw him, and you're like, oh, my gosh, this, you know, I have did you go to the police? I mean, how does what has that whole process been like for you?
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
No, and actually, we encourage people to report as soon as possible. And it's a process you cannot go into a police department with your hair on fire because they're just gonna think you're some lunatic person. You gotta go in and in S.C.A.R.S, and again the Society of Citizens Against Relationship Scams, we have a website called romance scamsnow.com, we have a three step process for victims. And the first thing is totally disconnect from whoever this person was, you do not want to keep it going like I did, thinking that I was going to catch them, you're not going to be able to catch them. The next thing is reported and have your facts. They don't care about the emotions. They want to know, where did it happen? How did it happen, how much money gets sent? Where did the money go? If you accepted packages, here's the thing, if the if you've been a mule, if you've accepted packages, you've accepted checks or something, you got to report that to your bank. Be proactive because if they come at you, they're now arresting 80 year old women for being money mules. One lady down in Louisiana was there going to put her in jail, because she kept doing it after they said stop, this is a scam. So you got to be really, really careful. So it's just a matter of of report, because you also like in state of Florida, you may be able to get victims assistance for rent, or for therapy, something that you may not be able to afford, because you've given it all up. So you've got to just eat your ego on this one. And say you walk into a police department and say I just want a written report number. You don't they don't have to believe you, they can't do anything, they cannot get your money back the local cops. FBI probably cannot get your money back, report it to IC three.gov Report to any scam.org There are places to put the FTC is really good place to report it now the ftc.gov. And so it's important to get it out there not that you're going to get anything back. But because the numbers we have to build up the numbers of of credible victims. So that government will finally take notice, you know, unless Zuckerberg mother or Amanda Ginsburg from match or someone you know high up unless their mother gets taken. This is not going to be a big issue for social media, because they don't understand it because the victims don't speak up. If one out of 100 people reports and this is billions of dollars, imagine what the real number is. But people are too afraid to speak up. We need to help our law enforcement understand there's got to be victim advocates in each law enforcement office. That as in domestic violence years ago, you know, if you walked in with a black eye 50 years ago, they say go home and be nice to your husband. You walk in today, they go and arrest the guy immediately. There's got to be someone there that understands what's happening here and can just help the victim through it and realize that help them realize they're probably not going to get their money back because that's rare, especially with the Bitcoin transactions now. poof, gone, you know, money's gone. Wire transfers. Why didn't the bank say something to me? I'd been a banker, I knew my way around banking, which was probably my downfall because I knew other bankers. If the bank had done a fraud investigation or just a look at my accounts when I'm doing a wire, I hadn't done a wire for 50 years. And then all of a sudden for two years, I'm doing 25,000 50,000 $100,000 wires. Isn’t that a red flag to somebody. So there's, there's a line between protecting their privacy and protecting your money. I, I hope over time that it's getting better, I actually realized that fidelity, I just use them. As an example, I met one of their reps. And he said, Deb, enough of our clients had been taken that we actually have a trusted contact, that has to be filled in on the if you're opening up a new financial account, you have to designate somebody as a fine as a trusted contact. And if the reps think that there's some sort of scam or fraud going on, they are allowed to go to that trusted contact, who could be a spouse, it could be a child, it could be whatever. Now, I wouldn't have liked that if they had gotten to my kid. But I've heard of people who have gone to a trusted contact, and they were able to thwart the fraud. The client was really ticked off. But they saved hundreds of 1000s of dollars
Calla: It’s a safeguard for a little bit of annoyance, I guess, or what could be annoyance.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
And if you decide to keep, you know, to walk away from your financial institution, and keep doing it anyway. Well, it's your choice at that point. We can only warn you, we can't stop you.
Leanne: Do you know of any statistics or like how often this is actually happening to people?
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
I want to say like every second around the world, the numbers are on romancescamsnow.com. I don't have them in front of me. They change every minute, you know, I do know that it's like one in one in 10. That reports.
Leanne: I was just wondering, because I mean, it's huge.,
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
It's much bigger than we ever think. Because people aren't talking about it.
Calla: Yeah. And I was shocked to to find that, like, a lot of the time people think that it's just happening to women, but the amount of scams that men like that was so shocking, because I was as I was reading your book, and I even had the thought like this happening to men, like what is happening here, you know, and then as I read on, yes, it is. And they're actually a bigger percentage of the people being taken.
Leanne: I’ve watched 90 Day fiance.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
Never seen that. But when I went into the FBI, they said, Deb, there are more men in Palm Beach County that get taken for over a million than women, but they'll never talk, And that's because they're businessmen, and they don't want anybody to know that they did it. They're angry because they've gone into it thinking they were going to help this woman. And now they don't know if it was the man or woman that scammed them.
Leanne: And it's the shame keeping everybody quiet, too. That's the sad part. And it kind of does. I mean, I've had my own shame and in my own life, and it it does hold you hostage and kind of keeps you paralyzed and quiet until the last thing you want to do is share, you know what happened, but it does free you from from the binds of it.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
It does. And the first time that you tell it, you don't have to tell everybody everything. And we tell our victims who I like to call survivors, we tried to we encourage them to find somebody they trust. If it's not their friends and their kids yet, at some point, you're gonna have to tell your family, you don't have to tell them how much you lost. But you just have have to say, hey, you know, I'm in a situation now where, for me, my kids didn't, I didn't want to have to go live with them. Fortunately, I didn't lose my house. But many victims have lost their homes. They need to know that they can go somewhere that someone will be willing to take them in and just say I get it, you know, but usually they're angry. From a bankers point of view. I mean, the worst customers I had were my customers kids who thought that they now had no inheritance and I'm thinking you know what? You're not entitled to your mother's inheritance.
Leanne: Wow. Yeah. Right. What a reaction.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
And scamming, I'd seen a report that 60% of fraud happens by family members.
Leanne: To members.
Calla: True. Oh my god. Yeah, I didn't even think about that
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
Or caregivers. The other thing, especially down here in South Florida is we have a lot of caregivers and family members are not local. And one of my friends, our I guess it was her great aunt turned out she had been cleaned out by her caregiver who had was in cahoots with a neighbor, and he set up an online banking account using her credentials which got from the caregiver Here's one thing we try to tell our folks is make sure if you've got banking and online banking access, open up the online banking yourself. Because otherwise, it's an account that's sitting there that has no online banking presence. And a scammer can get your credentials and go and wipe you out, check your savings accounts. Here's the thing. Most people look at their checking accounts, they don't look at their savings accounts, right? Look at your checking account, or your savings accounts because they can funnel money, they get money out of savings accounts. And it's, there's just so many protections that we aren't even thinking about. I had had a friend who called up and she said, Hey, I know what happened to you need to help me my next door neighbor just called me and said she wants me to help her take a picture of her credit card, so she can send it to her friend.
Leanne: Even I know that one, yeah.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
This is an 80 year old lady, let's say no, why don't you go over there and stop her right now. By the time she got there, she didn't have to take a picture. She told the guy the numbers. And then when she called the credit card company, my friend wasn't wasn't the family member and the credit card companies like you can't call us and tell us to put a flag on that. The old lady has to well, the old lady didn't think it was fraud. So it's the scammers. They're laughing the word of the bank, because they got away. Yeah, they got it.
Calla: And essentially, because there's so much information that they have, before they even get to the target, you know that they can they can hone in on a certain demographic or certain things like that. It's just it's absolutely terrifying.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
And watch what you put out on your social media. Everyone thinks that oh, we've got we have all these friends. Well, you only have about 20 friends on Facebook that are watching what you're doing. You don't need that. I've interviewed young kids who think well, I need 20,000 followers. I'm like, No, you don't, because about 19,000 of those were scammers. So you don't need to put out that your where you're living or your age or your you know marital status, because you don't need to that's not the presence, you know, locked down your privacy locked down your pictures. I have a lot of friends who share pictures of their kids. Well guess what my scammer had his family. Where does pictures come from? They got hijacked off of someone's social media profile. I don't put pictures of my grandkids on site. And I actually got blasted by my by my kids one time that I tried. They're like, Mom, that's not your business, putting our kids pictures up there.
Calla: I've had that conversation too.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
hurt your feelings.
Calla: I know, one thing to be prideful of that, but it is it's a privacy. It's a privacy concern for sure.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
And I worry about our teenagers, you know, taking the scan down to another level. The girls around here, boys too, but I'll talk to the girls. They're 13 to 18. They're playing lacrosse at the local high school at three o'clock. And this is what I look like, Aren't I pretty? Well, that's all over online. Traffickers. predators know exactly what those girls look like and where they're going to be. And poof, they're gone.
Leanne: Oh, that's terrifying.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
The other thing about the young women is that they don't have the money, but they have access to their parents credit cards. Think about that. They can be buying iTune cards, mom and dad probably won't pay attention. You know, unless it's big amounts of money. But they're looking for love. They want a friend. And if they can help their friend by getting them a new phone, or by buying an iTunes card, they'll do it. But yeah, lots of rich kids around here. You know, they can do that. So it's a vicious circle, unfortunately.
Calla: I guess so. I can only imagine some of the other conversations that took place for you when you were going through this. Is there any I'm just curious, that stands out to you, or conversations that really had an impact for you when you were going through this?
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
I mean, after the after the event or during
Calla: both? Is there moments where you're like, Okay, I know, I'm gonna get to the other side of this because of these conversations that I've had.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
I think when I realized that I wasn't alone, and thank goodness for my parents support from the very beginning. The hardest thing for me was to tell the kids and actually my oldest son who is military pilot, just he heard a recording. I had been on a radio show, and I sent the recording to my daughter in law. And she was listening to it. And I hadn't told my son yet. And he heard a part of the recording. He came un glued. And so he Skyped me, and if you could come through the screen on a computer, he would have done it. And, and I realized at that point I it changed our relationship, but it changed it for the good because he was the one that got the call about his dad dying. He was 23 at the time. And at that point he had taken on the mantle of protector, mom's protector. And when I didn't tell him what was going on, he thought I didn't trust him. Maybe I didn't, but I didn't want him to take on this responsibility. So because he had nothing to do with it, he tried to warn me. And I just like, You know what? I'm not going to lose the house over my head. I'm not coming to live with you. I don't need your money. Unfortunately, he was coming up for a security clearance background check. And I said, Hey, I've had those. I went to the FBI. It's not like I paid a million dollars to a Nigerian National. And did it willingly and knowingly? I did not I have recorded it, I reported it. It's nothing for you to worry about. Let it go. And when I assured him that of those things, he's like, okay, he goes, Can we talk if something comes up? Like? I
Calla: For sure. Keep me in the loop. Wow.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
Yeah. So we've had it changed just for the good. And honestly, for everybody that I've talked to, since it really opened up our relationship, and the people that didn't want to hear it or didn't understand it, that kind of poo pooed me, because a lot of those people, I had given money to his friends and didn't get back. And I'm thinking, I cannot be willingly giving money to anybody anymore. Just except for myself, and you know, my immediate family. But I can't do that anymore. And that was tough. Because I felt like I've I've always been willing and able to give. And I don't do that now. I'm very careful with who I give to. Because especially those of us that give money to family or friends. It's a gift at that point, unless you have it in writing. Don't expect to get it back even though you're assured that it will come back. Some friends I've lost because it never came back. And I think if you don't pay up, you feel uncomfortable. Yeah, that separates you from from folks. So the money situation if somebody asked you for money, my get down and dirty talk now is no. Yeah,
Leanne: yeah, that's what my dad has always kind of driven.
Calla: Get a job.
Leanne: Me as well. Yeah, figure it out.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
Absolutely, get a job.
Leanne: Did you start the Society of Citizens Against Relationship Scams?
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
No, that was started by Dr. Tim McGinnis. Tim's out of Miami, and I came in probably is one of the more vocal. And it's very difficult because again, it's a volunteer organization. It's a volunteer support organization. Probably we have the Encyclopedia of scams on romancescamsnow.com. Everything you want to know about any kind of scam is going to be on there. Tim, I do host a podcast called Stand up and Speak up and it's live, not video. Here's an interesting, my one of my very first guests was a retired Army Colonel whose picture had been stolen and used by 1000s. Of profilers.
Leanne: Thousand? He must have been a handsome dude.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
He was, and he's retired now. And he was actually on the Mel Robbins show with me. That's where I met him in person. When I went to interview him, it was the very first time I was gonna do a zoom, because normally I do a lot of radio type show. And he said, Deb, I won't be on your show. I said, why? He said, Because scammers can change what I say. They, oh my gosh, they can. Artificial Intelligence is really quite good. And they can make it look like he's saying something that he wasn't really saying. And if you think about this, those of us that have been Netflix binge eaters for the last two years, we watch a lot of shows that are filmed in Spain and Finland and around the world. And we hear English and our eyes are seeing their mouths go thinking they're speaking in English, but they're not. They're speaking in Spanish and French and all this. But our brains are incredible things. They see what they want to see. And the scammers can can do the same thing. Because I have people say, Well, I talked to him, I saw him I saw Instagram pictures, or Instagram videos. They manipulated it. And so that's why my show is is audio only. But Dr. Tim is my sidekick. He goes okay, so you're oh shoot having brain cramp, Johnny Carson, and he's Johnny Carson sidekick. And we're doing a show this week on It's kind of a quarterly uptake, a recap of of the scams that are going on. So it's, it's been very empowering for me, I really get a joy when I have a call with a survivor who, because she either read the book, or she's seen the Zoom calls or the support calls or whatever that we do. She's really gotten over the victim point and says, I can recover, I can do things. We just have to change our expectations in life. And every business owner that has ever made a lot of money has always been on the bottom. Everybody has failed from Warren Buffett to you know, the Jeff Bezos everybody has hit rock bottom is what to do with it. And if you just succumb to why me poor pity me, you're never going to recover and it doesn't matter if you are a romance scam or you got you know, just made a poor business decision. And you're never gonna recover if you have that mindset. So it's it's changed the mindset and realize that we're here for our experiences and the experiences I've had have been priceless, even though it costs a lot of money. I can't take any of that money with me. But the experiences that I've had and the people that I've been able to support. Personally, it's it's worth every penny that I lost. Although I'd like to have some of it back in the bank.
Calla: Right, right. What a testimony to closure to that you have of just being able to navigate worst case scenario and come out even better for it and find love again, and recoup your finances and live your life. I mean, that's amazing.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
I work at it.
Calla: Yeah, it shows, it shows.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
It's a work in progress every single day. It's a mindset change. And what's interesting to me is when I have guests on Thursday, everybody's had a story. It's called Stand up and Speak up. Everybody has had a story in their life where they've had something happen, and they've been afraid to speak about it. But once they talk about it, they get so I call it getting ginned up, and I don't drink but I get ginned up '. But when you realize that there's someone out there that's going through the same thing, and they just need to know they're not alone, they just have to have a handhold. And if I can do that for one person, then opening up on this whole story has been totally worth it. And I fortunately been able to be there for more than one person. And I will continue to do it until social media or the government or somebody really takes this seriously. And I've got to say that I was in Texas in November for a court case one of our survivors had, they had rounded up one of the scammers, he actually confessed he was having a sentencing hearing up in Plano. I flew out there to visit my daughter, but also to support my friend. It was the first time I've gone to court. And we actually saw the scammer. And it was frightening for her for her and a little bit scary for me. I'm thinking, Okay, who is this guy? Well, turns out he's probably 20 or 30 years old. guy. He's a father of a small child. He's from Nigeria, Kenya, United States, married an American got that got dissolved. ICE was sitting there waiting in case that he got out on the day they were going to pick him up and deport him. But there were 80 Plus victims, and they were mostly all over 60 years old. That is a federal crime against the elderly. And my friend was there to give a victim impact statement. She was one of 11 victims willing to speak but only one showed up and it was her. And she did it. She said because I was there to hold her hand.
Leanne: Oh, I just got chills.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
It was wonderful. And when we saw the guy come in, and he was in an orange jumpsuit with handcuffs, we're like, yes, yeah, one of them. But that's where I realized the FBI could make a difference because the evidence that they presented was so thorough. They had accumulated you know, financial forensics had done banking transactions, they had, you know, the Zoom video, the little zoom outside your door. This guy got the ring, the ring, that's what I meant the ring. This guy had had his neighbor's house set up where package was for being delivered there. And he would go intercept before the neighbor got home. Well, he didn't get all of them. And so the FBI was able to get the ring video of him going and talking to his neighbor asking for these packages. And she's like, Well, why are you doing this? You know, or he took videos of himself counting cash gifts, victims that sent money to him. And then that money had to be counted and then sent on to the, to the next scammer. So he had to take videos counting showing he got the cash sound like what an idiot.
Calla: Yeah, so incriminating,
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
Unbelievable, they're not thinking beyond, you know, beyond their nose. But what they do is they they funnel it into organizations in Texas, it was an automobile shipping thing, where they would take all this cash and they would buy cars, and they would ship the cars to Nigeria. Now they've successfully laundered money. The cars get to Nigeria, they get sold over there and the cash goes in the bank. It's brilliant.
Calla: Well, I trust no one.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
No one because think about your emails that you get from Bank of America, Chase, you know, your accounts been compromised. Or check this out. Don't ever click a link on something like that go to the website directly. Because there's a way that they were gonna we're gonna do something because we're not paying attention. We're gonna click because we're not paying attention. Don't do that. And we think we're too smart. But we're like click click click. I mean, I I am very careful. But I noticed every now and then I'm like, oh gosh, why did I do that?
Leanne: Yeah, we're too comfortable with our phones now. It's just another part of us. Easy to get sucked in.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
Exactly. And they are texting all the time. And my mom and dad who obviously know what's going on, you know, they've got a call from where they used to live on the west coast of Tampa has the same area code and everything. And mom's like, well, maybe that's my girlfriend. She's trying to get a hold of me as a mom, if it's somebody that needs to call you to leave a message. Don't answer that unavailable, or don't answer that call from from Tampa, because you think don't, you know, my father in law before he passed away, used to send checks to every organization that sent him a letter. Kids in the reservation or this and that, and we're like, you don't know that these are not scams. You know, just don't?
Leanne: Do you ever feel like, burdened by caution? After all, this has happened to you?
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
No, I think I have a healthy, healthy, but there are a lot of people that are. I give to church, you know, something that I trust. I don't give to just everybody. I mean, if there are kids in the neighborhood? Sure. I'd rather write them a check get their magazine or candy or something. But the guys who come knocking on my door. Nope, I'm sorry. I can't help you today. I'm usually I'm on a I'm on a call. I'm on a business meeting.
Calla: Yeah, just wave them away.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
Contractors, if they're not legit, you know, don't give, don't give money to anybody, if you haven't really done a good check on him. Because down here, too, that that happened a lot more years ago, where they would come and say, I'm gonna fix your pool screen or something. And you give them a deposit, and they never show up.
Leanne: So one of my clients he was having worked on in his house, and it was a husband and wife that were doing the work and the wife couldn't come the second day. So the husband was like, you can just make the checkout to me, but he had already written it out to the company, because he had this weird feeling. And he followed his gut. And he was spot on that, that you know, this guy might be doing some some sneaky stuff. So yeah.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
Just be careful. Just be aware and be aware of these things happen. They happen every day. And it's at that moment, when we're just feeling like, it's not going to happen to us that it happens.
Calla:I'm staying in the woods, y'all. I’m not leaving. I do have one more kind of silly question, because I noticed when you were having the communications with this gentleman and things like I hope and I just want to know, did he ruin poetry for you?
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
No, and I actually write a lot now and I actually just got my first paying gig the other day I usually I write for positive tribe, which is an online magazine. And I've written a couple books. Now. I love to write I don't necessarily write poetry. I do like to listen to it. It hasn't stopped me from listening to songs, except for the three that are better on my screensaver. I've gotta get rid of them. But that's something that we tell the victims too, is like, make sure that you get rid of all that stuff. You know, make a copy of it in case you need it for evidence for a court case, which is rare, but you never know. But then stop looking at it. Don't look at the things. I mean, the one trigger I had was I was actually interviewed by National Geographic for the show trafficked, they did a romance. Season two, I think it was episode two, they were here for a while. And they had me sitting down at my computer and also opening up one of the books and they had me like going line by line. It was really good. Good video. As I was reading it, there was a trigger, they're looking at the words that had been said. And if they, I don't need to be doing this, you know, and the kids probably won't either, and will donate it to a library of something someday. But just put it behind you. When you have it has been revealed that it's a scam, write it down, put it in, you know, in your history. But that's not you don't define yourself by what's happened. It's your past. And if you let it hold on to your present and your future, then you're never gonna get over it, and everybody can get over it. I have a lot of women that just can't get past the money aspect of it. But there's a way you have to reset your expectations and realize that maybe you can't have that housekeeper maybe you can't have that million dollar house but maybe you can have an apartment, maybe you can keep living. You know, I've realized over the years that the greatest thing is your health, your health and your time. It's not the stuff and I've I've had so many friends and business associates that have lost family because of stuff. Not worth it. You know, don't here's the other thing is please don't blame victims for things that have happened to them. They don't need anybody More than themselves. Yes, we blame ourselves enough. There's no glory and victim shaming, victim blaming. Everybody has done something. And we typically don't talk about it. The victims that are strong enough to say something they want your support. They know you can't help them money wise, necessarily, but you can at least hold their hand. And they just want to know that they're not in this by themselves.
Leanne: What would you say to the people who are victims, but maybe haven't come to terms fully with that, that they have been scammed? Like, is there a very fine line between blaming and giving them awareness of their part? In the situation?
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
Yeah, there's a there's a fine line. And we've got to be careful. And I'm more of the heart side of the Tim and Debbie show. Anthropologist, and he's pretty, you know, because he's heard it for 15 years. There is a fine line. And it, we have to acknowledge that we're responsible, we're responsible for that first, hello. And then after that, it's manipulation. So be careful. You don't need the friend request, don't if you don't know somebody, even women's groups, this has happened to some of my friends, women's groups, where they'll get in through a mutual friend, they get themselves into these organizations, because one person has clicked yes, on a friend request. I get this all the time, I get requests from men typically that I have no who have no idea who they are. But they have a mutual friend of mine, or two, or three or four. And I know that these women are not really their friends, but they probably got busy and just said, oh, yeah, I'm going to business, I'll just accept that friend request. Right? Don't do that. Because once a scammer gets in there could even could be a woman picture a woman's picture, right? But just you don't have to have all these friends. Because they're not your friends. If you don't know them. If you haven't met them in person, man. Yeah, I've got a public profile for the woman behind smile. But my personal one, I don't want a lot of people knowing what I'm doing or who's around, you know, be really, really careful and diligent on what you put out there. And even the little games that are played, I've got friends that play, you know, those 25 questions on Facebook? And the answer yes or no to all those things. You know, how many passwords come out of those things? Oh, we're thought about that. You're given all that information out there. So scammer says, Oh, I've got this one. I bet. You know, she grew up in this town. Or the cat's name or something, something we would never think about, but they're not us. They don't think like us, they think so differently. So that's where we get caught. Because they they know how we think they know how our passwords work. And, you know, they can hack into almost anything. So just Just be careful. And and it's important. And I don't want to scare anybody,
Calla: No, I'm going to delete my Facebook. I'm excited for a reason. This is it, Debbie, thank you.
Debby Montgomery Johnson:
Take a break at least take a break for a while.
Calla: No, I come from a line of my my I have a sibling and a parent who are fraud investigators. So I'm used to this world and I have family crisis with the people close to you doing that. So like I totally understand this world and how complex and convoluted it can be. And just thank you from really from my soul, thank you for coming and being so honest and talking to us about it. It's it's a topic that we do need to talk about. And thank you for continuing to have conversations about it even outside of here. I really appreciate it.
Debby Montgomery Johnson: Thank you and it's interesting that you said your family are involved in that it's you don't normally hear from the victim side, there's not a lot of victim support out there. There's a lot of cybersecurity and all the all the things that technological things that are being done, but nobody wants to take on the victims. It's uncomfortable when you got some weaken. And it's unfortunate that you know, even people working in our offices that are paying bills are going to become victims because they're going to get an email saying hey, wire $100,000 to XYZ company in the next 15 minutes. And then finds out that that was that was a BBC now the business email compromised scam where it wasn't the boss actually sending an email. And now that person that has been thinking they were doing with the boss wanted to do is has now given away $100,000 of the company money, they're gonna get fired. They might be liable for it. And all they were trying to do is please the boss. So there's it's part of our lives everywhere in business at home and just be really, really careful before you click or before you send money to anybody. The other thing that big years ago, and I think it's still happening is the real estate escrow accounts. You know, you'll get an email saying hey, put money in your escrow account, and you think it's coming from your banker or from your realtor, and it's a scammer that has spooked all that and now you've lost your escrows So, if there's money to be gained they've got to, they've got a handle on it. And we just have to do our due diligence and be responsible for not letting ourselves be that take that first step. Thank you girls. I really appreciate it.
Calla: Thank you, enjoy the rest of your day we will be in touch. Thank you so much, Debbie.
Debby Montgomery Johnson: Thank you so much.