A 79-year-old woman died 'almost penniless' after scammers drained her account of £20,000 - taking money until the day she died.
Elaine Chamberlain believed she was in a loving relationship and set to marry one of the fraudsters, sending him money until she had just £120 left.
Elaine died last month.
Son Richard said: “These people were in her head. They knew what they were doing, they made her feel special, they made her feel wanted and good about herself. It didn’t matter what anyone said to her.”
Elaine had been with partner Danny for 32 years until he died in 2013.
Then in 2019 she met someone online.
Ricard said: “I knew scammers were about, so I said to her, ‘you’re sending him money are you?’ and she said that she wasn’t.”
His mother, a former dinner lady, was led to believe that the person she was talking to was a man in his 60s, working abroad as a diver on a ship.
Richard's online research found the profile was a catfish, using a Facebook photo of a man from Wales. His worries were confirmed when he overheard a phone call between the pair.
He said: “You could tell from the voice that it wasn’t the man in the picture.
“I told mum, ‘you’re being scammed’, but she would just say, ‘no I’m not, no I’m not’.”
Richard says his mother became aware that the man she was talking to was not the man in the picture, but says it "did not matter to her".
The Post Office contacted police in early 2020 over concerns about unusual activity from her bank account.
Officers advised her to stop while Richard notified social services and his mum's bank – but she managed to get round the obstacles by visiting money exchange centres to transfer the funds instead.
“I said, ‘what the hell are you doing mum?’ and she said, ‘it’s to help his sick son’.
“I told her it had to stop.”
Richard found receipts showing his mum had been asked to send money to addresses in Leeds and London.
He claims to have told police and urged them to investigate, but says he was told his mum had chosen to send the money, so there was nothing they could do.
He said: “The whole situation with my mum was having an effect on my relationships, I’d hit rock bottom with it.
“I was doing everything I could to stop what was happening but it felt like I was just banging my head against a brick wall.”
Richard tried to get things under control by taking hold of her financial affairs – but discovered on returning home from holiday that she had reversed everything.
“By that point, my mum was brainwashed," he said.
He said by the end of 2020, Elaine was "in really poor health and the house was in a terrible state".
“All she was interested in was this man, she was constantly online talking to him.
“I was looking at my mum and it was like looking at a blank page, all these people had to do was click their fingers and she would do anything.
“I saw her account and there was another £5,000 missing but she denied still talking to him. It hurt to be constantly lied to.”
Richard said he went to see his mum days before she died in May and that she looked in terrible health.
He added: “I could tell she wasn’t taking her tablets or drinking and said that I would get in touch with the doctor.”
Two days later, Richard received news that his mum had been taken to hospital with cellulitis, and within hours she died from multiple organ failure.
He said the scammers tried to call her on FaceTime at the hospital.
“I answered," he said, "and it was a man in his 30s asking for Elaine.
"I said ‘she’s dead, you killed her’, and put the phone down.”
Richard later discovered that his mum died with just £120 to her name.
He also found a wedding dress and two rings in her bedroom. She had sent pictures of herself wearing the dress to the scammers.
He added: “I think my mum knew that the game was up and gave in. She instigated her own death in my opinion.
“I want to speak out about what happened to my mum to try and prevent the same thing from happening to anyone else.
“These scammers are so horrible and nasty, they ruin people’s lives, they ruined my mum’s life.”
