The cartel gave me three weeks…maybe it was four
Who: Joseph? or was it Gianni? or Kevin? Or Vincent?
City: Passing through South Florida
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Quote: People don’t disappoint you. Your expectations do.
“Years ago, I joined jDate, the online dating site populated by men wearing sunglasses and baseball caps or posting twenty-year-old photographs of themselves. Add in the blurry selfies, and you have a flowchart of the available men in my age group within a twenty-five-mile radius.
Every year, jDate gives me a couple of free days, hoping to lure me back.
This year, I looked.
That’s where I found Joseph — The Viking.
His profile was irresistible. He was a widower, finally ready to date again. A Norwegian who had promised his mother that one day he would reconnect with his Jewish roots. He was an interior designer and architect who was writing a book about the hundred-year history of the house he lived in — how it had evolved over time and the lives of the people who had called it home.
One detail in his profile made me laugh. His dealbreaker was “overhead lighting without dimmers.”
I replied with a single sentence.
“All of my light switches are on dimmers.”
And just like that, it began.
Every day there was another text. Or a short video. He showed me his design firm, talked about an ambitious project in Dubai, and described the ninety days he would be spending there. We discussed architecture, anti- semitism, writing, creativity, and life.
I was dazzled.
No — that’s not the right word.
I was irrational.
I developed genuine feelings for someone I had never met. I reread every text, saving them in a special folder as though they were treasured letters. For nearly a month, I floated.
Then Maria intervened.
Maria is my tech-savvy friend. She became suspicious of the photographs, the texts, the videos, the website — even the Dubai project. She began conducting reverse-image searches and investigating everything I had shared with her.
Joseph from Albany was also Gianni in northern Italy.
Sylvester on the Ivory Coast.
Ramsey.
Jeffrey.
Eric.
Kevin.
Vincent.
Eight different identities.
His accent wasn’t Norwegian. It was German.
His photographs appeared on a scam-tracking website alongside twenty other profiles where he was an engineer, a rental car agent, a construction worker. According to the FBI, he was likely part of an organized criminal cartel whose endgame was simple: gain trust, then ask for money.
Who had I been talking to?
The answer was devastating.
It was a scam.
I had been scammed.
Not financially.
Emotionally.
My feelings had been manipulated. My intelligence had been assaulted.
I called a police detective I know. His advice was immediate and unequivocal:
“Block every number. Block every text. Don’t respond again.”
And just like that…
it was over.”
