A single mum conned out of a massive £18,000 after being “lured” into “trading” by a smooth-talker on a dating app, has issued a stark warning others to always “listen to your gut feeling”.
Earlier this year, Gabriella Kranyik, 46, a personal fashion assistant from north-west London and mum to teen daughter Stella, 18, was desperately looking for ways to boost her income as she was “struggling financially”.
She met a man named Gabriel on the dating app “happn” though she’s since sussed out the name was likely “fake name” and got sweet-talked into trading within just a fortnight of chatting, believing her cash would be put to good use. But after shelling out £600 and £1,500, Gabriella was gutted when she discovered her ‘profits’ of 52,406.60 US dollars (£39,078.35) were a complete con job.
READ MORE: Vince McMahon claims on Netflix to have ‘three brains’ – one is for ‘fun and sex’
Click for more of the latest news from across the world from the Daily Star.
(Image: PA)
Already £10,000 in the hole, Gabriella tried to claw back some cash through signing up for online work, only to find out, much to her despair, that it was all another scam. Saddled with borrowing about £11,000 from mates and family for both flops, she shared how it left her feeling “embarrassing” and “humiliating”.
She’s since taken to launching a fundraising page, hoping to salvage her finances enough to cover rent, bills and repay the hefty sum she owes, reports the Mirror.
Gabriella reached out to Action Fraud about each scam, yet she revealed “nothing happened” despite her detailed accounts Action Fraud admitted they got two reports but didn’t pass them to the police. She shared with PA Real Life the toll it took on her, leaving her in a state of financial ruin: “Financially the scams completely ruined me. Literally, on my account it was showing zero.
(Image: PA)
“The day after the second scam I couldn’t even string a sentence together. I was extremely shocked and extremely fragile. I stupidly invested my salary, so I wasn’t able to pay my rent, my bills. I still owe money to my landlord.
“I still cannot understand how I could say yes to the whole thing, but within two weeks I just said yes.”
The pair started chatting on WhatsApp and with Gabriel’s smooth talk “phrasing everything nicely”, Gabriella was convinced she’d “profit a huge amount of money” if she used Revolut and Trust Wallet.
Come June 1, 2024, a so-called advisor told her that she needed to cough up tax to the tune of 7,860.9 US dollars by June 4 to get her hands on the funds. The message warned: “If you fail to pay taxes in a timely manner, it will affect your credit score and result in a daily late fee of 1% of the total account amount, as well as legal responsibility for your tax evasion behavior [sic].”
Feeling the weight of the deadline to pay the fee within three days, Gabriella grew anxious, fearing she’d be blacklisted. She recalled: “I was feeling trapped now, I just wanted to get my money back, but there was no way back.
(Image: PA)
“Gabriel was pushing me, trying to get me to apply for a loan, saying, ‘I will try to help you because we are together in this situation’. “So in the end, that’s when I started borrowing money from my friends and family. “”.
Gabriella paid the tax amount, expecting her funds to be ready after 12 hours. However, she received a message stating “the fund transfer has failed”.
She was then asked to pay a withdrawal fee of approximately $3,000 (£2,237), which she paid, followed by another payment request. It was then that she realized she’d been scammed and “slowly Gabriel disappeared”.
Gabriella lost around £10,000 in total from the initial scam, leaving her feeling “ashamed”. “It was shocking, and I felt a huge amount of guilt,” she admitted. “I didn’t want to believe it happened to me, and I became very anxious, worrying about how I’d repay the money I borrowed from friends and family.”
Gabriella admitted that it has been “a learning experience” but she is keen to share her story to prevent others from falling into the same trap. She said: “Now I know there are red flags I should have acted upon.”
“First of all, I had the bad feeling, the gut feeling from the first moment when I made the payment and that’s actually my message to everyone, you need to listen to your gut feeling. I should have listened to myself and just left things at the very beginning.”
For the latest breaking news and stories from across the globe from the Daily Star, sign up for our newsletters.