Life comes at you pretty fast in our modern, Tinder-fueled era. One minute you're swiping right and chatting with a cute guy named Tristan, and Tristan seems so great! He's got a kind face, a solid finance job, and an air of mystery about him. You go on a few dates, you hit it off, and then suddenly you're handing Tristan a check for thousands of dollars.
According to Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance, this is exactly what happened to two New York Women. Brandon Kiehm, 35, was indicted Tuesday for allegedly stealing a total $26,000 from two women he met through Tinder. Prosecutors say Kiehm joined the dating app last year, claimed he worked for Goldman Sachs, and used the fake name Tristan Acocella. With this false identity in place, Kiehm allegedly began seeing a woman in July. He proceeded to lie to the woman, saying he needed money to pay for his sister's cancer treatments, and the woman agreed, handing him a check for $14,000, according to the indictment.
Vance's investigation alleges that Kiehm tried to pay the woman back with a check from a closed bank account. The D.A. says he then committed effectively the same scam—with the same made-up cancer story—on another woman in October of last year, who gave him $12,000 in cash.
"The classic dating scams of yesteryear appear to be thriving online," Vance said in a statement. "My office is seeing an increase in the number of scammers targeting singles online."
In addition to the Tinder scams, Kiehm has also been charged with stealing the credit card information of a man who once employed him as a dog walker. He used that info to open a Venmo account, and used it to pay himself roughly $13,000 over the course of two months.
Kiehm was charged Tuesday with three counts of grand larceny, identity theft and scheme to defraud, to all of which he pleaded not guilty. His bail was set at $10,000, but the Times reports that he was released without paying.
The FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center reported 5,883 incidents of online dating scams in 2014, a wave of crime that resulted in thefts totaling over $86 million.
