Boyfriend's sister defrauded him out of 8 grand...

LegacyUser

To make a long story short my boyfriend got a claim back a few years ago before we met. He saved some and his sister took the rest off him (8 grand) and "invested" it for him.
This was before we met.

Anyway, the first time I met her, she had rung him up asking to borrow 300 euros which we drove an hour to meet her and give her. When he asked for it back she made up an exuse about him spilling something on her carpet years before and refused to give back the money.
It was a total crock of course and an excuse but he is soft and she is "fiery" (real loose canon) so he let it lie.

Anyway, as I heard more about this sister over time it began to dawn on me that she is not the profile of the type of person you would expect to play the stock market or know about investing money. Long term unemployed, serious drink problem, inveterate gambler who has lost custody of her own child.

I mentioned it to my boyfriend had he ever asked to see any paperwork or documentation regarding this investment, had he ever asked her any questions etc The answer was no, yes he was incredibly gullible and trusted her (She used him as a free babysitting service and regularly borrowed money off him before he moved away from her)
All this was kept from his other sisters and brothers, she somehow managed to manipulate him, but as I say he escaped.
Well putting it all together it seemed obvious to me she had gambled or drank the money away and he would not see it again.

As it turns out now she admitted (under duress) at Christmas that the money is gone! She gets violently agressive when asked to explain claiming her money is also gone (yeh right she has not got two red cents) and changes the subject playing the victim and roaring, shouting and going mad.

We had taken her son out at the weekend to see a sporting event and spent about €200 on him. Then she rings last night looking for a "loan" of €500 from my boyfriend as she has no "rent" -total bull, I went mad and after the call told my boyfriend not to give her another red cent, he rang her back and challenged her about the €8 k and asked to see paperwork about the investment, of course she went mad and sceamed and ranted and said forget it (meaning about the €500) and hung up.

I am furious, I suppose its none of my business, but I just want my boyfriend to tell the rest of the family (brothers and sisters) what she has done (parent has passed on) and stop protecting her, but he is afraid, he admitted to her years ago he had done drugs, smoked dope and I think he is afraid she will try to blackmail him with that.

It seems she has a dangerous mouth and will stoop to anything even lies if she is crossed.

What shoud we do ?

Nothing...?

Beruthiel

Unregistered wrote: »

he is afraid, he admitted to her years ago he had done drugs, smoked dope and I think he is afraid she will try to blackmail him with that.

Blackmail? lol
He can only be blackmailed if it bothers him for people to know he smoked a bit of dope.
You're right though, you should keep out of it.
At the end of the day, she's family and it's his decision what he does next.
Don't push him on anything or he will just feel like piggie in the middle.

hobochris

Beruthiel wrote: »

Blackmail? lol
He can only be blackmailed if it bothers him for people to know he smoked a bit of dope.
You're right though, you should keep out of it.
At the end of the day, she's family and it's his decision what he does next.
Don't push him on anything or he will just feel like piggie in the middle.

I'd agree with this up to a point.
If it effects you then you should say something. I.e. if giving her the money means you cant afford something like your rent or car insurance etc..

If he asks for your opinion on it then don't hold back.

Cuddlesworth

By giving her money and letting her refuse to face the consequences of what she is doing your boyfriend is helping. He should have cut her off a long time ago.

partyguinness

Issue Debt Collection proceedings....other than that accept it I'm afraid.

Watch your bank accounts and any joint accounts with b/friend.

OP- are you frustrated that she is taking advantage of your b/friend or that he hasnt spent the money on you..;)

LegacyUser

Really, your boyfriend has allowed this by not confronting her at any stage and basically allowing her to step on him anytime she feels.

If she is so nasty, why does he continously give her money?

In relation to the blackmail, how long ago did this happen? If it was a long time, would anyone really care? Does anyone really care anyway? Since she is, according to you, a gambling addict and alcoholic, so her word may not be believed in anycase.

If he really wants the money back, maybe get the whole family together to discuss what to do. Or get a solicitor involved and demand the paper work.

How old are the people involved may I ask? From the way to write, everyone seems old enough to know better. I am just curious if this is the case.

LegacyUser

OP- are you frustrated that she is taking advantage of your b/friend

Yes, I am furious about it.....he is such a good hearted lad, wouldn't harm a fly, he could have bought himself a car with it.

Its so upsetting -a lot of people if they got money from a claim, would blow it on having a good time but he thought he was being prudent and thinking of his future, it makes my blood boil that she could treat such a gentle person like this, not only does she not have any remorse but she is actually angry that he is finally seeing through her and is no longer going to be an income stream for her.

I never take money off my boyfriend, its one of the things he always remarked on when we got together, I have a good job and I have worked hard for everything I have -I dont see a man as a meal ticket.

I know its strictly none of my business but its hard to take seeing someone you love being abused.

Re- the blackmail thing, he smoked dope and also would have taken e the odd time but that was all years back, but there are guards in the family and I think thats what has him rattled now.

The rest of the family have all cut her off more or less. So do people think we should just let it go.....

The debt collection agency, how would that work......he gave her the money in cash...so no bank draft or cheque to prove anything.....(I know, I know)

Zaph

Unregistered wrote: »

Re- the blackmail thing, he smoked dope and also would have taken e the odd time but that was all years back, but there are guards in the family and I think thats what has him rattled now.

Other than the possible disapproval from those particular family members, there's nothing to be concerned about. The Gardaí have a lot more to be doing with themselves than dealing with some guy who smoked a bit of dope and took a couple of tablets years ago. Your boyfriend shouldn't let his sister use this to maintain a hold over him, it's not as if he's commited murder now, is it?

Unregistered wrote: »

The rest of the family have all cut her off more or less. So do people think we should just let it go.....

I think you should take the lead from the rest of the family and cut her off. Forget about the money, it's never coming back I'm afraid, and maintaining contact with her in an effort to recover it will only inevitably lead to more grief for you and your boyfriend.

biko

Unregistered wrote: »

Re- the blackmail thing, he smoked dope and also would have taken e the odd time but that was all years back, but there are guards in the family and I think thats what has him rattled now.

So? Gardas will know how common it is and won't pay heed to youthful indiscretions. There is no case for blackmail as I see it.

Lizzykins

I've seen this before and believe me you won't get any money back. Best thing is to encourage your boyfriend not to give the sister another red cent. Forget blackmail-who cares if he smoked dope years back.

partyguinness

She will attempt to blackmail him...come on..how immature and desperate is that if that is what she resorts to?

Let her at it...she still owes the money...would anyone believe her? call her bluff

Re Debt Collections...bring her to the Circuit Court for a return of the money. Sure no direct proof but thats not fatal.

Your boyfriend can give direct evidence..sworn affidavit etc and she would then have to deny it...

What does your b/friend think? Thats ultimately matters. We know how you feel.

CDfm

it does your boyfriend no good to be treated as a soft touch everytime she has a problem or wants to scam him.

she sounds quite devious and any emotional support you give him is just that,

we hate to see those we love getting abused so I am with you on this

Hobart

As has been said previous, the smoking of the dope is something that can only be treated as embarrassing, and in no way will it expose him to any criminal charges or retribution.

The way I would handle it, if she tried to threaten your BF with *exposure*, I would simply tell him to remind her about the €8K she has de-frauded him out of. I would also mention that he can chase up the paper work from the solicitor firm that dealt with the claim, and the bank accounts the money was withdrawn from.

As for the advice that you should keep out of it because she is family, that is frankly ridiculous. This guy is/has being manipulated by a stronger character who new what kind of buttons to press for her own ends. There are a lot of vulnerable people out there who are an "easy" touch for others. Those others come in all forms:
Friends
Family
Work Colleagues
Drinking Buddies
Hanger's On
Under no circumstances should you keep out of this, but I would caution about approaching other family members in isolation or appearing to be the one who is driving this issue forward. If it was me in that situation, I would manufacture a situation where all his/her siblings were together and I would then raise the issue, or ask my partner to raise the issue. Bullies are normally a lot more restrained when they are out of their comfort zone.

Don't let this issue fester and worry you B/F, address it head on, and get involved.

LegacyUser

partyguinness wrote: »

What does your b/friend think? Thats ultimately matters. We know how you feel.

(If it was me I would nail her to the wall, but sadly its not me!)

He is adament that he just wants to forget it and he is done with her. But I dont quite believe him, he is late 20's and she is late 30's I would say, tried (badly) to be some sort of parent subsitite to him (he was the baby of the family) after the death of the parent so he has some sort of autmatic respect for her, even though in my opinion she deserves nothing of the sort, she was nothing but a nasty bully.

What worries me is that he is so determined to keep this from the others as he claims they would "go mad" and give out sh1t to him. Yes they would but only out of concern for him. They are decent people and genuinely love him.

Last night on the phone initially he was going to give her the €500 euros even though he knew in his heart what had gone on, he was sort of in denial in his head. That worries me for the future.

It was only after I gave out sh1t about throwing good money after bad that he phoned back and she got in a strop shouting "forget it" and hung up, that he felt he was off the hook (in terms of feeling obliged to give her the €500) !!!

I dont like the hold she has over him, I am afraid she will worm her way back in....and if he is keeping this from his family, maybe to avoid confrontation in the future he will hide it from me if she comes back demanding with menaces again....

LegacyUser

How well do you know his family?

It does seem from your last post that he may well hide from you any 'donations' to her as he does from his family, especially if you continue to tell him not to.

From what you said, he looks on her as a surogate mother due to her looking after him when the parents died. Whether she did this well or not is irrelevant. It is something which should be commended really as she was giving up some of her life to look after him.

Due to this, he may well feel that he cannot say no to her. Because of this, I would say, if you know the family at all well, maybe drop it subtly into a conversation, or to mention it in passing to one of the other family members.

CDfm

OP - I think he should explain to his family what has happened IE that she has invested money for him and he is looking to recover whatever is left (I would leave the drugs part out) and is looking for the paperwork to do it.

But the drugs threat is fairly useless really.

Also- he should itemize the loans that he has given her and tell them as far as he is concerned there is no more money to give her anymore.They could then confront her over this as a family.

Chances are she has borrowed from everyone and the easiest way to sort it is like this.People who con hate exposure- and bullies love to isolate people.

This should stop the borrowing once and for all m-it may not get the money back but it will land it squarily at the womans door.

CodeMonkey

What worries me is that he is so determined to keep this from the others as he claims they would "go mad" and give out sh1t to him. Yes they would but only out of concern for him. They are decent people and genuinely love him.

I think it's also possible here that the boyfriend doesn't want the rest of the family to know how gullible and soft he is. They already know how bad she is and had cut her off while the boyfriend kept on giving her money. The blackmail thing sounds like an excuse to not tell the family.

Then again, I don't mean to be rude but the boyfriend doesn't sound like the smartest person I've ever met. If he believed in that investment story and still wanted to give his sister more money when she asked then he might just believe that he'll get into trouble for smoking dope a long time ago etc.

LegacyUser

hi there,

i also have a boyfriend who is suffering financially beacuse of a family member. in my situation his sister borrowed from an ex and didnt repay him. he went to gaurds and solicitor and to avoid his sister bein locked up, he now has the burden of repaying the money.

again i am dealing with a soft hearted character but the fact that a sibling can be so devious and ungrateful is harder to swallow.

i know people say dont get involved but i think indirectly u could work on your boyfriend and stop what is happening.a bit of reverse psychology like 'i would never to that to my brother' or 'id hate to have all my money taken from me like that' will get hom thinkin and without telling him what to do he may get the strength to put a stop to it.

i hope it works out for yous and doesnt affect your relationship.

Lollipops23

what a gigantic mess. while the blame is on his sister for being an obnoxious(alcholic?) bully, i can't help but think that your OH is some class of eejit, tbh.

We all like to see only the best in people we love, as i'm sure he did when giving her the 8k, but really, he didn't think to get some type of documents?even just to have for his investment portfolio?sheesh,the one time i invested a tiny bit of money i insisted on the paperwork just cos i liked the sound of having a portfolio:o familial love is not an excuse for genuine lack of cop on.

LegacyUser

Unregistered wrote: »

From what you said, he looks on her as a surogate mother due to her looking after him when the parents died. Whether she did this well or not is irrelevant. It is something which should be commended really as she was giving up some of her life to look after him.

Just couldn't let this go by......she never looked after him at all or gave up any time from drinking to do anything for him other than sabotage any (innocent) fun he tried to have with her horrible power tripping, interfering and bullying.

The other sister was the one who took him under her wing, brought him on days out, cooked for him and knew him as a person!

But anyway thats all by the by now!

Yes, he is soft and I guess this is why he is hiding it, embarassment, I know he was silly, I know he was, but really the punishment doesnt befit the crime.

Bottle_of_Smoke

Get the impression he doesn't mind giving it to her. She's a manipulative bitch but he seems happy enough.

I think the drugs black mail is a wee fib he's telling you so he doesn't have to confront her.

LegacyUser

Unregistered wrote: »

Just couldn't let this go by......she never looked after him at all or gave up any time from drinking to do anything for him other than sabotage any (innocent) fun he tried to have with her horrible power tripping, interfering and bullying.

The other sister was the one who took him under her wing, brought him on days out, cooked for him and knew him as a person!

But anyway thats all by the by now!

Yes, he is soft and I guess this is why he is hiding it, embarassment, I know he was silly, I know he was, but really the punishment doesnt befit the crime.

That says it all.

He is soft and its probably the things you like about him that made him vulnerable.

For you it seems like you are seeking revenge -which does not seem what he wants.

Dealing with it within the family brings it out and prevents a recurance.

Pub07

I cant understand why anyone would be saying 'she is family so you should stay out of it'. I take it this is the op's long term boyfriend, one of things that comes with going out with someone is that you look out for the person you're with and help them deal with tough situations that arise. He's being manipulated to a very high degree by his twat of a sister and is being taken for a total fool, the op is just doing with any decent concerned partner would do and trying to help him fix this problem, he has shown himself incapable of fixing it himself by this stage. OP, you should probably give him a look at the replys on this thread, he's probably so used to handing her over money on demand that it is completely normal for him to do it now. He needs to seriously rethink his position and realise that he has been getting screwed over for years and this isn't normal. Under no circumstances should he give her as much as 50 cent for a bag of crisps in future, he should be cutting this poisonous cow out of his life.

Re this 8k, I wouldn't just write it off automatically as some posters suggest, this is a serious sum of money that has basically been stolen from him. If it's not possible to retrieve it then fair enough, write it off but I think talking to a solicitor would be a good idea at this point, they'll tell you straight up whether you are wasting your time or if it's worth pursuing.

wasper

Unregistered wrote: »

To make a long story short my boyfriend got a claim back a few years ago before we met. He saved some and his sister took the rest off him (8 grand) and "invested" it for him.
This was before we met.

Anyway, the first time I met her, she had rung him up asking to borrow 300 euros which we drove an hour to meet her and give her. When he asked for it back she made up an exuse about him spilling something on her carpet years before and refused to give back the money.
It was a total crock of course and an excuse but he is soft and she is "fiery" (real loose canon) so he let it lie.

Anyway, as I heard more about this sister over time it began to dawn on me that she is not the profile of the type of person you would expect to play the stock market or know about investing money. Long term unemployed, serious drink problem, inveterate gambler who has lost custody of her own child.

I mentioned it to my boyfriend had he ever asked to see any paperwork or documentation regarding this investment, had he ever asked her any questions etc The answer was no, yes he was incredibly gullible and trusted her (She used him as a free babysitting service and regularly borrowed money off him before he moved away from her)
All this was kept from his other sisters and brothers, she somehow managed to manipulate him, but as I say he escaped.
Well putting it all together it seemed obvious to me she had gambled or drank the money away and he would not see it again.

As it turns out now she admitted (under duress) at Christmas that the money is gone! She gets violently agressive when asked to explain claiming her money is also gone (yeh right she has not got two red cents) and changes the subject playing the victim and roaring, shouting and going mad.

We had taken her son out at the weekend to see a sporting event and spent about €200 on him. Then she rings last night looking for a "loan" of €500 from my boyfriend as she has no "rent" -total bull, I went mad and after the call told my boyfriend not to give her another red cent, he rang her back and challenged her about the €8 k and asked to see paperwork about the investment, of course she went mad and sceamed and ranted and said forget it (meaning about the €500) and hung up.

I am furious, I suppose its none of my business, but I just want my boyfriend to tell the rest of the family (brothers and sisters) what she has done (parent has passed on) and stop protecting her, but he is afraid, he admitted to her years ago he had done drugs, smoked dope and I think he is afraid she will try to blackmail him with that.

It seems she has a dangerous mouth and will stoop to anything even lies if she is crossed.

What shoud we do ?

Nothing...?

In regards the 8K, don't get involved. This was in the past & I think your BF should write it off as a bad investment.
Make sure that she doesn't con him into giving her more money.

LegacyUser

It's alot of your buisiness what happens, he's your life partner. It's usually not a good idea to get involved with family but your more family to him that his so called sister.

Please please get him to see that she will just get worse and worse, tell her to stick the 8k where the sun don't shine and cut ALL contact with her and if nessecary write a short essay to the family explaining the situation and why he can't handle her anymore.

She's a sucker for taking 8k from her own brother, but if he 'lends' her any more money then he's a sucker. He could have spent that 8k on you like. bet ya would've like that lol.

Please wb to me telling me if the content of my post is any way feasible.

LegacyUser

Thanks to all that replied (especially same situation) -well it turns out those who said the blackmail/drugs thing was an excuse are right.

The real reason is that he cant face his siblings knowing what a silly mistake he made -I can see where he is coming from on that and I wouldn't put him through that if he doesn't want to. I dont fear that he will give her any money again, I think the penny has really dropped with him this time.

He had been really suffering with isomnia since Xmas (when she told him, I only found out last week) Thats how bad it was getting to him and still is. He had to go to the doc to get some sleeping tablets, we tried Kalms (didnt work) and cutting out caffeine but the problem was the sister problem nothing to do with physical. The sleeping tabs are working ok for the moment but what about the long run.....

I am so angry with her, yes I would want revenge even though I know that wont do any good in the long run and plus more importantly it would upset my BF which I would never do.
When we met her the weekend before I knew I was saying about his insomnia and she played the innocent and said go to the doctor. I suppose she knew well what was buggin him and her answer was suppress it with drugs, which in the end we had to do agh!!!!!!!

Like you said the gentle, kind qualities he has are an advantage but the softness with the sister was the down side of that, so I suppose I have to take the good with the bad.

So here we are, not able to do much, I just have to watch him suffering, its killing me, I know its not about me, I just wish I could make it right but hey ho.

CDfm

Unregistered wrote: »

Thanks to all that replied (especially same situation) -well it turns out those who said the blackmail/drugs thing was an excuse are right.

The real reason is that he cant face his siblings knowing what a silly mistake he made -I can see where he is coming from on that and I wouldn't put him through that if he doesn't want to. I dont fear that he will give her any money again, I think the penny has really dropped with him this time.

He had been really suffering with isomnia since Xmas (when she told him, I only found out last week) Thats how bad it was getting to him and still is. He had to go to the doc to get some sleeping tablets, we tried Kalms (didnt work) and cutting out caffeine but the problem was the sister problem nothing to do with physical. The sleeping tabs are working ok for the moment but what about the long run.....

A friend of mine got conned over Xmas and the money and some items were recovered but it wouldnt have happened only he said it.

At this stage your BF knows what his family are like and vice versa.

Its a nasty little secret that hewould be better fessing up to and maybe peace can be restored.