She showed her battle against cancer and leukemia and managed to raise almost 40 thousand dollars but was discovered

There are good people in the world. Empathetic, kind-hearted. We see a lot on the news and networks of the other type of person and believe that they are the majority, but they are not or at least they are not the ones that matter.

All or almost all scams are aimed at these people. to good Especially those hoaxes that appeal to solidarity. They are the most difficult deceptions to understand. The ones that cause the most outrage.

​One such case occurred in Iowa, USA, where a 19-year-old girl he convinced hundreds of people to donate money to face his fight against cancer. But it was all a hoax. And they finally caught her.

The woman, who calls herself Madison “Maddie” Russo, showed on TikTok her tough “battle” against pancreatic cancer and a tumor “about the size of a soccer ball” as a cover for his scam.

Almost 40 thousand dollars and up to 10 years in prison

Therefore, he convinced hundreds of people to donate money to him through GoFundMe. The girl came to accumulate more than 37 thousand dollars before its facade collapsed.

Russo was arrested on January 23 on charges of first-degree robbery, a felony in Iowa punishable by up to 10 years in prisonaccording to the Eldridge Police Department.

Police said Russo Stage 2 false pancreatic canceracute lymphoblastic leukemia, “and a tumor the size of a football that wrapped around his spine.”

The scammer had raised $37,303 from more than 439 unsuspecting donors.

Also, Russian he gave speeches about his made-up health struggles at St. Ambrose University, where he studied, and at the non-profit National Pancreatic Foundation based in Chicago.

Also Russian once featured on the Project Purple podcastfrom where they described the situation as “unfortunate” and justified the appearance of the woman in the program by saying that at that moment “there was no reason not to believe Maddie’s story”.

The beginning of the end​

Russo’s story began to unravel on Jan. 11, when anonymous people claiming to be medical professionals reported noticing “many medical discrepancies” in adolescent publications on the networks.

At the same time, several TikTok users who have viewed Russo’s videos documenting his cancer treatments noted that some of his medical equipment and location didn’t look good.

The investigators also said Russo stole photos shared online by real cancer patients and presented them as his own.

When the police ran a search warrant on Russo’s apartment In Bettendorf they confiscated a brown paper bag containing medical supplies, an IV stand with a feed pump filled with cotton buds, a wig and nausea pills in the name of a relative.

Investigators also requested Russo’s medical records and found that the teenager never been diagnosed with any type of cancer or cancer in any of the medical facilities in the area where you have been a patient.

In an October 2022 interview with the North Scott Press, Russo said he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer on Feb. 10 and leukemia a few months later.

I remember hanging up the phone and I was a mess”, he told the news. “I was literally in tears, but somehow I ended up working up the courage to wipe my tears and went back to class, which was pretty crazy now that I think about it.”

Russo said the doctors they gave him an 11% survival rate for five years, before discovering the massive, presumably inoperable tumor in his spine.

Russo said in the interview that between February and October of last year he underwent to 15 cycles of chemotherapy and 90 cycles of radiation.

“Life has been crazy,” she said. “It’s like a Comma 22. I can’t win by losing. I feel like I’ve been shaken to my core and, right now, everything is a bit uncertain. I just want to know my game plan, and right now I don’t know what it is.”

GoFundMe addressed the scam in a statement to McClatchy News, saying the site has “a zero tolerance policy with the misuse of our platform and cooperate with police investigations of people accused of wrongdoing”.

Everyone who has donated to Russo’s fundraiser have been refundedand Russo was banned from GoFundMe.

One of Russo’s campaign donors told station KWQC she was “shocked”when he learned of the teenager’s arrest.

Russo was released from prison on $10 bond just four hours after his arrest. He is due back in court on March 2.

Source: New York Post