August 10, 2024 • 41 mins
Fake German heiress Anna Sorokin conned her way into Manhattan society.
Posing as Anna Delvey, a German heiress, she swindled banks, hotels, and friends out of more than $200,000. She forged checks to get money from banks and charmed people into paying for extravagant meals, and travel.
Sorokin was convicted on a handful of grand larceny and theft of services charges. After serving her time, the 31-year-old was released from prison, now, fighting being deported, but again Sorokin falls on her feet. First, she landed a deal with Netflix for the rights to her life story, then began selling her artwork, and now, Sorokin said her home confinement and social media ban is “more restrictive” than jail.
Now her artwork is making a splash.
Joining Nancy Grace Today:
- Wendy Patrick – California Prosecutor, Author of “Why Bad Looks Good” and “Red Flags,” and Host of “Today with Dr. Wendy” on KCBQ in San Diego; X: @WendyPatrickPHD
- Dr. Donna Rockwell – Clinical Psychologist (Michigan/New York) Specializes in Celebrity Mental Health; Adjunct Faculty: Saybrook University: College of Integrative Medicine and Health Sciences, DonnaRockwell.com; CEO/Founder: “Already Famous with Dr. Donna”
- Jim Ellis – Certified Fraud Examiner, Former FBI Agent (29 years), JKE Texas Private Investigator
- Rebecca Rosenberg – Fox News Digital Crime Reporter; Author: “At Any Cost;” Twitter: @ReRosenberg
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Oh my stars, does it
never end with this woman, fraudster and a Delvi now
selling her home art. Not only is she selling her art,
(00:22):
it's actually on display to sell on Netflix's Owning Manhattan?
Does this woman ever stop one angle after the next.
I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories. Thank you for
being with us. What is Owning Manhattan. It's the latest
(00:44):
addition to Netflix's empire of reality shows, and it is
set in the world of lux real estate. It follows
a guy who came from Bravos Million Dollar Listing and
about twelve agents in his real estate brokerage empire, and
(01:05):
they hustle across the city to make million dollar deals.
And now, how does Anna delviy fit into this? Because
the infamous con artist Anna Delvi aka Anna Serucan, if
you'll recall, she posed as a wealthy heiress to make
(01:25):
a name for herself in the social circles in the
city's art circles in New York. Over four years, she
defrauded banks, hotels, so called friends for over a quarter
million dollars. She became a media darling after the Netflix
(01:49):
mini series Inventing Anna. She was convicted. She served four
years behind bars for attempted grand larceny, larsening the second degree,
and theft of services. I don't know what good that
did her friends. They were never repaid. But this is
how she pops up on Netflix. The real estate agent
(02:09):
is showing a commercial real estate property in the New
York area of Hell's Kitchen. This particular site was on
Eleventh Avenue and it's a huge silver structure with different
sized windows. It's zoned for performing arts. While she's showing it,
(02:32):
she decides to host a party at the building to
show off all of its amenities, like the views from
the rooftop first floor that's set up to be an
art gallery. On the night of the party, the entire
space is blanketed with artwork, provocative artwork. People are going
(02:52):
in and out to look at the building, and one
of the agents becomes interested in one painting, and particularly
while walking through the Netflix camera pans over to the
wall and there is a girl painted on the wall
that looks very familiar, brown hair, thick black glasses, and
(03:15):
the paint. In one painting, she's looking over her shoulder
at a brick apartment building with a smaller but fancier
version of herself under the words no one is Safe.
In the Netflix special, a speaker says, who's this artist?
And we learn it's Anna Delvi's art. Yeah, it was
(03:40):
explained on Netflix quote. While she was in jail, she
decided to start painting. They decide to put her paintings
up and let people get interested enough to get their
phones out and take videos of the art. Now, this
is a mastermind scheme by the realtor who realized is
that by putting Anna Delvey's work on social media, it
(04:03):
will also catch the walls of the building, the lighting,
the ceiling high, everything wonderful about the building that's for sale.
Anna Delvey aka Annasorkin never misses a chance to trade
on her notoriety. What happened art aside? Take a listen
(04:27):
to Inside Edition.
Speaker 2 (04:29):
She claims she was a wealthy heiress from Europe worth
more than sixty million dollars, but it was a lie.
Annasorkin went to prison for two years for defrauding banks, hotels,
and even her closest friends out of hundreds of thousands
of dollars. Her trial drew international attention.
Speaker 3 (04:49):
This woman made national headlines posing as a wealthy woman.
Speaker 1 (04:54):
Now, the woman.
Speaker 2 (04:54):
Known as the SOHO Grifter is speaking to ABC's Deborah Roberts.
Speaker 4 (05:00):
This is the first time you've sat down for television interview.
Speaker 1 (05:02):
Why are you talking with us? Why not?
Speaker 5 (05:06):
I would like to show the world that I'm not
this downgraedy person that they portrayed me to be.
Speaker 1 (05:12):
You ask her who she really is? Did she tell
you Annasorgan is a very complicated character.
Speaker 6 (05:17):
You might believe that annasoricon is a very gifted, clever,
wanna be businesswoman or a complete con artist. And there
are many people in her way who would tell you
that she is the classic con artist.
Speaker 1 (05:31):
Why can't she be both? Why can't she be a
great business person and the ultimate scammer? I see her
as both. Take a listen hour cut one from the
Vanity Fair special Scandalous.
Speaker 7 (05:45):
By twenty sixteen, Anna Delvey was a regular in the
NYC social scene, frequenting many popular downtown restaurants, bars, and clubs.
With an extravagant lifestyle and a seemingly endless supply of money,
Delvy was an enigma that was made for the.
Speaker 1 (06:00):
Age of Instagram.
Speaker 7 (06:02):
Always at the right place with the right people, living
her best life.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
But with no apparent cause for her fame. With me,
an all star panel to make sense of what we
know right now with Me Wendy Patrick, California prosecutor, author
of Red Flags and host of Today with Doctor Wendy KCBQ.
You can find her at wendypatrickphd dot com. Doctor Donna
Rockwell Special guests joining US clinical psychologists in both Michigan
(06:28):
and New York specializing in celebrity mental health on faculty
Saybrook University. Jim Ellis with a special guest joining US
certified fraud examiner, former fed with the FBI. Don't mess
with this guy. FBI agent twenty nine years now, Private
investigator at JKE Texas Private Investigator jke Texas dot com.
(06:54):
But first, I want to go to a woman I've
been dying to talk to, Rebecca Rosenberg with Fox Digital.
She's a crime reporter and author of a fantastic book
At any cost, Rebecca, who is this woman?
Speaker 8 (07:10):
Who is this woman? Well, her family came from Russia.
They moved to Germany, and I believe her father was
actually a truck driver. She did not come from a
wealthy family and she just invented this identity when she came.
Speaker 1 (07:29):
To New York. Now, her coming to New York was
quite a story. So Russian born moving to Germany, the
child of a truck driver. She ends up getting a
job or an internship that takes her to Paris. From there,
the position brings her to New York. I believe it
(07:51):
was mon talk. And then she very simply overstayed her visa,
which thousands of people do every year, but none do
it in this style. Anna Sorokan, take a listen to
our cut six our friends at Inside Edition. Is she
in a courtroom or at a red carpet event?
Speaker 9 (08:10):
Anna Sorrikin is accused of posing as an heiress to
live an extravagant lifestyle, but it's what she's wearing to
trial that is making headlines. The twenty seven year old
defendant showed up wearing a form fitting black dress with
a plunging neckline and choker necklace. It's a look that
could backfire. Warren stylist John Karen.
Speaker 10 (08:29):
Black dress definitely a no no. A hyper sexualize her.
It makes her appear to be like a seductress. The
choker kind of shows to me that she's trying to
be overtly sexy. The more sexy she appears to be, it.
Speaker 9 (08:43):
Hurts her Sorakin is so obsessed with her clothes. She
refused to enter the courtroom because the outfit she was
given to wear was not up to her standards. The
angry judge told her this is unacceptable and inappropriate.
Speaker 1 (08:56):
This is not a fashion show. Wow, well, you know what.
It didn't work. She continued wearing designer clothes to every
single court appears. But this goes way back. Her desire
for a lifestyle she could not afford started in her teens.
Take a listening to our buddy Jesse Palmer at Daily
Mail TV.
Speaker 11 (09:15):
Anna, who interned at a trendy French magazine, reportedly managed
to scam extended stays in swanky Manhattan hotels, dinner at
high end restaurants, and flights on chartered jets to finance
her lavish lifestyle and keep the grift going. She allegedly
built banks out of thousands in cash.
Speaker 1 (09:35):
And that's not all.
Speaker 11 (09:36):
The fake heiress reportedly fleees her friend out of sixty
two thousand dollars for a world class trip to Morocco.
But Anna went too far when she attempted to take
out a loan for twenty two million dollars to finance
a visual art center she called the Anna Delvi Foundation.
In all, Anna reportedly scammed a total of two hundred
(09:57):
and seventy five thousand dollars.
Speaker 1 (09:59):
I mean, maybe it's just me, but to you, Doctor
Donna Rockwell, joining US clinical psychologist Faculty, Saber University. Doctor Rockwell,
I don't know very many people except maybe Alois that
lives in hotels.
Speaker 12 (10:14):
No, I guess we don't really know many people who
live in hotels. But it's very posh, isn't it.
Speaker 1 (10:20):
To do that?
Speaker 12 (10:20):
She might be a eloise poser, I guess, But you
know that makes her look really unattainable and like she's
got lots of money. So I think people in her
situation will do anything they can to look like they're billionaires,
not even millionaires.
Speaker 1 (10:37):
And Rebecca Rosenberg joining us in Fox News Digital. Rebecca,
she wasn't just staying down at the Motel six. She
was staying at very very expensive and luxurious hotels.
Speaker 8 (10:48):
Yes, she was staying at eleven Howard Street for a
very long time, racked up a bill that tens of
thousands of dollars. That's where she lived here for a
big chunk of.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
The time, the New York You know, it was really
interesting that she created this illusion that super rich and
super educated people fell for and I guess you'd call
it New York society until she went and basically invited
(11:26):
herself to be on a yacht in a bisa and
then after everyone got off at the end of the vacation,
she and her boyfriend turn around and get back on
and stay for another week or ten days. I mean,
Jim Ellis, you're the certified fraud examiner, former FBI agent
twenty nine years, for beat's sake. When you commandeer a
(11:50):
yacht with a captain and a staff and all the
food and you're out at sea and the gas that
is a huge bill, a huge bill.
Speaker 13 (12:02):
And frankly, you know, she probably could have been stopped
and exposed at that point if any of these people
along the way you lost money, who got you know,
enticed by her story and it actually applied you know,
reason and common sense at a certain point, things wouldn't
have gotten as far as as they did.
Speaker 1 (12:23):
Yeah, you know, that's really interesting. Wendy Patrick, California prosecutor,
author of Red Flags. You can hear her on Today
with doctor Wendy k c b Q. Doctor Wendy, I
find it, Wendy Patrick, I find it really interesting that
the owners or the people that had rented the yacht
originally didn't go after her. Now they are really really
(12:50):
wealthy Hampton Nights, And I got to tell you something, Wendy.
I've been to the Hamptons a couple of times for
charity when I would be speaking to a group or
raising money somehow or other. That's the same, Wendy. I
couldn't wait till I packed up my little rental car
(13:12):
and got I mean, I knew I was a dog upstairs.
I did not get in. That was not where I
was supposed to be. And these rich people that got
ripped off but didn't report it, whether they didn't want
to look stupid or what. Yeah, no, that's right, Nancy.
I'm like you.
Speaker 13 (13:27):
I'm more I'm more familiar with the Hampton in with.
Speaker 8 (13:30):
The free breakfast.
Speaker 1 (13:33):
Stealing it go ahead.
Speaker 14 (13:35):
So this is the this is the problem with the
super super rich. And it is a problem because financial
responsibility should be everyone's responsibility. But they probably either.
Speaker 12 (13:44):
Didn't know or didn't care.
Speaker 14 (13:46):
Why do I say that, because we've covered so many
stories where you do have the ultra rich that are
scammed are defrauded by somebody like Anna, but don't consider
it in the balance to be worth their while to
pursue it, not realizing there may be so many other
victims that they might be preventing.
Speaker 1 (14:08):
Crime stories with Nancy Grace. Where is Anna Delvey aka
Anna Sorkin? Now while she has been released from prison,
She's holding party after party in her New York apartment.
And that's while she was under house arrests and now
selling art. Whatever becomes of Anna Sorkin, the fake heiress
(14:36):
who ripped off her victims to the tune of over
a quarter million dollars, Remember what happened? I'm not quite
sure Rebecca Rosenberg what her motivation is other than just
living the high life. But imagine the impact she could
have made being the daughter of a truck driver. I mean,
I'm the daughter of a railroad worker and a bank teller,
(14:59):
and I know my parents worked overtime to send me
to college, send me to law school, and so much more.
She actually has a brilliant mind.
Speaker 8 (15:09):
Yeah, but I don't think that if she had been
honest about her origins, anybody the people that she was
trying to hang out with the New York that they
would have really paid.
Speaker 13 (15:19):
Attention to her.
Speaker 1 (15:20):
We know she was born in Russia, grew up in Germany.
Her father worked at a transport company. It went and solved.
At nineteen, she left her parents and brother for Paris
to decide to pursue fashion. She has only ever spoken
very vaguely of her parents, as she terms conservative. But
(15:41):
while she's in Paris, she takes on the name Anna
Delvy and she shoots photographs for a fashion art magazine
named Purple. She only got four hundred euros a month
and she stayed financially dependent on her parents, who would
send her money pay for her apartment. Then she had
(16:01):
a breakup, headed to New York and she went for
a trip to Montalk and then Fashion Week, and that
really did it. When she was at Fashion Week, there
was no suggestion she would ever turn back. She went
from boutique hotel to boutique hotel, always handing out chrisp
(16:22):
one hundred dollars tips and putting off bills with promises
of wire transfers that never happened. So, Rebecca Rosenberg, I
know we've got the one victim Rachel Deloche Williams. But
that's two hundred and seventy five thousand dollars. What about
(16:42):
all of the hotels and all of the other people
she ripped off.
Speaker 8 (16:46):
Well, a lot of people didn't come forward. And actually
Rachel Delos was really interesting because at the end Rachel
actually couldn't get paid restitution because the jury did not find.
Speaker 1 (16:59):
The broken deal of ripping her off.
Speaker 8 (17:03):
That was kind of that was one of the charges
they did not convict on.
Speaker 1 (17:06):
Take a listen to hour cut five b our friends
at time.
Speaker 15 (17:11):
Prosecutor Catherine mccau says the defendant has not assent to
her name as far as we can determine, also noting
that Soroken is Russian born, not German, though she could
be deported to Germany no matter how the trial turns out,
as she's reportedly overstayed her visa under the name Anna delve.
She arrived in New York with a high priced wardrobe
and was known for handing out one hundred dollars cash tips,
(17:32):
reportedly saying at different points that her father was a diplomat,
an oil baron, or involved in the solar panel business,
none of which are the case. People who knew her
said she often asked others to use their credit cards
to cover cab and plane fares and then failing to
repay them.
Speaker 1 (17:47):
Rebecca Rosenberg Netflix multi episode creation Inventing Anna. What is it?
Speaker 8 (17:57):
It's a show based on her life stole, so based
on it kind of glamorizes her. I'd see her criminal
activity in New York which she was convicted, and she
sold her life rights to Netflix for them to do
the show.
Speaker 1 (18:15):
This woman cons she cons big. Take a listen to
our cut too from Vanity Fear.
Speaker 7 (18:23):
Prior to their departure, Davis's manager told her Delvi's bill
and room charges were starting to mount and were still unpaid.
As a result, the hotel changed Delvy's room code and
detained all of her personal belongings. To renew her visa,
Delvi said she had to spend intervals of time out
of the country, so she decided to embark on an
adventure to Morocco. She invited her New York City circle
(18:46):
of friends. This trip was the quintessential example of the
lavish lifestyle that delv was known for. A private villa
with a personal butler, all for just a mere seven
thousand dollars a night during their trip, DELV making one
excuse after an Chris Williams to pick up the tab
more and more frequently, eventually covering costs for dinner and
expensive Moroccan dresses. A stark change from the day's DELV
(19:09):
would pay for everything. Then, one morning, DELV was informed
by a hotel employee that they did not have a
working credit card on file. DELV brushed this off as
an issue with her bank, but soon after Williams was
prussured into putting down her credit card by hotel management
staff and security members.
Speaker 1 (19:26):
Jim ellis joining us former fed with the FBI. Have
you ever seen anything like it where a person who
is so obsessed with a lifestyle or getting money actually
has alternate identities and scams and lies to even their
closest friends, their lovers.
Speaker 13 (19:47):
Oh absolutely, I mean in her heart and astoric is
a con and she basically just cares about herself and
she doesn't care what's.
Speaker 1 (20:00):
Left in her wake.
Speaker 13 (20:02):
And I've seen this through my career, both as an
FBI agent and as a private investigator. People act the
same way. I'm familiar with one con artist who dressed
up He's a Southern Baptist boy from Louisiana, and he
dressed stuff like a Hasidic jew complete with clothing and makeup,
(20:22):
so he could go vouch to other people in the
Jewish community for himself. I mean that people will go
to no ends to satisfy their greed, to satisfy their
one for fame and power.
Speaker 1 (20:37):
How do you untangle a case.
Speaker 13 (20:39):
Like this well, I mean, obviously from a law enforcement perspective,
you don't even know about it till somebody who reports it.
Speaker 1 (20:46):
I'm thinking about her personality. She goes to trial, she
goes to trial. I want you to hear what the
attorney said in court. Take listen to our cut seven
air friends at GMA. She has a fake until she
can make it.
Speaker 16 (21:01):
Those words from the defendant's own attorney, who claims she
never intended to commit a crime, but prosecutors call her
a fraud and a liar who would do almost anything
to prolong her life of luxury. This morning, the fate
of an alleged scam artist is now in the hands
of a jury, both sides wrapping up arguments for a
(21:21):
case that's drawn international outrage. The style savvy defendant even
turning heads in court wearing an animal print dress. She
called herself Anna Delvi, a fashionable globetrotter who prosecutors say
was pretending to be a high flying German heiress living
a fairytale life of glitz and glam among Manhattan's elite.
Speaker 1 (21:41):
Wow, okay, take a listen to her and a sroken
in her own words are cut nine from the BBC.
Did you get a thrill from him?
Speaker 3 (21:51):
I mean, were you satisfied when you got away with something,
when you achieved something, when you slipped under the radar
and didn't have to pay. Was it thrilling?
Speaker 5 (22:00):
Because in my head another thought that I was cheating
or getting away with anything. In my head, like anybody
that would borrow from them that would be getting back.
I felt like they portrayed me as like someone who
is very manipulative, which I don't think I am. And
I was like never really like too nice of a person.
I was never like really trying to talk my way
into anything. I kind of just told people what I
(22:21):
want and like they either gave.
Speaker 1 (22:22):
It to me or not, and I just moved on.
She taught them into what she wanted through lines. I mean,
Donald rockwell, we really need a shrink. How can she
take hundreds of thousands of dollars in luxury hotels, clothing
that she got her friends to pay for, racking up
credit cards she'd never pay back, hundreds of thousands of
(22:44):
dollars in credit cards, all based on lies. I mean,
she had to know that was wrong. She wasn't just
faking it, fake it till you make it. She was
outright lying for goods and services.
Speaker 12 (22:58):
Yeah, she was outright lying. That's how we see it.
It's interesting, you know, because a person who has early
life narcissistic.
Speaker 1 (23:08):
Wounds, okay, I see, I don't know what that means.
Speaker 12 (23:10):
What it means that someone is only really thinking about themselves.
Speaker 1 (23:14):
You said, a narcissistic wound. What's a narcissistic wound? I
know who narcissist, But what's a narcissistic wound?
Speaker 12 (23:21):
When we're babies, If our mother or primary caretaker doesn't
look at us and say, who is a pretty baby?
Is a pretty baby? We don't know that we exist.
So without early life mirroring, meaning the parent or the
caregiver is looking at you, you know you're existing, you're
smiling back, there becomes a deficit that develops in a person,
(23:43):
and that is who becomes a narcissist or a self
serving person in adulthood, and we probably know many of
them in our own lives. However, in the context of same,
there's something called acquired situational narcissism, which means that the
situations that we come into after a baby, in other words,
(24:04):
like Anna when she was in her nineteen and in
her twenties, is enough to turn us into that kind
of a person, meaning all for me and none for you.
And how does she get away with that? She gets
away with it because she's in denial, which is a
psychological coping mechanism, So the only way that she can
(24:24):
do these things is to not have a conscience, to
not think about it. So she has a sense of
acquired situational narcissisms because of her situation, and then wanted
more of it and more of it and more of it.
And what people don't really understand about saying is that
it is as addictive as heroine. The second we get
(24:45):
a taste of the spotlight, most of us we want
more and more and more. And that's what happened with Anna.
She was in denial. She was projecting anything that she
was thinking about herself onto other people. She asked for
what she wants did, as we just heard on the tape,
she got it or she didn't get it, and she
moved on. She did not have a conscience to think
(25:06):
about is this the right thing? Am I hurting anybody?
That's not how these people think. And it became more
and more and more because the same is addictive.
Speaker 1 (25:16):
You know, Wendy Pasture. She may have justified it in
her own mind, certainly not defending her because this is
irrational rate, this is not reasoning, it's irrational. She was
taking from rich people in the Hamptons. I'm talking to
like thirty million dollar homes with you know, guest houses
that are you know, bigger than our homes or apartments.
(25:39):
She was taking from someone that could afford it, Like
she overstayed on the yacht for a week because somebody
else much richer than her was paying for it. So
I wonder in her mind is she justify it that way?
Only had it.
Speaker 14 (25:53):
Been a very short amount of time with something overall
weekend or maybe even a week. But the amount of time,
the duration that this went on, there was no conceivable
way in her mind that she possibly could have thought
she would pay any of it back. You know, she
may have faked it until she made it when she
first got to New York, but when stealing money from
others over that period of time.
Speaker 12 (26:13):
Faking it is fraud.
Speaker 14 (26:14):
Hopefully that was a sound by somebody who's at her trial,
because there's no other ways circumstantially you can justify that
many victims over that.
Speaker 1 (26:22):
Long period of time, and even now it's still all
about her. Take a listen to our friend Emily Mateless
at the BBC cuts in why.
Speaker 3 (26:32):
Do you think so many people believed you?
Speaker 4 (26:34):
Then?
Speaker 3 (26:35):
What was it in your personality that could convince people?
Speaker 1 (26:39):
I don't know.
Speaker 5 (26:39):
I think like maybe believed I was smart and I
was working on something that was that could have like
a great potential and that would be successful.
Speaker 1 (26:47):
I don't know.
Speaker 5 (26:48):
I don't feel like it has much to do with
my personality. I guess like I really believed in myself
and not what I was doing.
Speaker 1 (26:56):
I don't know.
Speaker 5 (26:56):
It's hard to explain. I guess like people just see
like I'm challenged and I was focused, and I work
hard and I could make them a lot of money.
Speaker 1 (27:09):
Rebecca Rosenberg worked hard and what every time I see
a foo or a post of her. She's on a
luxury trip, or she's shopping at what well.
Speaker 8 (27:18):
I think I think a lot of her victims wanted
to believe in her success because it meant their success too.
You know, she's saying, Okay, I'm going to build this
annadelby Foundation in Manhattan for twenty two million. And you
know one of the persons, one of the people she
do with, the architect, well for him, you know, he
he wanted to be involved in that big project, so
(27:40):
he wanted to sort of believe the lie because it
would ultimately help him. So I think a lot of
it was people wanting to kind of believe it was
true because there was an advantage to them.
Speaker 1 (27:51):
These are just some of the things. And I want
to go to you on Jim Ellis that we have
uncovered falsifying financial documents from international banks wait for it,
totally approximately sixty million euros securing a loan of one
hundred grand after lying to bank reps with CTI, depositing
(28:14):
countless bad checks and to other banks. I guess you
know how you flow to check, You deposit a check,
you would draw the funds and then you try to
short up from another bad account so that won't fall through,
and then another You basically play rop a dope on banks.
That was totally nearly eighty thousand dollars. That doesn't include
(28:38):
the money she conned off our friends, never paying them back,
theft of services almost a half a million dollars. I
mean that's a lot of money, Jim.
Speaker 13 (28:52):
Oh, absolutely, it's a lot of money. And you mentioned
earlier you weren't sure how she ever worked hard. She
worked hard in preparing all these fraudulent documents and passing
all those bogus checks and coming up with stories that
were plausible but yet not too specific. The life of
(29:12):
the con is hard work, and they do it for
the for the power, they do it for the money,
They do it for the same. I think she solved
the banks as her potential savior. You know, you think
of of like Elizabeth Holmes with Sarnos. You know, was
she a genius or was she a scam artist? You know,
(29:34):
if if Sorkin was able to produce all these phony
documents and convince a bank to lend her twenty two
million dollars.
Speaker 1 (29:43):
So why explain that to us some mere mortals? What
do you mean produce phony documents and convince big banks
to learn her a lots of money.
Speaker 13 (29:51):
Sure it happened, you know, she apparently was really adept
in Adobe photoshop. I mean, she was taking documents and
altering them to convince the bankers that she had Swiss
bank accounts, that she had trust documents, and she had
lawyers and CPAs or accountants over in Europe. And it
(30:14):
was going, at least to a certain extent, probably till
it hit the underwriting department, the people in the back
of the office who make sure everything's all the boxes
are checked. It was it was painting a picture of her,
of exactly who she was claiming to be. And I
think if she she probably she possibly could have felt
(30:37):
that if she was able to land that loan. In
her mind, she probably was going to pay all those
people back that she had scamped.
Speaker 1 (30:45):
In her mind.
Speaker 13 (30:46):
It's in her mind, and she may have we don't know.
She's kicking the can down the road. She's getting her
next victim, and when that, when it comes time to
pay them back, she'll worry about that later. It's never ending.
I mean, it's what brings down every ponzee scheme in
the end, and This wasn't a large scale ponzee scheme.
(31:07):
But you know, some of that money she scammed through
those phony checks that she deposited with City Bank and
the loan she got from City National Bank, she used
to pay some of her debts that to the hotels
and other businesses so that she could stay afloat and
(31:27):
maintain that illusion.
Speaker 1 (31:29):
Well, Jim Ellis, I guess what you're saying is she
would pay back the hotels to the extent that she
could get them to allow her to stay there for
even longer. I mean, what does it mean to kayta check?
Speaker 13 (31:41):
Well, t kya check. And it's a lot harder nowadays
than they used to be because the float, which is
the time that the check is deposited in the one
bank and actually clears in the originating bank, it's so
much shorter. But you basically take a check and you
present it to a bank that you know is worthless,
(32:02):
or it may appear it has funds, but by the
time that check is presented for payment to the originating bank,
there aren't any funds available.
Speaker 1 (32:17):
Crime stories with Nancy Grace Anna Delvisorcan who was placed
on house arrests. What she was released from jail for
a nearly three hundred thousand dollars heist that we know
of making a name in the headlines again. This time
(32:38):
her provocative art appears on a Netflix special. But you know,
cable TV lets you see what they want you to see,
and that is not who Anna Sorcan really is. Who
is she? Take a listen to our friends at GMA,
(32:59):
Good Morning America.
Speaker 17 (33:00):
New York City jury finding socialite and Asauric, a so
called SOHO grifter, guilty on eight counts, including grand larceny,
attempted grand larceny, and theft of services to.
Speaker 11 (33:11):
Jurors obviously believed our point of view and followed our
logic and acquitted her for the top charges.
Speaker 1 (33:16):
I'm sad and that she was convicted of some of
the other charges.
Speaker 17 (33:19):
Sorgan was acquitted of two charges, including the most serious,
attempting to steal more than one million dollars from City
National Bank.
Speaker 1 (33:26):
Jay Rebecca Rosenberg joining us from Foxy's Digital, explaining the
split verdict. What was she convicted on and on what
was she acquitted?
Speaker 8 (33:35):
She was acquitted on trying to score this massive twenty
million dollars loan, which was one of the top charges
that was the attempted grand larceny and she was acquitted
of stealing the number kind of varied that around seventy
thousand from Rachel Deloche. That was the trip that she
invited her best friend at the time, Richard Deloschan, to Morocco,
(33:58):
where they stayed in the seven thousand and night riod
outside a marakesh and at the end of the trip
she stuck her with the bill.
Speaker 14 (34:05):
She persuaded her to put the.
Speaker 8 (34:08):
Entire ship on her credit card and she would pay
her back. So those were the two main counts she
was acquitted on and then she was convicted in She
was convicted in the chartered plane incident.
Speaker 1 (34:23):
Right, well, let me let that side. Canra Becca Eisenberg
the chartered plane incident? What was that?
Speaker 8 (34:29):
So it was called Blade is the company, and she
persuaded them to fly her without paying up front to
a Berkshire Hathaway conference in Omaha and basically was like,
I'll pay you later, and they thought she paid them
later and she didn't. And that was about thirty five
(34:49):
thousand dollars.
Speaker 1 (34:50):
It was a chartered flight, a chartered flight incident. Okay,
so she ends up going to not jail, but to Rikers.
Is anybody on the panel familiar with Rikers? Okay, yeah,
just by reputation. Yeah, you don't want to go there
(35:10):
unless you have to take a Listen to Anna Sorokan
speaking to our friend Deborah Roberts at ABC.
Speaker 4 (35:19):
Dorekan says she's paid for her mistakes her time behind bars,
including nineteen months in New York's infamous Rikers Island jailed,
some of it in solitary confinement. You're being held in Rikers,
one of the most frightening jails in the country.
Speaker 1 (35:35):
What was that like for you? Were you terrified in.
Speaker 5 (35:38):
A way that was therapeutic? I mean it's a therapeutic
I for example, use the time, like to read a
lot and to write.
Speaker 4 (35:46):
You've heard that, you've said that it's the prison's kind
of a waste of time.
Speaker 5 (35:49):
Yeah, taking a person, straping them off everything, putting them
somewhere where they have pretty much very few opportunities to rehabilitate.
So how is this supposed to help someone who already
had to resort to life of crime?
Speaker 1 (36:04):
And that tells me right there that Anna delviy aka
Anna Sorokan learned nothing from our time behind bars. Wendy
Patrick nothing.
Speaker 14 (36:14):
It also tells us that she is admitting that she
resorted to a life of crime, which contradicts everything she
said before the trial and even in some interviews after
the trial. She knew because she wasn't working, as you
pointed out several times, there was no way she was
going to be able to repay these loans. But sitting
through the trial, sitting in Riker's Island prison therapeutic you
(36:35):
have to wonder whether she received special treatment. We don't
know one way or the other, but it is very
interesting that her attitude apparently hasn't changed.
Speaker 1 (36:43):
I'm sure she got special treatment because she had managed
to convince everyone that she was a celebrity that deserves
special treatment. You know, Rebecca Rosenberg, I'm not sure I
understand the not guilty on the sixty grand she ripped
off from Rachel Delight Williams. Was this is Jerry's thinking?
Speaker 15 (37:01):
Well.
Speaker 8 (37:01):
I spoke to a couple of jurors after the verdict
and they kind of felt that in the end, Rachel
came out ahead, even though it was this like really
stressful situation for her where she had put the payment
for this trip on her work visa card and just
you know, it was a sum of money that was
(37:21):
greater than what she earned as a salary. But eventually,
you know, she did, she did end up with I
think her book advance was three hundred thousand dollars. I
don't know what she got paid from HBO. So I
think that they just didn't feel that bad for her.
Speaker 1 (37:39):
But why because why do they not feel bad for
Rachel Williams.
Speaker 8 (37:43):
Because she was also using Anna Soroken. You could say,
like she, you know, it's sort of weird, like she's
going out with Anna all the time, and Anna it's
always paying for absolutely everything. You know, I personally wouldn't
feel that comfortable if I was going out with somebody,
even if they were much wealthier than me, with them
(38:04):
flitting the bill every time. So I think that was kind.
Speaker 1 (38:07):
Of their reasoning. Take a listen to what happens immediately
when she walks out from behind bars are cut fourteen
inside edition.
Speaker 4 (38:16):
If you walked out of prison a free woman, HI
on a What was the first thing you did that brought.
Speaker 14 (38:21):
Me my phone?
Speaker 1 (38:21):
So I got on social media.
Speaker 6 (38:24):
She came out of prison and immediately set down to
do this interview with us and immediately went on social
media and immediately started to resume kind of a glamorous life.
Speaker 1 (38:35):
So the first thing she does is on social media.
What does that tell you? Doctor Rockwell, the same thing and.
Speaker 12 (38:42):
Tells you, Doctor Gray, that she didn't feel all bad
about one thing through this entire event, that there's a
lack of conscience, and that she was loving the spotlight
and she couldn't wait to get back into it. As
I say, it's an addiction. It makes the horror flash
in your mind. You have endorsements, your brain comes alive
(39:05):
with your own image, and you love it. You salivate
over it. And that's what happened to Panna Sorkin.
Speaker 1 (39:11):
Jim ellis Certified Fraught Examiner, are now with his own
firm JKE Texas dot Com. Jim shopaholics or people that
get a thrill out of buying things. I think Anna
Sorokan aka n Anna Delvy got a thrill of some
sort of this fake life she was leading. Do you
(39:35):
think someone like her can turn over a new leaf
or is this just who she is?
Speaker 13 (39:41):
Well, that's a good question. I mean I always hope.
Speaker 1 (39:44):
I did say what you hope, Jim ellis you investigated
so many con guys, what do you think they don't stop?
Speaker 13 (39:53):
I mean, as you pointed out, she immediately got back
on social media. And I agree with doctor Rockwell that
it was for the endorphent rush of getting that hit,
of getting that fame and putting out that projection. But
I think it's also a certain aspect that is rebuilding
her stature so that she can now see where she
(40:18):
can get her next meal ticket from. But who in
the right mind would want to work with somebody that
just got out of prison for defrauding hundreds of thousands
of dollars from the people she was closest to.
Speaker 1 (40:34):
Well, as predicted, Annasaurican aka and Adelve has appeared again.
She won't go away. Has she ever considered going home?
Is there any way to deport this woman? After being
placed on house arrest and throwing one high profile party
after the next in her apartment and again that's under
(40:56):
house arrest, she is now pursuing her art. Anne has
landed on a Netflix series, but regardless of Netflix, she
will be best known for her storing role in court.
Don't worry, you haven't heard the last of Anna Delvey
(41:16):
Nancy Grace crime stories. Signing off goodbye friend,
Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Oh my stars, does it
never end with this woman, fraudster and a Delvi now
selling her home art. Not only is she selling her art,
(00:22):
it's actually on display to sell on Netflix's Owning Manhattan?
Does this woman ever stop one angle after the next.
I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories. Thank you for
being with us. What is Owning Manhattan. It's the latest
(00:44):
addition to Netflix's empire of reality shows, and it is
set in the world of lux real estate. It follows
a guy who came from Bravos Million Dollar Listing and
about twelve agents in his real estate brokerage empire, and
(01:05):
they hustle across the city to make million dollar deals.
And now, how does Anna delviy fit into this? Because
the infamous con artist Anna Delvi aka Anna Serucan, if
you'll recall, she posed as a wealthy heiress to make
(01:25):
a name for herself in the social circles in the
city's art circles in New York. Over four years, she
defrauded banks, hotels, so called friends for over a quarter
million dollars. She became a media darling after the Netflix
(01:49):
mini series Inventing Anna. She was convicted. She served four
years behind bars for attempted grand larceny, larsening the second degree,
and theft of services. I don't know what good that
did her friends. They were never repaid. But this is
how she pops up on Netflix. The real estate agent
(02:09):
is showing a commercial real estate property in the New
York area of Hell's Kitchen. This particular site was on
Eleventh Avenue and it's a huge silver structure with different
sized windows. It's zoned for performing arts. While she's showing it,
(02:32):
she decides to host a party at the building to
show off all of its amenities, like the views from
the rooftop first floor that's set up to be an
art gallery. On the night of the party, the entire
space is blanketed with artwork, provocative artwork. People are going
(02:52):
in and out to look at the building, and one
of the agents becomes interested in one painting, and particularly
while walking through the Netflix camera pans over to the
wall and there is a girl painted on the wall
that looks very familiar, brown hair, thick black glasses, and
(03:15):
the paint. In one painting, she's looking over her shoulder
at a brick apartment building with a smaller but fancier
version of herself under the words no one is Safe.
In the Netflix special, a speaker says, who's this artist?
And we learn it's Anna Delvi's art. Yeah, it was
(03:40):
explained on Netflix quote. While she was in jail, she
decided to start painting. They decide to put her paintings
up and let people get interested enough to get their
phones out and take videos of the art. Now, this
is a mastermind scheme by the realtor who realized is
that by putting Anna Delvey's work on social media, it
(04:03):
will also catch the walls of the building, the lighting,
the ceiling high, everything wonderful about the building that's for sale.
Anna Delvey aka Annasorkin never misses a chance to trade
on her notoriety. What happened art aside? Take a listen
(04:27):
to Inside Edition.
Speaker 2 (04:29):
She claims she was a wealthy heiress from Europe worth
more than sixty million dollars, but it was a lie.
Annasorkin went to prison for two years for defrauding banks, hotels,
and even her closest friends out of hundreds of thousands
of dollars. Her trial drew international attention.
Speaker 3 (04:49):
This woman made national headlines posing as a wealthy woman.
Speaker 1 (04:54):
Now, the woman.
Speaker 2 (04:54):
Known as the SOHO Grifter is speaking to ABC's Deborah Roberts.
Speaker 4 (05:00):
This is the first time you've sat down for television interview.
Speaker 1 (05:02):
Why are you talking with us? Why not?
Speaker 5 (05:06):
I would like to show the world that I'm not
this downgraedy person that they portrayed me to be.
Speaker 1 (05:12):
You ask her who she really is? Did she tell
you Annasorgan is a very complicated character.
Speaker 6 (05:17):
You might believe that annasoricon is a very gifted, clever,
wanna be businesswoman or a complete con artist. And there
are many people in her way who would tell you
that she is the classic con artist.
Speaker 1 (05:31):
Why can't she be both? Why can't she be a
great business person and the ultimate scammer? I see her
as both. Take a listen hour cut one from the
Vanity Fair special Scandalous.
Speaker 7 (05:45):
By twenty sixteen, Anna Delvey was a regular in the
NYC social scene, frequenting many popular downtown restaurants, bars, and clubs.
With an extravagant lifestyle and a seemingly endless supply of money,
Delvy was an enigma that was made for the.
Speaker 1 (06:00):
Age of Instagram.
Speaker 7 (06:02):
Always at the right place with the right people, living
her best life.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
But with no apparent cause for her fame. With me,
an all star panel to make sense of what we
know right now with Me Wendy Patrick, California prosecutor, author
of Red Flags and host of Today with Doctor Wendy KCBQ.
You can find her at wendypatrickphd dot com. Doctor Donna
Rockwell Special guests joining US clinical psychologists in both Michigan
(06:28):
and New York specializing in celebrity mental health on faculty
Saybrook University. Jim Ellis with a special guest joining US
certified fraud examiner, former fed with the FBI. Don't mess
with this guy. FBI agent twenty nine years now, Private
investigator at JKE Texas Private Investigator jke Texas dot com.
(06:54):
But first, I want to go to a woman I've
been dying to talk to, Rebecca Rosenberg with Fox Digital.
She's a crime reporter and author of a fantastic book
At any cost, Rebecca, who is this woman?
Speaker 8 (07:10):
Who is this woman? Well, her family came from Russia.
They moved to Germany, and I believe her father was
actually a truck driver. She did not come from a
wealthy family and she just invented this identity when she came.
Speaker 1 (07:29):
To New York. Now, her coming to New York was
quite a story. So Russian born moving to Germany, the
child of a truck driver. She ends up getting a
job or an internship that takes her to Paris. From there,
the position brings her to New York. I believe it
(07:51):
was mon talk. And then she very simply overstayed her visa,
which thousands of people do every year, but none do
it in this style. Anna Sorokan, take a listen to
our cut six our friends at Inside Edition. Is she
in a courtroom or at a red carpet event?
Speaker 9 (08:10):
Anna Sorrikin is accused of posing as an heiress to
live an extravagant lifestyle, but it's what she's wearing to
trial that is making headlines. The twenty seven year old
defendant showed up wearing a form fitting black dress with
a plunging neckline and choker necklace. It's a look that
could backfire. Warren stylist John Karen.
Speaker 10 (08:29):
Black dress definitely a no no. A hyper sexualize her.
It makes her appear to be like a seductress. The
choker kind of shows to me that she's trying to
be overtly sexy. The more sexy she appears to be, it.
Speaker 9 (08:43):
Hurts her Sorakin is so obsessed with her clothes. She
refused to enter the courtroom because the outfit she was
given to wear was not up to her standards. The
angry judge told her this is unacceptable and inappropriate.
Speaker 1 (08:56):
This is not a fashion show. Wow, well, you know what.
It didn't work. She continued wearing designer clothes to every
single court appears. But this goes way back. Her desire
for a lifestyle she could not afford started in her teens.
Take a listening to our buddy Jesse Palmer at Daily
Mail TV.
Speaker 11 (09:15):
Anna, who interned at a trendy French magazine, reportedly managed
to scam extended stays in swanky Manhattan hotels, dinner at
high end restaurants, and flights on chartered jets to finance
her lavish lifestyle and keep the grift going. She allegedly
built banks out of thousands in cash.
Speaker 1 (09:35):
And that's not all.
Speaker 11 (09:36):
The fake heiress reportedly fleees her friend out of sixty
two thousand dollars for a world class trip to Morocco.
But Anna went too far when she attempted to take
out a loan for twenty two million dollars to finance
a visual art center she called the Anna Delvi Foundation.
In all, Anna reportedly scammed a total of two hundred
(09:57):
and seventy five thousand dollars.
Speaker 1 (09:59):
I mean, maybe it's just me, but to you, Doctor
Donna Rockwell, joining US clinical psychologist Faculty, Saber University. Doctor Rockwell,
I don't know very many people except maybe Alois that
lives in hotels.
Speaker 12 (10:14):
No, I guess we don't really know many people who
live in hotels. But it's very posh, isn't it.
Speaker 1 (10:20):
To do that?
Speaker 12 (10:20):
She might be a eloise poser, I guess, But you
know that makes her look really unattainable and like she's
got lots of money. So I think people in her
situation will do anything they can to look like they're billionaires,
not even millionaires.
Speaker 1 (10:37):
And Rebecca Rosenberg joining us in Fox News Digital. Rebecca,
she wasn't just staying down at the Motel six. She
was staying at very very expensive and luxurious hotels.
Speaker 8 (10:48):
Yes, she was staying at eleven Howard Street for a
very long time, racked up a bill that tens of
thousands of dollars. That's where she lived here for a
big chunk of.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
The time, the New York You know, it was really
interesting that she created this illusion that super rich and
super educated people fell for and I guess you'd call
it New York society until she went and basically invited
(11:26):
herself to be on a yacht in a bisa and
then after everyone got off at the end of the vacation,
she and her boyfriend turn around and get back on
and stay for another week or ten days. I mean,
Jim Ellis, you're the certified fraud examiner, former FBI agent
twenty nine years, for beat's sake. When you commandeer a
(11:50):
yacht with a captain and a staff and all the
food and you're out at sea and the gas that
is a huge bill, a huge bill.
Speaker 13 (12:02):
And frankly, you know, she probably could have been stopped
and exposed at that point if any of these people
along the way you lost money, who got you know,
enticed by her story and it actually applied you know,
reason and common sense at a certain point, things wouldn't
have gotten as far as as they did.
Speaker 1 (12:23):
Yeah, you know, that's really interesting. Wendy Patrick, California prosecutor,
author of Red Flags. You can hear her on Today
with doctor Wendy k c b Q. Doctor Wendy, I
find it, Wendy Patrick, I find it really interesting that
the owners or the people that had rented the yacht
originally didn't go after her. Now they are really really
(12:50):
wealthy Hampton Nights, And I got to tell you something, Wendy.
I've been to the Hamptons a couple of times for
charity when I would be speaking to a group or
raising money somehow or other. That's the same, Wendy. I
couldn't wait till I packed up my little rental car
(13:12):
and got I mean, I knew I was a dog upstairs.
I did not get in. That was not where I
was supposed to be. And these rich people that got
ripped off but didn't report it, whether they didn't want
to look stupid or what. Yeah, no, that's right, Nancy.
I'm like you.
Speaker 13 (13:27):
I'm more I'm more familiar with the Hampton in with.
Speaker 8 (13:30):
The free breakfast.
Speaker 1 (13:33):
Stealing it go ahead.
Speaker 14 (13:35):
So this is the this is the problem with the
super super rich. And it is a problem because financial
responsibility should be everyone's responsibility. But they probably either.
Speaker 12 (13:44):
Didn't know or didn't care.
Speaker 14 (13:46):
Why do I say that, because we've covered so many
stories where you do have the ultra rich that are
scammed are defrauded by somebody like Anna, but don't consider
it in the balance to be worth their while to
pursue it, not realizing there may be so many other
victims that they might be preventing.
Speaker 1 (14:08):
Crime stories with Nancy Grace. Where is Anna Delvey aka
Anna Sorkin? Now while she has been released from prison,
She's holding party after party in her New York apartment.
And that's while she was under house arrests and now
selling art. Whatever becomes of Anna Sorkin, the fake heiress
(14:36):
who ripped off her victims to the tune of over
a quarter million dollars, Remember what happened? I'm not quite
sure Rebecca Rosenberg what her motivation is other than just
living the high life. But imagine the impact she could
have made being the daughter of a truck driver. I mean,
I'm the daughter of a railroad worker and a bank teller,
(14:59):
and I know my parents worked overtime to send me
to college, send me to law school, and so much more.
She actually has a brilliant mind.
Speaker 8 (15:09):
Yeah, but I don't think that if she had been
honest about her origins, anybody the people that she was
trying to hang out with the New York that they
would have really paid.
Speaker 13 (15:19):
Attention to her.
Speaker 1 (15:20):
We know she was born in Russia, grew up in Germany.
Her father worked at a transport company. It went and solved.
At nineteen, she left her parents and brother for Paris
to decide to pursue fashion. She has only ever spoken
very vaguely of her parents, as she terms conservative. But
(15:41):
while she's in Paris, she takes on the name Anna
Delvy and she shoots photographs for a fashion art magazine
named Purple. She only got four hundred euros a month
and she stayed financially dependent on her parents, who would
send her money pay for her apartment. Then she had
(16:01):
a breakup, headed to New York and she went for
a trip to Montalk and then Fashion Week, and that
really did it. When she was at Fashion Week, there
was no suggestion she would ever turn back. She went
from boutique hotel to boutique hotel, always handing out chrisp
(16:22):
one hundred dollars tips and putting off bills with promises
of wire transfers that never happened. So, Rebecca Rosenberg, I
know we've got the one victim Rachel Deloche Williams. But
that's two hundred and seventy five thousand dollars. What about
(16:42):
all of the hotels and all of the other people
she ripped off.
Speaker 8 (16:46):
Well, a lot of people didn't come forward. And actually
Rachel Delos was really interesting because at the end Rachel
actually couldn't get paid restitution because the jury did not find.
Speaker 1 (16:59):
The broken deal of ripping her off.
Speaker 8 (17:03):
That was kind of that was one of the charges
they did not convict on.
Speaker 1 (17:06):
Take a listen to hour cut five b our friends
at time.
Speaker 15 (17:11):
Prosecutor Catherine mccau says the defendant has not assent to
her name as far as we can determine, also noting
that Soroken is Russian born, not German, though she could
be deported to Germany no matter how the trial turns out,
as she's reportedly overstayed her visa under the name Anna delve.
She arrived in New York with a high priced wardrobe
and was known for handing out one hundred dollars cash tips,
(17:32):
reportedly saying at different points that her father was a diplomat,
an oil baron, or involved in the solar panel business,
none of which are the case. People who knew her
said she often asked others to use their credit cards
to cover cab and plane fares and then failing to
repay them.
Speaker 1 (17:47):
Rebecca Rosenberg Netflix multi episode creation Inventing Anna. What is it?
Speaker 8 (17:57):
It's a show based on her life stole, so based
on it kind of glamorizes her. I'd see her criminal
activity in New York which she was convicted, and she
sold her life rights to Netflix for them to do
the show.
Speaker 1 (18:15):
This woman cons she cons big. Take a listen to
our cut too from Vanity Fear.
Speaker 7 (18:23):
Prior to their departure, Davis's manager told her Delvi's bill
and room charges were starting to mount and were still unpaid.
As a result, the hotel changed Delvy's room code and
detained all of her personal belongings. To renew her visa,
Delvi said she had to spend intervals of time out
of the country, so she decided to embark on an
adventure to Morocco. She invited her New York City circle
(18:46):
of friends. This trip was the quintessential example of the
lavish lifestyle that delv was known for. A private villa
with a personal butler, all for just a mere seven
thousand dollars a night during their trip, DELV making one
excuse after an Chris Williams to pick up the tab
more and more frequently, eventually covering costs for dinner and
expensive Moroccan dresses. A stark change from the day's DELV
(19:09):
would pay for everything. Then, one morning, DELV was informed
by a hotel employee that they did not have a
working credit card on file. DELV brushed this off as
an issue with her bank, but soon after Williams was
prussured into putting down her credit card by hotel management
staff and security members.
Speaker 1 (19:26):
Jim ellis joining us former fed with the FBI. Have
you ever seen anything like it where a person who
is so obsessed with a lifestyle or getting money actually
has alternate identities and scams and lies to even their
closest friends, their lovers.
Speaker 13 (19:47):
Oh absolutely, I mean in her heart and astoric is
a con and she basically just cares about herself and
she doesn't care what's.
Speaker 1 (20:00):
Left in her wake.
Speaker 13 (20:02):
And I've seen this through my career, both as an
FBI agent and as a private investigator. People act the
same way. I'm familiar with one con artist who dressed
up He's a Southern Baptist boy from Louisiana, and he
dressed stuff like a Hasidic jew complete with clothing and makeup,
(20:22):
so he could go vouch to other people in the
Jewish community for himself. I mean that people will go
to no ends to satisfy their greed, to satisfy their
one for fame and power.
Speaker 1 (20:37):
How do you untangle a case.
Speaker 13 (20:39):
Like this well, I mean, obviously from a law enforcement perspective,
you don't even know about it till somebody who reports it.
Speaker 1 (20:46):
I'm thinking about her personality. She goes to trial, she
goes to trial. I want you to hear what the
attorney said in court. Take listen to our cut seven
air friends at GMA. She has a fake until she
can make it.
Speaker 16 (21:01):
Those words from the defendant's own attorney, who claims she
never intended to commit a crime, but prosecutors call her
a fraud and a liar who would do almost anything
to prolong her life of luxury. This morning, the fate
of an alleged scam artist is now in the hands
of a jury, both sides wrapping up arguments for a
(21:21):
case that's drawn international outrage. The style savvy defendant even
turning heads in court wearing an animal print dress. She
called herself Anna Delvi, a fashionable globetrotter who prosecutors say
was pretending to be a high flying German heiress living
a fairytale life of glitz and glam among Manhattan's elite.
Speaker 1 (21:41):
Wow, okay, take a listen to her and a sroken
in her own words are cut nine from the BBC.
Did you get a thrill from him?
Speaker 3 (21:51):
I mean, were you satisfied when you got away with something,
when you achieved something, when you slipped under the radar
and didn't have to pay. Was it thrilling?
Speaker 5 (22:00):
Because in my head another thought that I was cheating
or getting away with anything. In my head, like anybody
that would borrow from them that would be getting back.
I felt like they portrayed me as like someone who
is very manipulative, which I don't think I am. And
I was like never really like too nice of a person.
I was never like really trying to talk my way
into anything. I kind of just told people what I
(22:21):
want and like they either gave.
Speaker 1 (22:22):
It to me or not, and I just moved on.
She taught them into what she wanted through lines. I mean,
Donald rockwell, we really need a shrink. How can she
take hundreds of thousands of dollars in luxury hotels, clothing
that she got her friends to pay for, racking up
credit cards she'd never pay back, hundreds of thousands of
(22:44):
dollars in credit cards, all based on lies. I mean,
she had to know that was wrong. She wasn't just
faking it, fake it till you make it. She was
outright lying for goods and services.
Speaker 12 (22:58):
Yeah, she was outright lying. That's how we see it.
It's interesting, you know, because a person who has early
life narcissistic.
Speaker 1 (23:08):
Wounds, okay, I see, I don't know what that means.
Speaker 12 (23:10):
What it means that someone is only really thinking about themselves.
Speaker 1 (23:14):
You said, a narcissistic wound. What's a narcissistic wound? I
know who narcissist, But what's a narcissistic wound?
Speaker 12 (23:21):
When we're babies, If our mother or primary caretaker doesn't
look at us and say, who is a pretty baby?
Is a pretty baby? We don't know that we exist.
So without early life mirroring, meaning the parent or the
caregiver is looking at you, you know you're existing, you're
smiling back, there becomes a deficit that develops in a person,
(23:43):
and that is who becomes a narcissist or a self
serving person in adulthood, and we probably know many of
them in our own lives. However, in the context of same,
there's something called acquired situational narcissism, which means that the
situations that we come into after a baby, in other words,
(24:04):
like Anna when she was in her nineteen and in
her twenties, is enough to turn us into that kind
of a person, meaning all for me and none for you.
And how does she get away with that? She gets
away with it because she's in denial, which is a
psychological coping mechanism, So the only way that she can
(24:24):
do these things is to not have a conscience, to
not think about it. So she has a sense of
acquired situational narcissisms because of her situation, and then wanted
more of it and more of it and more of it.
And what people don't really understand about saying is that
it is as addictive as heroine. The second we get
(24:45):
a taste of the spotlight, most of us we want
more and more and more. And that's what happened with Anna.
She was in denial. She was projecting anything that she
was thinking about herself onto other people. She asked for
what she wants did, as we just heard on the tape,
she got it or she didn't get it, and she
moved on. She did not have a conscience to think
(25:06):
about is this the right thing? Am I hurting anybody?
That's not how these people think. And it became more
and more and more because the same is addictive.
Speaker 1 (25:16):
You know, Wendy Pasture. She may have justified it in
her own mind, certainly not defending her because this is
irrational rate, this is not reasoning, it's irrational. She was
taking from rich people in the Hamptons. I'm talking to
like thirty million dollar homes with you know, guest houses
that are you know, bigger than our homes or apartments.
(25:39):
She was taking from someone that could afford it, Like
she overstayed on the yacht for a week because somebody
else much richer than her was paying for it. So
I wonder in her mind is she justify it that way?
Only had it.
Speaker 14 (25:53):
Been a very short amount of time with something overall
weekend or maybe even a week. But the amount of time,
the duration that this went on, there was no conceivable
way in her mind that she possibly could have thought
she would pay any of it back. You know, she
may have faked it until she made it when she
first got to New York, but when stealing money from
others over that period of time.
Speaker 12 (26:13):
Faking it is fraud.
Speaker 14 (26:14):
Hopefully that was a sound by somebody who's at her trial,
because there's no other ways circumstantially you can justify that
many victims over that.
Speaker 1 (26:22):
Long period of time, and even now it's still all
about her. Take a listen to our friend Emily Mateless
at the BBC cuts in why.
Speaker 3 (26:32):
Do you think so many people believed you?
Speaker 4 (26:34):
Then?
Speaker 3 (26:35):
What was it in your personality that could convince people?
Speaker 1 (26:39):
I don't know.
Speaker 5 (26:39):
I think like maybe believed I was smart and I
was working on something that was that could have like
a great potential and that would be successful.
Speaker 1 (26:47):
I don't know.
Speaker 5 (26:48):
I don't feel like it has much to do with
my personality. I guess like I really believed in myself
and not what I was doing.
Speaker 1 (26:56):
I don't know.
Speaker 5 (26:56):
It's hard to explain. I guess like people just see
like I'm challenged and I was focused, and I work
hard and I could make them a lot of money.
Speaker 1 (27:09):
Rebecca Rosenberg worked hard and what every time I see
a foo or a post of her. She's on a
luxury trip, or she's shopping at what well.
Speaker 8 (27:18):
I think I think a lot of her victims wanted
to believe in her success because it meant their success too.
You know, she's saying, Okay, I'm going to build this
annadelby Foundation in Manhattan for twenty two million. And you
know one of the persons, one of the people she
do with, the architect, well for him, you know, he
he wanted to be involved in that big project, so
(27:40):
he wanted to sort of believe the lie because it
would ultimately help him. So I think a lot of
it was people wanting to kind of believe it was
true because there was an advantage to them.
Speaker 1 (27:51):
These are just some of the things. And I want
to go to you on Jim Ellis that we have
uncovered falsifying financial documents from international banks wait for it,
totally approximately sixty million euros securing a loan of one
hundred grand after lying to bank reps with CTI, depositing
(28:14):
countless bad checks and to other banks. I guess you
know how you flow to check, You deposit a check,
you would draw the funds and then you try to
short up from another bad account so that won't fall through,
and then another You basically play rop a dope on banks.
That was totally nearly eighty thousand dollars. That doesn't include
(28:38):
the money she conned off our friends, never paying them back,
theft of services almost a half a million dollars. I
mean that's a lot of money, Jim.
Speaker 13 (28:52):
Oh, absolutely, it's a lot of money. And you mentioned
earlier you weren't sure how she ever worked hard. She
worked hard in preparing all these fraudulent documents and passing
all those bogus checks and coming up with stories that
were plausible but yet not too specific. The life of
(29:12):
the con is hard work, and they do it for
the for the power, they do it for the money,
They do it for the same. I think she solved
the banks as her potential savior. You know, you think
of of like Elizabeth Holmes with Sarnos. You know, was
she a genius or was she a scam artist? You know,
(29:34):
if if Sorkin was able to produce all these phony
documents and convince a bank to lend her twenty two
million dollars.
Speaker 1 (29:43):
So why explain that to us some mere mortals? What
do you mean produce phony documents and convince big banks
to learn her a lots of money.
Speaker 13 (29:51):
Sure it happened, you know, she apparently was really adept
in Adobe photoshop. I mean, she was taking documents and
altering them to convince the bankers that she had Swiss
bank accounts, that she had trust documents, and she had
lawyers and CPAs or accountants over in Europe. And it
(30:14):
was going, at least to a certain extent, probably till
it hit the underwriting department, the people in the back
of the office who make sure everything's all the boxes
are checked. It was it was painting a picture of her,
of exactly who she was claiming to be. And I
think if she she probably she possibly could have felt
(30:37):
that if she was able to land that loan. In
her mind, she probably was going to pay all those
people back that she had scamped.
Speaker 1 (30:45):
In her mind.
Speaker 13 (30:46):
It's in her mind, and she may have we don't know.
She's kicking the can down the road. She's getting her
next victim, and when that, when it comes time to
pay them back, she'll worry about that later. It's never ending.
I mean, it's what brings down every ponzee scheme in
the end, and This wasn't a large scale ponzee scheme.
(31:07):
But you know, some of that money she scammed through
those phony checks that she deposited with City Bank and
the loan she got from City National Bank, she used
to pay some of her debts that to the hotels
and other businesses so that she could stay afloat and
(31:27):
maintain that illusion.
Speaker 1 (31:29):
Well, Jim Ellis, I guess what you're saying is she
would pay back the hotels to the extent that she
could get them to allow her to stay there for
even longer. I mean, what does it mean to kayta check?
Speaker 13 (31:41):
Well, t kya check. And it's a lot harder nowadays
than they used to be because the float, which is
the time that the check is deposited in the one
bank and actually clears in the originating bank, it's so
much shorter. But you basically take a check and you
present it to a bank that you know is worthless,
(32:02):
or it may appear it has funds, but by the
time that check is presented for payment to the originating bank,
there aren't any funds available.
Speaker 1 (32:17):
Crime stories with Nancy Grace Anna Delvisorcan who was placed
on house arrests. What she was released from jail for
a nearly three hundred thousand dollars heist that we know
of making a name in the headlines again. This time
(32:38):
her provocative art appears on a Netflix special. But you know,
cable TV lets you see what they want you to see,
and that is not who Anna Sorcan really is. Who
is she? Take a listen to our friends at GMA,
(32:59):
Good Morning America.
Speaker 17 (33:00):
New York City jury finding socialite and Asauric, a so
called SOHO grifter, guilty on eight counts, including grand larceny,
attempted grand larceny, and theft of services to.
Speaker 11 (33:11):
Jurors obviously believed our point of view and followed our
logic and acquitted her for the top charges.
Speaker 1 (33:16):
I'm sad and that she was convicted of some of
the other charges.
Speaker 17 (33:19):
Sorgan was acquitted of two charges, including the most serious,
attempting to steal more than one million dollars from City
National Bank.
Speaker 1 (33:26):
Jay Rebecca Rosenberg joining us from Foxy's Digital, explaining the
split verdict. What was she convicted on and on what
was she acquitted?
Speaker 8 (33:35):
She was acquitted on trying to score this massive twenty
million dollars loan, which was one of the top charges
that was the attempted grand larceny and she was acquitted
of stealing the number kind of varied that around seventy
thousand from Rachel Deloche. That was the trip that she
invited her best friend at the time, Richard Deloschan, to Morocco,
(33:58):
where they stayed in the seven thousand and night riod
outside a marakesh and at the end of the trip
she stuck her with the bill.
Speaker 14 (34:05):
She persuaded her to put the.
Speaker 8 (34:08):
Entire ship on her credit card and she would pay
her back. So those were the two main counts she
was acquitted on and then she was convicted in She
was convicted in the chartered plane incident.
Speaker 1 (34:23):
Right, well, let me let that side. Canra Becca Eisenberg
the chartered plane incident? What was that?
Speaker 8 (34:29):
So it was called Blade is the company, and she
persuaded them to fly her without paying up front to
a Berkshire Hathaway conference in Omaha and basically was like,
I'll pay you later, and they thought she paid them
later and she didn't. And that was about thirty five
(34:49):
thousand dollars.
Speaker 1 (34:50):
It was a chartered flight, a chartered flight incident. Okay,
so she ends up going to not jail, but to Rikers.
Is anybody on the panel familiar with Rikers? Okay, yeah,
just by reputation. Yeah, you don't want to go there
(35:10):
unless you have to take a Listen to Anna Sorokan
speaking to our friend Deborah Roberts at ABC.
Speaker 4 (35:19):
Dorekan says she's paid for her mistakes her time behind bars,
including nineteen months in New York's infamous Rikers Island jailed,
some of it in solitary confinement. You're being held in Rikers,
one of the most frightening jails in the country.
Speaker 1 (35:35):
What was that like for you? Were you terrified in.
Speaker 5 (35:38):
A way that was therapeutic? I mean it's a therapeutic
I for example, use the time, like to read a
lot and to write.
Speaker 4 (35:46):
You've heard that, you've said that it's the prison's kind
of a waste of time.
Speaker 5 (35:49):
Yeah, taking a person, straping them off everything, putting them
somewhere where they have pretty much very few opportunities to rehabilitate.
So how is this supposed to help someone who already
had to resort to life of crime?
Speaker 1 (36:04):
And that tells me right there that Anna delviy aka
Anna Sorokan learned nothing from our time behind bars. Wendy
Patrick nothing.
Speaker 14 (36:14):
It also tells us that she is admitting that she
resorted to a life of crime, which contradicts everything she
said before the trial and even in some interviews after
the trial. She knew because she wasn't working, as you
pointed out several times, there was no way she was
going to be able to repay these loans. But sitting
through the trial, sitting in Riker's Island prison therapeutic you
(36:35):
have to wonder whether she received special treatment. We don't
know one way or the other, but it is very
interesting that her attitude apparently hasn't changed.
Speaker 1 (36:43):
I'm sure she got special treatment because she had managed
to convince everyone that she was a celebrity that deserves
special treatment. You know, Rebecca Rosenberg, I'm not sure I
understand the not guilty on the sixty grand she ripped
off from Rachel Delight Williams. Was this is Jerry's thinking?
Speaker 15 (37:01):
Well.
Speaker 8 (37:01):
I spoke to a couple of jurors after the verdict
and they kind of felt that in the end, Rachel
came out ahead, even though it was this like really
stressful situation for her where she had put the payment
for this trip on her work visa card and just
you know, it was a sum of money that was
(37:21):
greater than what she earned as a salary. But eventually,
you know, she did, she did end up with I
think her book advance was three hundred thousand dollars. I
don't know what she got paid from HBO. So I
think that they just didn't feel that bad for her.
Speaker 1 (37:39):
But why because why do they not feel bad for
Rachel Williams.
Speaker 8 (37:43):
Because she was also using Anna Soroken. You could say,
like she, you know, it's sort of weird, like she's
going out with Anna all the time, and Anna it's
always paying for absolutely everything. You know, I personally wouldn't
feel that comfortable if I was going out with somebody,
even if they were much wealthier than me, with them
(38:04):
flitting the bill every time. So I think that was kind.
Speaker 1 (38:07):
Of their reasoning. Take a listen to what happens immediately
when she walks out from behind bars are cut fourteen
inside edition.
Speaker 4 (38:16):
If you walked out of prison a free woman, HI
on a What was the first thing you did that brought.
Speaker 14 (38:21):
Me my phone?
Speaker 1 (38:21):
So I got on social media.
Speaker 6 (38:24):
She came out of prison and immediately set down to
do this interview with us and immediately went on social
media and immediately started to resume kind of a glamorous life.
Speaker 1 (38:35):
So the first thing she does is on social media.
What does that tell you? Doctor Rockwell, the same thing and.
Speaker 12 (38:42):
Tells you, Doctor Gray, that she didn't feel all bad
about one thing through this entire event, that there's a
lack of conscience, and that she was loving the spotlight
and she couldn't wait to get back into it. As
I say, it's an addiction. It makes the horror flash
in your mind. You have endorsements, your brain comes alive
(39:05):
with your own image, and you love it. You salivate
over it. And that's what happened to Panna Sorkin.
Speaker 1 (39:11):
Jim ellis Certified Fraught Examiner, are now with his own
firm JKE Texas dot Com. Jim shopaholics or people that
get a thrill out of buying things. I think Anna
Sorokan aka n Anna Delvy got a thrill of some
sort of this fake life she was leading. Do you
(39:35):
think someone like her can turn over a new leaf
or is this just who she is?
Speaker 13 (39:41):
Well, that's a good question. I mean I always hope.
Speaker 1 (39:44):
I did say what you hope, Jim ellis you investigated
so many con guys, what do you think they don't stop?
Speaker 13 (39:53):
I mean, as you pointed out, she immediately got back
on social media. And I agree with doctor Rockwell that
it was for the endorphent rush of getting that hit,
of getting that fame and putting out that projection. But
I think it's also a certain aspect that is rebuilding
her stature so that she can now see where she
(40:18):
can get her next meal ticket from. But who in
the right mind would want to work with somebody that
just got out of prison for defrauding hundreds of thousands
of dollars from the people she was closest to.
Speaker 1 (40:34):
Well, as predicted, Annasaurican aka and Adelve has appeared again.
She won't go away. Has she ever considered going home?
Is there any way to deport this woman? After being
placed on house arrest and throwing one high profile party
after the next in her apartment and again that's under
(40:56):
house arrest, she is now pursuing her art. Anne has
landed on a Netflix series, but regardless of Netflix, she
will be best known for her storing role in court.
Don't worry, you haven't heard the last of Anna Delvey
(41:16):
Nancy Grace crime stories. Signing off goodbye friend,
Host
Nancy Grace
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