September 30, 2021 • 28 mins
Johnathan gets a panicked call from Mair...in jail. Her powerful Irish family set her up to make it look like she stole hundreds of thousands from her employer, all so they can torpedo her chances of getting her $25 million inheritance. Johnathan spends $70,000 trying to help Mair clear her name and help her get what’s rightfully hers. But one day he discovers "Mair Smyth" is not even her real name. And that's only the tip of the iceberg that forces Johnathan to question everything he thinks he knows about Mair Smyth.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Certain portions of what you're about to hear have been
dramatized based on real life events, eyewitness accounts, and court records.
Mayor Smith is an Irish heiress worth millions. Let's get started.
She was so majestic, she was royal, and I was
immediately drowned. She made quite a splash, didn't she see day?
(00:25):
Mayor is dating a powerful Los Angeles politician, and she's
fighting tooth and nail with her wealthy family back in
Ireland over a twenty five million Euro inheritance. That's thirty
four million in American dollars. There's a clause in the
inheritance that if she's convicted of a felony, she gets disinherited.
Did you hear that story too? I warned Mayor that
(00:47):
her family might try to frame her with a crime
to get her disinherited and keep her millions for themselves,
But she laughs it off until one day you have
a collective call from the Century Regional Detention Facility from
Jonathan Press want to accept you were right. I was
(01:08):
arrested today. My family set me up to make it
look like I stole two hundred thousand dollars from Pacific
Islands trying to get me Disinheritance. I'm Jonathan Walton and
(01:31):
this is Queen of the Con Episode two, The Inheritance.
I'm at work when I get that jailhouse phone call,
so like sitting next to you, and you're just like
holy shit. You're like my friend Mayor, she's arrested, and
(01:53):
I'm like what Evan Goldstein and I are producing a
History Channel show when Mayor calls me from jail and
lie of and you were you witnessed that phone call? Yeah,
I was. I was sitting right next to you, and
you were like ashen, like you lost all the color
in your face. It's been fourteen months since the day
(02:14):
I met Mayor, and we'd become best friends. Actually we'd
become more than best friends. We'd become family. This is
like your sister calling you from jail, but from the
outside in it felt like this train wreck, but like
what happens next. I got hooked on the story too,
(02:35):
And as Evan will go on to witness firsthand, there
are many more crazy plot twists ahead. Fasten your seat belts.
It's going to be a bumping nuts enough to give
Betty Davis's character in All About eve whiplash. What is
he talking about? Shortly after Mayor calls me from jail,
(02:59):
her boyfriend the politician phones to ask if I can
bail her out of jail. He tells me he can't
because he doesn't want his wife and kids finding out. Yeah,
he's married. You see, when you bail someone out of jail,
it becomes public record in the court system. And the
last thing the politician wants is someone in the press
(03:22):
discovering he posted bail for a woman who is not
his wife. The politician assures me, though Mayor will pay
me back. She's a wealthy woman. She's good for it.
Don't worry. So you heard me on the phone calling
around for a bail bondsman. Oh yeah, that's right. Yeah.
And then it became this thing where it's like you
(03:42):
had to figure it out. I think you're talking like
getting quotes or something. Do you talk to a couple
of them? Yeah, I talked to a bunch of them.
I'd never build anyone out of jail before Mayor's bail
is set at seventy thousand dollars, and every bail bondsman
I call wants at least ten percent or seven thousand
dollars cat to get her out, but the politician has
(04:02):
connections and turns me onto a guy he knows who'll
do it for. So that's what I pay dollars to
bail Mayor Smith out of jail. And that's when I
learned her name isn't actually Mayor Smith at all, it's
Mary Anne Smith. I think nothing of it, but looking back,
(04:24):
that was a huge red flag. Luckily, the politician shows
up on my doorstep the very next day with cash
in hand. After I built her out of jail. He
paid me back. He said it was her money. She's
good for it. She's good for it. She's a woman
of her word. And so begins the all out war
(04:48):
for Mayor's inheritance. I'm drafted as a soldier on the
front lines, and I'm happy to help in any way
I can. After all, she's like a sister to me
at this point, and it really pisces me off that
the owner of the Pacific Islands travel agency would conspire
with Mayor's family to frame her with a crime and
(05:09):
disqualify her from that twenty five million euro inheritance. I mean,
she's their star employee. What kind of saleswoman was she
was she good. Oh my god, she was the best.
Michelle Roque is a coworker of Mayor's selling vacations to
the Pacific Islands, and she was a Tahiti specialist. Basically,
(05:31):
she sells a lot of packages to Bora Bora, Tahiti, Morea,
so the South specific. Pretty much. When we're short in sales,
JP would be like, Mayor, we need some sales. She
would make it happen in a day or two. And
JP is the owner of Pacific Islands. Correct, Yes, Mayor
(05:54):
sold like the hundred thousand this month. So he's ecstatic
about that because these are expensive vacations right, oh yeah, yeah,
at least a minimum of ten dollars in one week
and that's the low end. How was Mayor with clients, Well,
she's very popular. Everybody was like Mayor was good. Mayor
(06:14):
was great because she's the sweetest. She will go out
of her way to do things for you. And she
did that for me because I was new in town.
I needed like a place to stay. She helped me
with all of that. She would go a mile for you.
We became really good friends. Actually we became really close.
(06:36):
She helped me get my apartment I mean, she made
it happen in a couple of weeks. She goes, I
know the owner, I can get you in. She even said,
I'll go ahead and pay for the deposit, and you
just paid me back later. So she paid you the
deposit for your apartment. Paid. Yeah, And she said I'll
(06:58):
take care of it because I us going back and
forth between Fresno and l a sot that weekend that
I was supposed to sign all of the paperwork. She says,
don't worry about it, I got it. You just pay
me when you get back or whenever. I said, okay,
that's nice. So she's she's very sweet, and JP, the
(07:20):
owner of Pacific Islands, loves sweet Mayor. Remember, JP is
the guy that Mayor says is best friends with her
cousin Fenton back in Ireland. Mayor is making a lot
of money for JP, selling nearly a million dollars in
luxury vacations a year for his company. Mayor says she
spends a lot of time in the Pacific Islands growing up,
(07:42):
taking yearly vacations there with her family, so getting to
relive those happy experiences while describing these exotic, sun drenched
places to prospective clients, brings her tremendous joy, and it
also makes her a great saleswoman. I mean, when you
love what you sell, the product sells itself right. And
(08:04):
JP is grateful to Mayor for bringing in so much business.
And Mayor is grateful to JP for giving her a
purpose and something fun to do while living in Los Angeles,
and she shows her appreciation for JP publicly. Mayor used
to because I used to tag along with her all
the time, because she gives me a right to work
(08:25):
in home. Every day. She would always buy a nice
expensive bottle of Coniak or something for JP. So I'm thinking, wow,
they have a really good relationship. She would buy expensive stuff. Yeah,
coniacs expensive. Oh yeah, and she would not just buy
just the cheap one. She would drag me to distours.
(08:46):
It's like, oh, I am looking for this specific coniac
to ball or. You know. So I say they have
a good relationship. It was great. But at some point,
when the fight for mayor his inheritance starts heating up,
her relationship with JP starts to change. Remember, Mayor says
(09:07):
JP is best friends with her cousin Fenton back in Ireland,
and clearly JP is taking Fenton's side in trying to
deny Mayor her rightful share of that million euro inheritance.
So JP and Mayor have a spectacular falling out. They're
fighting like hell, oh yeah, definitely. Would there be shouting?
Would he shout at her? Well, you know they will
(09:29):
shut the door normally, but you would hear him in
JP's office. She told me that JP is working with
her family and set her up to make it look
like she stole two dollars. Yes, yes, So Mayor is
fired and then arrested for grand theft. I bail her
(09:52):
out of jail. She's no longer working at Pacific Islands
in July, and as the weeks pass, she's no longer
working at all anywhere. I'm worried about her. Mayor is
(10:19):
unemployed and that really concerns me. I mean, I know
she has plenty of money to live on, but not
working can drive a person crazy, you know, and it's
driving her crazy. Then one day she calls me up
and tells me she got a job as a psychic. Yeah,
(10:39):
a psychic, using yet another name, an empathic psychic. Mayor says,
she calls up one of those psychic numbers and takes
a test over the phone and passes with flying colors.
She says the gift runs in her family and that
(11:00):
she's always been ashamed of it, but now she needs
to use it to make a living, and in no
time at all, she has a slew of clients and
a splashy website with an explainer video that I produce.
I've always had a gift since I was a little girl,
and her Irish accent is suddenly not so Irish. It
(11:21):
materialized throughout my childhood and I didn't really understand what
it was. I would always know things were happening before
they happened, and everyone would laugh at me, so I
stopped admitting that I knew these things were going to happen,
but things would have developed, like for instance, I knew
my dad was leaving, and a week later my dad left.
Um I knew I was going to have a fall
(11:44):
and break my shoulder, and for two weeks before the
event happened, I was four years old. My mom said,
don't bring such things into being, but I could picture
myself falling, and on the day I was wearing the
outfit that I saw myself falling and I cried for
an hour, I didn't want to wear it, and I balloon.
It was exactly as I saw hi it. So I've
always visioned things and felt things. So I grow to
(12:10):
accept Mayor as a psychic fairly quickly. I truly believe
she has a gift. I mean I witness it, and
so does my buddy Evan in a weird kind of way.
You know, I'm a psychic. If you ever want to talk,
you know, I don't remember if she was like heavily
discounted prices or she's like, I'll just do it because
(12:31):
you're friends with Jonathan, but you know, she kind of
offered up her her psychic services. You know. I was
in a very kind of dark place at that point.
Evan and I are working on a show he created
called Fat Guys in the Woods for the Weather Channel.
We secured our place at the top of the food
change and now we have the waistline to prove it.
(12:51):
And he moves into our guest room for a few
months because he's having trouble at home, major trouble. So
your wife was cheating you. I found out she was cheating,
But before you knew for sure, Mayor told me, yeah,
she's cheating. And it's a blonde guy and it was
and it was a blond guy. Like, how does she
know that? Yeah? How could she? She didn't tell you this.
(13:18):
This is when she met you for one or two
times in the place. She's like, yeah, I had a
vision and she is cheating on him, and it's with
a blond guy and it turned out to be a
very blond guy. But how does she know that? Yeah?
I know, right, that's and you were a stranger to
her at that point. She just met you, and she
didn't know that many details either about what to just
(13:40):
pick that out of the air. Could have been a redhead,
could have been a brown hair guy. Most guys have
brown or black hair, I mean most of mine guys. Anyway, Look,
it would have been easy to laugh the whole thing
off as a parlor trick and dismiss the idea of
Mayor being an actual psychic. But very quickly, tons of
other people all over Los Angeles start beating a path
(14:04):
to her door for readings. So I found Mayor Annie
out in attorney Michelle Thompson DaCosta is having some life issues.
I wanted to see a psychic. She had great reviews,
and so I booked her for one reading and then
that's how I got to know her. And how was
(14:26):
your reading? Your first reading with her? She was spot on.
She was so spot on. That's when I referred my mother.
I referred every friend and I was like, you have
to go see her. And that is the one thing
(14:47):
because people ask me, you know, people tell me the
psychic thing was a scam. I'm like, no, she really
was psychic. She was at my husband's birthday party once
and I saw her read like three or four people
brought them to tears, like it's crazy. She knew dates, names.
It's just weird, you know, timeframes, and with clairvoyant abilities
(15:12):
like that, mayor quickly begins attracting a whole other level
of clientele. So I'm the CEO and founder of Global
Women's Empowerment Network. As the head of a major nonprofit
in Los Angeles, test catch A Tory is way more
grounded in reality than in psychic readings. But her business
partner implores her to reconsider. And he called me up
(15:35):
and said, oh my gosh, I have this fabulous psychic.
I want to pay for a reading for you. And
I said, uh not thanks, I just didn't want to
go there, you know, for whatever reason intuitively are otherwise
He just raved about her and said, well, you know,
let me know if you change your mind. But she's
really interested in women empowerment and maybe you guys can
(15:56):
have a conversation. So we did have a converse station.
We lasted about almost an hour and we instantly clicked,
and she was so excited about GWEN Global Women's Empowerment
Network and what we're doing, and thought that maybe she
might be able to help in one way or another.
She said she had a lot of celebrity clients that
(16:17):
she can't disclose right then, so she offered to help. Yes,
I was so excited. Does she name any celebrities or
she said she can't name them? At first she said
I can't name them, but then she would drop little hints.
Then it would unravel that one of her big clients
(16:38):
and her you know, favorite friends was Jennifer Aniston. And
so she said, I want to bring Jennifer and you
know and have you meet her, and I want you
to you know, I think she'll be really happy to
be like a spokesperson for GWEN. So I was so excited.
That's freaking huge, that's huge. I mean somebody like yeah wow.
(17:04):
So Mayor's career as a soothsayer appears to be taking
off fast, especially with the A list crowd in Los Angeles,
celebrities like Jennifer Anniston. All of a sudden, Mayor moves
out of my apartment building and into a brand new, plush,
opulent high rise. How much was it. It was close
(17:25):
to six thousand a month. That's a ton of money,
and especially in l A, It's like that's a lot
of money to burn on an apartment every month. But
Mayor says living there is good for her burgeoning psychic
business because it engenders trust and confidence from her clients,
especially her high end clients, and it helps build her
brand as a psychic to the movers and shakers in Hollywood.
(17:49):
She definitely kind of marched to the beat of her
own drama, which was impressive, you know, like like she
seemed like she had her ship together. My husband Pablo
nominates Mayor for the Ice Bucket Challenge in and she
(18:12):
has her massage therapist shoot this video in her swanky
new apartment. Ready, no is it on? It's so Pablo,
thank you so much for nominating me for this aos
Ice bucket challenge like give it back to you and
truly would since I can't. Here's who I'm nominating, the
(18:36):
Double Dog Dare the Ice book at challenge for ao
S Charity. See you on the dog You're on. I
set up Baby Rose Hot Mama number two. Here's Ice
and your baby. Last but not least, my loving child
Chelsea student extraordinary. I hope your first week back to
(18:57):
school is amazing, I said, girlfriend, and I don't want
to hear about your chest cold. So let's get started morning.
This is graphic and again, thank you Pablo. I will
see you on Sunday. Let's go excuse the mess? How
(19:18):
am I trust the ice water here? Oh Houston, I
forgot to know you. You are going to say a word?
Were you? Houston? Massage? There is to the stars you
are talking on? Thanks so much O. No cubes in
(19:46):
the cleavage. Things start going really well from there, especially
on the inheritance front. She shows me an email from
her Los Angeles attorney that makes it look like the
Pacific Islands grand theft case against her is falling apart
because it's bogus, thereby ensuring she'll get her inheritance very soon.
(20:12):
The email went something like ms Smith. The prosecutor who
filed charges against you on behalf of Pacific Islands is
having trouble turning over discovery. He's either lost his files
or they never existed in the first place. If we
can't get your files, they're simply is no case. In
my thirty years practicing law, I've never seen anything like it.
(20:36):
The judge will throw this case out shortly. I am
certain of it. I am so relieved things are really
looking up for Mayor. But a few days later I
go to pick her up at her swanky new apartment
for brunch and find her doubled over, crying hysterically. They
(20:56):
froll my bank accounts. I am locked out of all
my money. And what's worse, she says she's not going
to be allowed a jury trial. A single judge will
be deciding her fate instead. I am so pissed. Her
family in Ireland. They're paying off some dirty l a
(21:19):
d A to freeze her bank account, so she's got
no fucking money. What the fuck? I call my buddy
Evan to tell him what happened. This is more or
less how it went, dude. That's like John Grishamship and
it's it's insane. The bogus Specific Islands case again. So
it was about to be dismissed, and and now they
pulled this. They're they're trying to pressure her to give
(21:40):
up her inheritance if she signs something thinks she wants
to give up her inheritance, her family's hold, and don't
get the whole Pacific balance case dropped. Dude, She's got
to fight it, man, I mean, yeah, she's gotta fight that.
I gotta help her. The ship that goes on in Ireland.
Here in America, you'd go to prison. Back in Ireland,
you'd get a pat on the back. I am now
(22:00):
more determined than ever to help Mayor clear her name
and get her inheritance. So I start loaning her money
to live on, since all her bank accounts and credit
cards are frozen. I let her borrow almost six thousand
dollars to pay her rent in that luxury apartment that month.
Then the next month I lend her another thirty two
(22:22):
d to move back into our building where the rent
is considerably cheaper. And then I just keep lending her
more cash to live on, almost sixteen thousand dollars in
total at this point, why did you keep giving her money?
I kept giving her money because she paid me back
the first you know, dollars I loaned her to for bail.
(22:44):
She paid me back the next day, or rather, the
married politician paid me back the next day. It was
her money. Yeah, I know, let's not forget. She was
like I loved her like a sister. We were ending
phone calls at that point with I love you, I
love you like you know, like I loved her, like
I loved who I thought she was. Well, you guys
were friends for a long time time before she ever
asked you for money. Yeah, yeah, fourteen months. As the
weeks pass, I keep lending there more money. I'm out
(23:07):
twenty dollars total. Then one day she tells me she's
got some great news. The Los Angeles District attorney prosecuting
her will agree to drop the bogus specific Island's case,
clearing the way for her to get her inheritance if
she can just pay fifty four thousand dollars. Now, I
(23:28):
had zero experience with the criminal justice system at this point,
like zero. I'd only ever been to court for a
traffic ticket twenty years ago. But I did know attorneys
and legal fees are prohibitively expensive, So paying fifty four
thousand to clear Mer's name so she could get millions
in inheritance seems like a no brainer to me. Now,
(23:52):
I had almost depleted my checking account at this point
loaning her twenty grand in cash. And while I make
more than a hundred thousand a year as a reality
TV producer, living in l A is expensive, very expensive.
So I only had another four thousand in cash to
loan her. And then I did something I can't believe
(24:13):
I let myself do. I let her charge my credit
cards fifty thousand dollars to make up the fifty four
thousand she needed to get the case against her dropped.
It felt like you were helping her, You're helping a
friend in need. Yeah, I was rescuing a damsel in
distress hundred percent, and like no hesitation. You know, there
(24:33):
was no question because I'm sure you've been you know,
you knew the whole story. I believe her family was
crazy and they're out for money, and you know what
people do for millions of dollars, people will kill. Mayor
would always tell me about her childhood with her crazy
Irish family in that same recording you heard in the
last episode. She talks about how violence and fear punctuate
(24:55):
every aspect of her life growing up. I identify with
my father, and I told you about her. My dad
had to leave because he was going to murder my mother.
He had mapped it out in books, notebooks, journals, how
he was going to murder my mother and dismember her body,
(25:16):
and not dismember but getting rid of it. And he
knew at that point he was really going to do
something to my mom. So I know all too well
what her family is capable of and what they'll do
to get Mayor out of their way so they can
take her inheritance. Why do you think she did have
this inheritance coming? Like we're talking millions of dollars? Did
(25:38):
she ever say anything or do anything that like was
just like, this isn't bullshit. I really believe her. Well,
she had a ton of evidence. She would show me
emails from her barristers, which are lawyers in Ireland about
her inheritance. She would show me she had like paperwork,
she'd show you well emails. But still there's like a
paper trio. It's not just her telling you exactly, but
(26:00):
on her phone, like she would show me her phone
and go, look what embarrassas saying, and I'd read it
and be like, oh, blah blah million. But wow, that's
a lot of money. So, in case you've lost track
at this point, I've lone Mayor almost seventy thousand dollars,
which is a lot of freaking money. You'd think I'd
be worried, but I'm not worried at all because the
(26:21):
bogus specific Island's case against her got dropped like a
bad habit. And don't forget, she's getting ready to collect
six and a half million dollars in inheritance. That was
her share of the million euros. So life is good.
Life is very very good. And then one day out
(26:41):
of the blue, Mayor gets drown in jail. Again. I
know exactly what's happening. She's being screwed over by her
Irish family. Actually, Mayor isn't being screwed over at all.
I am next time on Queen of the con And then, dude,
(27:05):
you are not going to believe the ship Mayor Smith
gets caught between a rock and a hard place. You've
been scamming us out of money this whole time. You have,
and that's only the beginning your purpose American. She was
born in Bangor main in nine pack a lunch. This
rabbit hole is long and winding. Pretty sure she drugged me.
(27:30):
For exclusive photos and other bonus material, follow at Queen
of the Con on Instagram and if you're enjoying Queen
of the Con, tell your friends about it and leave
us a review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get
your podcasts. Queen of the Con The Irish Heiress is
(27:52):
a production of a y R Media and I Heart Radio,
hosted by Me Jonathan Walton. Executive producers Jonathan Walton for
Nathan Walton Productions and Eliza Rosen for a y R Media.
Written by Jonathan Walton, Consulting producer Evan Goldstein, Senior Associate
producer Eric Newman. Sound designed by baked ZD Media, mixed
(28:16):
and mastered by Elliott Herman. Audio engineering by Elliott Herman,
Studio engineering by Chris McMasters. Voice acting performed by Kevin
Raymond and Amy Phillips. Legal counsel for a y R Media,
Gianni Douglas, Executive producer for I Heart Radio, Chandler Mainz
Certain portions of what you're about to hear have been
dramatized based on real life events, eyewitness accounts, and court records.
Mayor Smith is an Irish heiress worth millions. Let's get started.
She was so majestic, she was royal, and I was
immediately drowned. She made quite a splash, didn't she see day?
(00:25):
Mayor is dating a powerful Los Angeles politician, and she's
fighting tooth and nail with her wealthy family back in
Ireland over a twenty five million Euro inheritance. That's thirty
four million in American dollars. There's a clause in the
inheritance that if she's convicted of a felony, she gets disinherited.
Did you hear that story too? I warned Mayor that
(00:47):
her family might try to frame her with a crime
to get her disinherited and keep her millions for themselves,
But she laughs it off until one day you have
a collective call from the Century Regional Detention Facility from
Jonathan Press want to accept you were right. I was
(01:08):
arrested today. My family set me up to make it
look like I stole two hundred thousand dollars from Pacific
Islands trying to get me Disinheritance. I'm Jonathan Walton and
(01:31):
this is Queen of the Con Episode two, The Inheritance.
I'm at work when I get that jailhouse phone call,
so like sitting next to you, and you're just like
holy shit. You're like my friend Mayor, she's arrested, and
(01:53):
I'm like what Evan Goldstein and I are producing a
History Channel show when Mayor calls me from jail and
lie of and you were you witnessed that phone call? Yeah,
I was. I was sitting right next to you, and
you were like ashen, like you lost all the color
in your face. It's been fourteen months since the day
(02:14):
I met Mayor, and we'd become best friends. Actually we'd
become more than best friends. We'd become family. This is
like your sister calling you from jail, but from the
outside in it felt like this train wreck, but like
what happens next. I got hooked on the story too,
(02:35):
And as Evan will go on to witness firsthand, there
are many more crazy plot twists ahead. Fasten your seat belts.
It's going to be a bumping nuts enough to give
Betty Davis's character in All About eve whiplash. What is
he talking about? Shortly after Mayor calls me from jail,
(02:59):
her boyfriend the politician phones to ask if I can
bail her out of jail. He tells me he can't
because he doesn't want his wife and kids finding out. Yeah,
he's married. You see, when you bail someone out of jail,
it becomes public record in the court system. And the
last thing the politician wants is someone in the press
(03:22):
discovering he posted bail for a woman who is not
his wife. The politician assures me, though Mayor will pay
me back. She's a wealthy woman. She's good for it.
Don't worry. So you heard me on the phone calling
around for a bail bondsman. Oh yeah, that's right. Yeah.
And then it became this thing where it's like you
(03:42):
had to figure it out. I think you're talking like
getting quotes or something. Do you talk to a couple
of them? Yeah, I talked to a bunch of them.
I'd never build anyone out of jail before Mayor's bail
is set at seventy thousand dollars, and every bail bondsman
I call wants at least ten percent or seven thousand
dollars cat to get her out, but the politician has
(04:02):
connections and turns me onto a guy he knows who'll
do it for. So that's what I pay dollars to
bail Mayor Smith out of jail. And that's when I
learned her name isn't actually Mayor Smith at all, it's
Mary Anne Smith. I think nothing of it, but looking back,
(04:24):
that was a huge red flag. Luckily, the politician shows
up on my doorstep the very next day with cash
in hand. After I built her out of jail. He
paid me back. He said it was her money. She's
good for it. She's good for it. She's a woman
of her word. And so begins the all out war
(04:48):
for Mayor's inheritance. I'm drafted as a soldier on the
front lines, and I'm happy to help in any way
I can. After all, she's like a sister to me
at this point, and it really pisces me off that
the owner of the Pacific Islands travel agency would conspire
with Mayor's family to frame her with a crime and
(05:09):
disqualify her from that twenty five million euro inheritance. I mean,
she's their star employee. What kind of saleswoman was she
was she good. Oh my god, she was the best.
Michelle Roque is a coworker of Mayor's selling vacations to
the Pacific Islands, and she was a Tahiti specialist. Basically,
(05:31):
she sells a lot of packages to Bora Bora, Tahiti, Morea,
so the South specific. Pretty much. When we're short in sales,
JP would be like, Mayor, we need some sales. She
would make it happen in a day or two. And
JP is the owner of Pacific Islands. Correct, Yes, Mayor
(05:54):
sold like the hundred thousand this month. So he's ecstatic
about that because these are expensive vacations right, oh yeah, yeah,
at least a minimum of ten dollars in one week
and that's the low end. How was Mayor with clients, Well,
she's very popular. Everybody was like Mayor was good. Mayor
(06:14):
was great because she's the sweetest. She will go out
of her way to do things for you. And she
did that for me because I was new in town.
I needed like a place to stay. She helped me
with all of that. She would go a mile for you.
We became really good friends. Actually we became really close.
(06:36):
She helped me get my apartment I mean, she made
it happen in a couple of weeks. She goes, I
know the owner, I can get you in. She even said,
I'll go ahead and pay for the deposit, and you
just paid me back later. So she paid you the
deposit for your apartment. Paid. Yeah, And she said I'll
(06:58):
take care of it because I us going back and
forth between Fresno and l a sot that weekend that
I was supposed to sign all of the paperwork. She says,
don't worry about it, I got it. You just pay
me when you get back or whenever. I said, okay,
that's nice. So she's she's very sweet, and JP, the
(07:20):
owner of Pacific Islands, loves sweet Mayor. Remember, JP is
the guy that Mayor says is best friends with her
cousin Fenton back in Ireland. Mayor is making a lot
of money for JP, selling nearly a million dollars in
luxury vacations a year for his company. Mayor says she
spends a lot of time in the Pacific Islands growing up,
(07:42):
taking yearly vacations there with her family, so getting to
relive those happy experiences while describing these exotic, sun drenched
places to prospective clients, brings her tremendous joy, and it
also makes her a great saleswoman. I mean, when you
love what you sell, the product sells itself right. And
(08:04):
JP is grateful to Mayor for bringing in so much business.
And Mayor is grateful to JP for giving her a
purpose and something fun to do while living in Los Angeles,
and she shows her appreciation for JP publicly. Mayor used
to because I used to tag along with her all
the time, because she gives me a right to work
(08:25):
in home. Every day. She would always buy a nice
expensive bottle of Coniak or something for JP. So I'm thinking, wow,
they have a really good relationship. She would buy expensive stuff. Yeah,
coniacs expensive. Oh yeah, and she would not just buy
just the cheap one. She would drag me to distours.
(08:46):
It's like, oh, I am looking for this specific coniac
to ball or. You know. So I say they have
a good relationship. It was great. But at some point,
when the fight for mayor his inheritance starts heating up,
her relationship with JP starts to change. Remember, Mayor says
(09:07):
JP is best friends with her cousin Fenton back in Ireland,
and clearly JP is taking Fenton's side in trying to
deny Mayor her rightful share of that million euro inheritance.
So JP and Mayor have a spectacular falling out. They're
fighting like hell, oh yeah, definitely. Would there be shouting?
Would he shout at her? Well, you know they will
(09:29):
shut the door normally, but you would hear him in
JP's office. She told me that JP is working with
her family and set her up to make it look
like she stole two dollars. Yes, yes, So Mayor is
fired and then arrested for grand theft. I bail her
(09:52):
out of jail. She's no longer working at Pacific Islands
in July, and as the weeks pass, she's no longer
working at all anywhere. I'm worried about her. Mayor is
(10:19):
unemployed and that really concerns me. I mean, I know
she has plenty of money to live on, but not
working can drive a person crazy, you know, and it's
driving her crazy. Then one day she calls me up
and tells me she got a job as a psychic. Yeah,
(10:39):
a psychic, using yet another name, an empathic psychic. Mayor says,
she calls up one of those psychic numbers and takes
a test over the phone and passes with flying colors.
She says the gift runs in her family and that
(11:00):
she's always been ashamed of it, but now she needs
to use it to make a living, and in no
time at all, she has a slew of clients and
a splashy website with an explainer video that I produce.
I've always had a gift since I was a little girl,
and her Irish accent is suddenly not so Irish. It
(11:21):
materialized throughout my childhood and I didn't really understand what
it was. I would always know things were happening before
they happened, and everyone would laugh at me, so I
stopped admitting that I knew these things were going to happen,
but things would have developed, like for instance, I knew
my dad was leaving, and a week later my dad left.
Um I knew I was going to have a fall
(11:44):
and break my shoulder, and for two weeks before the
event happened, I was four years old. My mom said,
don't bring such things into being, but I could picture
myself falling, and on the day I was wearing the
outfit that I saw myself falling and I cried for
an hour, I didn't want to wear it, and I balloon.
It was exactly as I saw hi it. So I've
always visioned things and felt things. So I grow to
(12:10):
accept Mayor as a psychic fairly quickly. I truly believe
she has a gift. I mean I witness it, and
so does my buddy Evan in a weird kind of way.
You know, I'm a psychic. If you ever want to talk,
you know, I don't remember if she was like heavily
discounted prices or she's like, I'll just do it because
(12:31):
you're friends with Jonathan, but you know, she kind of
offered up her her psychic services. You know. I was
in a very kind of dark place at that point.
Evan and I are working on a show he created
called Fat Guys in the Woods for the Weather Channel.
We secured our place at the top of the food
change and now we have the waistline to prove it.
(12:51):
And he moves into our guest room for a few
months because he's having trouble at home, major trouble. So
your wife was cheating you. I found out she was cheating,
But before you knew for sure, Mayor told me, yeah,
she's cheating. And it's a blonde guy and it was
and it was a blond guy. Like, how does she
know that? Yeah? How could she? She didn't tell you this.
(13:18):
This is when she met you for one or two
times in the place. She's like, yeah, I had a
vision and she is cheating on him, and it's with
a blond guy and it turned out to be a
very blond guy. But how does she know that? Yeah?
I know, right, that's and you were a stranger to
her at that point. She just met you, and she
didn't know that many details either about what to just
(13:40):
pick that out of the air. Could have been a redhead,
could have been a brown hair guy. Most guys have
brown or black hair, I mean most of mine guys. Anyway, Look,
it would have been easy to laugh the whole thing
off as a parlor trick and dismiss the idea of
Mayor being an actual psychic. But very quickly, tons of
other people all over Los Angeles start beating a path
(14:04):
to her door for readings. So I found Mayor Annie
out in attorney Michelle Thompson DaCosta is having some life issues.
I wanted to see a psychic. She had great reviews,
and so I booked her for one reading and then
that's how I got to know her. And how was
(14:26):
your reading? Your first reading with her? She was spot on.
She was so spot on. That's when I referred my mother.
I referred every friend and I was like, you have
to go see her. And that is the one thing
(14:47):
because people ask me, you know, people tell me the
psychic thing was a scam. I'm like, no, she really
was psychic. She was at my husband's birthday party once
and I saw her read like three or four people
brought them to tears, like it's crazy. She knew dates, names.
It's just weird, you know, timeframes, and with clairvoyant abilities
(15:12):
like that, mayor quickly begins attracting a whole other level
of clientele. So I'm the CEO and founder of Global
Women's Empowerment Network. As the head of a major nonprofit
in Los Angeles, test catch A Tory is way more
grounded in reality than in psychic readings. But her business
partner implores her to reconsider. And he called me up
(15:35):
and said, oh my gosh, I have this fabulous psychic.
I want to pay for a reading for you. And
I said, uh not thanks, I just didn't want to
go there, you know, for whatever reason intuitively are otherwise
He just raved about her and said, well, you know,
let me know if you change your mind. But she's
really interested in women empowerment and maybe you guys can
(15:56):
have a conversation. So we did have a converse station.
We lasted about almost an hour and we instantly clicked,
and she was so excited about GWEN Global Women's Empowerment
Network and what we're doing, and thought that maybe she
might be able to help in one way or another.
She said she had a lot of celebrity clients that
(16:17):
she can't disclose right then, so she offered to help. Yes,
I was so excited. Does she name any celebrities or
she said she can't name them? At first she said
I can't name them, but then she would drop little hints.
Then it would unravel that one of her big clients
(16:38):
and her you know, favorite friends was Jennifer Aniston. And
so she said, I want to bring Jennifer and you
know and have you meet her, and I want you
to you know, I think she'll be really happy to
be like a spokesperson for GWEN. So I was so excited.
That's freaking huge, that's huge. I mean somebody like yeah wow.
(17:04):
So Mayor's career as a soothsayer appears to be taking
off fast, especially with the A list crowd in Los Angeles,
celebrities like Jennifer Anniston. All of a sudden, Mayor moves
out of my apartment building and into a brand new, plush,
opulent high rise. How much was it. It was close
(17:25):
to six thousand a month. That's a ton of money,
and especially in l A, It's like that's a lot
of money to burn on an apartment every month. But
Mayor says living there is good for her burgeoning psychic
business because it engenders trust and confidence from her clients,
especially her high end clients, and it helps build her
brand as a psychic to the movers and shakers in Hollywood.
(17:49):
She definitely kind of marched to the beat of her
own drama, which was impressive, you know, like like she
seemed like she had her ship together. My husband Pablo
nominates Mayor for the Ice Bucket Challenge in and she
(18:12):
has her massage therapist shoot this video in her swanky
new apartment. Ready, no is it on? It's so Pablo,
thank you so much for nominating me for this aos
Ice bucket challenge like give it back to you and
truly would since I can't. Here's who I'm nominating, the
(18:36):
Double Dog Dare the Ice book at challenge for ao
S Charity. See you on the dog You're on. I
set up Baby Rose Hot Mama number two. Here's Ice
and your baby. Last but not least, my loving child
Chelsea student extraordinary. I hope your first week back to
(18:57):
school is amazing, I said, girlfriend, and I don't want
to hear about your chest cold. So let's get started morning.
This is graphic and again, thank you Pablo. I will
see you on Sunday. Let's go excuse the mess? How
(19:18):
am I trust the ice water here? Oh Houston, I
forgot to know you. You are going to say a word?
Were you? Houston? Massage? There is to the stars you
are talking on? Thanks so much O. No cubes in
(19:46):
the cleavage. Things start going really well from there, especially
on the inheritance front. She shows me an email from
her Los Angeles attorney that makes it look like the
Pacific Islands grand theft case against her is falling apart
because it's bogus, thereby ensuring she'll get her inheritance very soon.
(20:12):
The email went something like ms Smith. The prosecutor who
filed charges against you on behalf of Pacific Islands is
having trouble turning over discovery. He's either lost his files
or they never existed in the first place. If we
can't get your files, they're simply is no case. In
my thirty years practicing law, I've never seen anything like it.
(20:36):
The judge will throw this case out shortly. I am
certain of it. I am so relieved things are really
looking up for Mayor. But a few days later I
go to pick her up at her swanky new apartment
for brunch and find her doubled over, crying hysterically. They
(20:56):
froll my bank accounts. I am locked out of all
my money. And what's worse, she says she's not going
to be allowed a jury trial. A single judge will
be deciding her fate instead. I am so pissed. Her
family in Ireland. They're paying off some dirty l a
(21:19):
d A to freeze her bank account, so she's got
no fucking money. What the fuck? I call my buddy
Evan to tell him what happened. This is more or
less how it went, dude. That's like John Grishamship and
it's it's insane. The bogus Specific Islands case again. So
it was about to be dismissed, and and now they
pulled this. They're they're trying to pressure her to give
(21:40):
up her inheritance if she signs something thinks she wants
to give up her inheritance, her family's hold, and don't
get the whole Pacific balance case dropped. Dude, She's got
to fight it, man, I mean, yeah, she's gotta fight that.
I gotta help her. The ship that goes on in Ireland.
Here in America, you'd go to prison. Back in Ireland,
you'd get a pat on the back. I am now
(22:00):
more determined than ever to help Mayor clear her name
and get her inheritance. So I start loaning her money
to live on, since all her bank accounts and credit
cards are frozen. I let her borrow almost six thousand
dollars to pay her rent in that luxury apartment that month.
Then the next month I lend her another thirty two
(22:22):
d to move back into our building where the rent
is considerably cheaper. And then I just keep lending her
more cash to live on, almost sixteen thousand dollars in
total at this point, why did you keep giving her money?
I kept giving her money because she paid me back
the first you know, dollars I loaned her to for bail.
(22:44):
She paid me back the next day, or rather, the
married politician paid me back the next day. It was
her money. Yeah, I know, let's not forget. She was
like I loved her like a sister. We were ending
phone calls at that point with I love you, I
love you like you know, like I loved her, like
I loved who I thought she was. Well, you guys
were friends for a long time time before she ever
asked you for money. Yeah, yeah, fourteen months. As the
weeks pass, I keep lending there more money. I'm out
(23:07):
twenty dollars total. Then one day she tells me she's
got some great news. The Los Angeles District attorney prosecuting
her will agree to drop the bogus specific Island's case,
clearing the way for her to get her inheritance if
she can just pay fifty four thousand dollars. Now, I
(23:28):
had zero experience with the criminal justice system at this point,
like zero. I'd only ever been to court for a
traffic ticket twenty years ago. But I did know attorneys
and legal fees are prohibitively expensive, So paying fifty four
thousand to clear Mer's name so she could get millions
in inheritance seems like a no brainer to me. Now,
(23:52):
I had almost depleted my checking account at this point
loaning her twenty grand in cash. And while I make
more than a hundred thousand a year as a reality
TV producer, living in l A is expensive, very expensive.
So I only had another four thousand in cash to
loan her. And then I did something I can't believe
(24:13):
I let myself do. I let her charge my credit
cards fifty thousand dollars to make up the fifty four
thousand she needed to get the case against her dropped.
It felt like you were helping her, You're helping a
friend in need. Yeah, I was rescuing a damsel in
distress hundred percent, and like no hesitation. You know, there
(24:33):
was no question because I'm sure you've been you know,
you knew the whole story. I believe her family was
crazy and they're out for money, and you know what
people do for millions of dollars, people will kill. Mayor
would always tell me about her childhood with her crazy
Irish family in that same recording you heard in the
last episode. She talks about how violence and fear punctuate
(24:55):
every aspect of her life growing up. I identify with
my father, and I told you about her. My dad
had to leave because he was going to murder my mother.
He had mapped it out in books, notebooks, journals, how
he was going to murder my mother and dismember her body,
(25:16):
and not dismember but getting rid of it. And he
knew at that point he was really going to do
something to my mom. So I know all too well
what her family is capable of and what they'll do
to get Mayor out of their way so they can
take her inheritance. Why do you think she did have
this inheritance coming? Like we're talking millions of dollars? Did
(25:38):
she ever say anything or do anything that like was
just like, this isn't bullshit. I really believe her. Well,
she had a ton of evidence. She would show me
emails from her barristers, which are lawyers in Ireland about
her inheritance. She would show me she had like paperwork,
she'd show you well emails. But still there's like a
paper trio. It's not just her telling you exactly, but
(26:00):
on her phone, like she would show me her phone
and go, look what embarrassas saying, and I'd read it
and be like, oh, blah blah million. But wow, that's
a lot of money. So, in case you've lost track
at this point, I've lone Mayor almost seventy thousand dollars,
which is a lot of freaking money. You'd think I'd
be worried, but I'm not worried at all because the
(26:21):
bogus specific Island's case against her got dropped like a
bad habit. And don't forget, she's getting ready to collect
six and a half million dollars in inheritance. That was
her share of the million euros. So life is good.
Life is very very good. And then one day out
(26:41):
of the blue, Mayor gets drown in jail. Again. I
know exactly what's happening. She's being screwed over by her
Irish family. Actually, Mayor isn't being screwed over at all.
I am next time on Queen of the con And then, dude,
(27:05):
you are not going to believe the ship Mayor Smith
gets caught between a rock and a hard place. You've
been scamming us out of money this whole time. You have,
and that's only the beginning your purpose American. She was
born in Bangor main in nine pack a lunch. This
rabbit hole is long and winding. Pretty sure she drugged me.
(27:30):
For exclusive photos and other bonus material, follow at Queen
of the Con on Instagram and if you're enjoying Queen
of the Con, tell your friends about it and leave
us a review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get
your podcasts. Queen of the Con The Irish Heiress is
(27:52):
a production of a y R Media and I Heart Radio,
hosted by Me Jonathan Walton. Executive producers Jonathan Walton for
Nathan Walton Productions and Eliza Rosen for a y R Media.
Written by Jonathan Walton, Consulting producer Evan Goldstein, Senior Associate
producer Eric Newman. Sound designed by baked ZD Media, mixed
(28:16):
and mastered by Elliott Herman. Audio engineering by Elliott Herman,
Studio engineering by Chris McMasters. Voice acting performed by Kevin
Raymond and Amy Phillips. Legal counsel for a y R Media,
Gianni Douglas, Executive producer for I Heart Radio, Chandler Mainz
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