American Grift

We are BACK, baby! After a two-year hiatus (sorry about that), Oriana and her rotating cast of cohosts have returned with a new, personal tale to jumpstart the revived American Grift. This installment centers around a wedding gift that led Oriana down a rabbit hole of petty grift and a web of deceit weaved in North Canton, Ohio, of all places. To discuss this story are Oriana's husband Steve Parkhurst (@ssssparkers on Twitter) and friend of the show and financial journalist/content director Ismat Mangla (@ismat on Twitter). You can follow us at @AmericanGrift!

We're back, baby, with an hour on the college admissions scam dubbed "Operation Varsity Blues" by the FBI. Comedian Gabe Gonzalez and freelance writer Aly Semigran join Oriana to talk about how weird it is that bribes to colleges are legal if they come in the form of a building you buy. Reading: https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/5766243-College-Admissions-Case-Complaint.html

We're back from hiatus with a crazy one about how rotten the dark heart of Instagram Influencing is, told through the lens of one particular "Influencer": Caroline Calloway. Pajiba pop culture writer and critic Kayleigh Donaldson joins Oriana to talk about parasocial relationships, ghostwriting, and empty mason jars. (First read Kayleigh's definitive story: http://www.pajiba.com/web_culture/the-case-of-caroline-calloway-and-her-creativity-workshop-tour.php) Photo by Jo Naylor via Flickr Creative Commons (https://www.flickr.com/photos/pandora_6666/)

Jho Low and his fellow schemers made off with $2.7 billion in one of the most extensive grifts of all time. Did you like the movie The Wolf of Wall Street? Well, it was financed with money from this scheme. Oriana talks with NY Post reporter Kevin Dugan and The Verge reporter Sean O'Kane about this Stefon bit of a grift. Maybe get yourself a copy of "Billion Dollar Whale" (by Wall Street Journal reporters Bradley Hope and Tom Wright) before listening. Photo from Jessica Simpson (https://www.flickr.com/photos/jeslettt/) via Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Lee Israel serves as the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come for Oriana. Kristy Puchko of Pajiba and Aly Semigran join her to discuss the literary forger, author of the beautifully sharp memoir "Can You Ever Forgive Me?" and subject of the equally beautiful and sharp movie of the same name starring Melissa McCarthy and Richard E. Grant. Oh also the Grift of the Week is these dummies: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/n-j-woman-alleged-gofundme-scam-was-duped-boyfriend-homeless-n937986

Who's Rudy Kurniawan, and what was his wine crime—pairing a malbec with tuna? No, Rudy sold fake fine wine. Lots of it. You can learn more by watching the documentary "Sour Grapes" on Netflix. Our Grift of the Week (this was recorded nearly a month ago) is the Trump family, thanks to a lawsuit alleging they lent their name to a number of get-rich-quick schemes. Read more about it here:https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/29/nyregion/trump-acn-lawsuit.html Photo courtesy of Dale Cruse via Flickr (Creative Commons license)

Oriana, Fast Company News Editor Christopher Zara, and Internet Culture Expert Sarah Hayden discuss the twin shitshows of Dashcon and Tanacon along with parasocial relationships and fandom! Two Gen Y-ers and a Gen X-er talking about the Kids These Days. What could possibly go wrong? Also, Facebook is the Grift of the Week. Dismantle Facebook. Reading: http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2018/06/what-happened-at-tanacon.html https://www.dailydot.com/parsec/dash-con-controversy-tumblr/

The Scam Slayer himself got in touch with the pod! So we recorded a special bonus episode where Andrew Therrien and Oriana talk about the darkness of man's hearts, payday lending, and what we can do to try and keep ourselves safe in this world of constant identity theft and grift. Photo by Richard Patterson via Flickr/Creative Commons. www.comparitech.com/

Fast Company News Editor Christopher Zara and freelance journalist Ismat Mangla join host Oriana Schwindt to discuss a rare hero in the world of grift: Andrew Therrien, who uncovered a massive fake debt collection scheme. If you thought debt collection couldn't get any scuzzier, just you wait. Also: Never take out a payday loan. Also also, Andrew reached out to us after we recorded this episode, and we'll have a SPECIAL BONUS EPISODE with him coming out soon! Reading: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2017-12-06/millions-are-hounded-for-debt-they-don-t-owe-one-victim-fought-back-with-a-vengeance Photo by Taber Andrew Fain via Flickr (Creative Commons license)

This time, it's personal. IBT Media co-founder Etienne Uzac was just named in an indictment from the Manhattan DA that alleges IBT Media (and two other companies called Christian Media Corp. and Oikos Networks Inc.) conspired to defraud investors of millions of dollars. Joining former IBT media employee Oriana in talking about this particularly weird (alleged) grift are fellow former IBT Media employees Cole Stangler and Owen Davis. It. Gets. Weird. Reading: https://www.wsj.com/articles/newsweeks-parent-company-co-founder-charged-with-defrauding-lenders-1539208065 https://www.motherjones.com/media/2014/03/newsweek-ibt-olivet-david-jang/ https://medium.com/@bpreeves/a-fool-and-his-money-are-the-new-owners-of-newsweek-financing-a-south-korean-cult-49b38946e1dc

April 2017. An island. A music festival. A shitshow. Join host Oriana Schwindt and cohosts Aly Semigran, and Sarah Hayden as they discuss how Billy McFarland went from the "Steve Jobs of Millennial Marketing" to serving six years for fraud. (This episode was actually recorded before he was sentenced to six years of prison time, but oh well.) Reading: https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2017/06/fyre-festival-billy-mcfarland-millennial-marketing-fiasco Photo courtesy of Yannick Charlet on Flickr, license via Creative Commons.

Through her blood testing company Theranos, Elizabeth Holmes bilked investors like Henry Kissinger and Rupert Murdoch out of hundreds of millions of dollars. That's cool. Less cool? Her blood testing technology never worked properly, and many, many patients who used it got bad results. Journalists Ismat Mangla and Sam Thielman join host Oriana Schwindt to discuss whether Holmes was delusional or a sociopath. For reading: https://www.wsj.com/articles/theranos-has-struggled-with-blood-tests-1444881901 https://www.vox.com/2018/9/6/17826924/goop-yoni-egg-gwyneth-paltrow-settlement Photo from Alden Chadwick (Flickr) via Creative Commons.

A girl with a European accent and tousled hair and big sunglasses walks into a fancy hotel in New York and stays there without a credit card on file. She throws cash around like candy. She's Anna Delvey, and she's a griftress. Fellow freelance writers Aly Semigran and LaToya Ferguson join host Oriana Schwindt to discuss whether reality is now just a recycled Gossip Girl plotline. For reading: https://www.thecut.com/2018/05/how-anna-delvey-tricked-new-york.html https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2018/04/my-misadventure-with-the-magician-of-manhattan Photo by Allan Erickson (via Flickr/Creative Commons)