A 53-year-old woman was scammed into paying hundreds of thousands of euros to a person posing as Hollywood megastar Brad Pitt as payment for hefty medical bills he couldn’t cover due to his divorce.
For more than a year, Anne, a French interior decorator, thought she was in a long-distance romantic relationship with Brad Pitt. This bizarre tale started in February 2023, when the middle-aged woman joined Instagram to share photos from a recent skiing vacation in the Alps. She was immediately approached on the social network by someone claiming to be Jane Pitt, the mother of legendary actor Brad Pitt, who started chatting with Anne and telling her what a good match she was for her son. It wasn’t long before someone posing as Brad Pitt approached Anne on Instagram. They chatted online every day, and before long, Anne fell in love which made her an easy target for a surprisingly effective scam.