Dina Leone gets in touch with her schoolmates through Facebook, asks them to pay for the 'treatment' and fulfill her last wish to visit Disneyland
Before After Con job: Dina Leone shaved her head to make her friends believe that she was dying of stomach cancer
Dina Leone gets in touch with her schoolmates through Facebook, asks them to pay for the 'treatment' and fulfill her last wish to visit Disneyland
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An uninsured mother of two from Baltimore has been accused of conning tens of thousands of pounds out of school friends by pretending to be dying from cancer.
Dina Leone used the social networking website Facebook to get back in contact with her former friends and cheat them out of money. Soon after they began corresponding through the site 37-year-old Leone dropped the bombshell that she was suffering from stomach cancer. She asked her friends for money to pay for treatment that could prolong her life. She even shaved her head to keep up the pretence of having the illness.
'Six months to live'
Prosecutors said Leone told her friends and even her own teenager daughter that she had six months to live.
Concerned friends arranged for Leone and her family to visit Disneyland in Florida after she said it was her dying wish.
Another paid for a lavish party for Leone's 16-year-old daughter in the belief that her mother was dying.
The mum of two had given her friends a bucket list u2014 a reference to the Jack Nicholson film The Bucket List in which cancer patients list things they want to do before dying. But prosecutors in Baltimore, Maryland, said the former estate agent had come up with the cancer scheme to con her friends after reconnecting through Facebook.
She had not spoken to many of the women in almost 20 years since leaving Dundalk High School in 1990.
But later up to a dozen women from her class began corresponding through Facebook, Leone sent out a photo of herself with a bald head and said she was dying of cancer.
Charity events
Several sent money to pay for chemotherapy while others organised charity events to raise funds. But those helping became suspicious after Leone suddenly appeared bald after chemo rather than losing her hair over a period of time. Vickey Squires (38), a school friend said "Leone also didn't seem to know much about
her treatment."
After police began investigating they found out that Leone had not been receiving any treatment. "There was no physical evidence of her being treated for cancer, and no medical evidence," said Assistant State's Attorney Adam Lippe.
Leone has been charged with theft and conspiracy charges. She has a criminal history that includes passing bad cheques and running a mortgage scam.
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