Tracey fell in love with a woman he met on Instagram and tried to bring her to Australia… then the awful truth emerged
A disabled pensioner is facing homelessness after being scammed out of $40,000 over almost two years.
Tracey Skeates, 63, from Caboolture, Queensland, met ‘Charlotte’ through Instagram and eventually sold his car and pawned his guitars to meet ‘her’ money requests as of October 2023.
Mr Skates told the Courier mail the $40,000 he sent to Charlotte was money from an inheritance.
‘A woman called Charlotte contacted me on Instagram. “She said she lived in America and asked if I lived alone,” he said.
“She had recently broken up with her boyfriend, she was looking for someone to talk to.”
The relationship progressed quickly and within just a week, the trusting retiree sent Charlotte $500 to fix her phone.
And within a month of the pair communicating, Charlotte told Mr Skeates she wanted to move to Brisbane to live with him – and become his wife.
The pensioner ‘vividly’ remembers wanting to spend Christmas in Australia, but like many scammers, Charlotte said she didn’t have enough money to move – so Mr Skeates started sending larger payments of $3,000 and $4,000.
The disabled pensioner was scammed by someone who used photos of Colombian bikini model Yisela Avendano (pictured), who was not involved in the scam. The scammer said they wanted to marry the Australian and move to Brisbane, prompting him to send tens of thousands of dollars
Charlotte ‘tried’ to fly to Australia five times to be with the disabled pensioner, but something always got in the way.
“The first time she tried to fly over, she said she was attacked on the way to the airport and was in a coma,” he said.
The excuses kept coming – another time she told Mr Skeates that someone had put ‘two grams of heroin’ in her luggage.
Charlotte also told Mr Skeates throughout the relationship that her phone camera was broken, so all their communication was via Instagram and WhatsApp calls.
Every time something went wrong, Mr Skeates sent more money so he could get Charlotte to Brisbane.
‘I sent her 80 percent of my disability pension every two weeks. I barely ate, all in the name of love,” he said.
Mr Skeates, who dreamed of traveling around Australia with the American, said his “stupidity” has seen him go from “having a dream” and enjoying his last few years to “not having a damn hope”.
He warned others that Charlotte always insisted that every payment be sent via Apple gift cards or cryptocurrency Bitcoin, making the payments almost impossible to chase.
Tracey Skeates, 63, from Caboolture, Queensland, met ‘Charlotte’ via Instagram and eventually sold his car and pawned his guitars to meet ‘her’ money requests as of October 2023
The scammer, called ‘Charlotte’, said the camera on their phone was broken and they were only messaging on Instagram and calling on WhatsApp (photo messages between Mr Skeates and his scammer posing as ‘Charlotte’)
The pensioner is ashamed that he was scammed out of such a large amount – and only realized ‘Charlotte’ was fake after carrying out a reverse image search.
His search discovered that Charlotte’s profile contained images of Yisela Avendano, a Colombian bikini model with nearly a million followers on Instagram.
Incredibly, despite discovering he had been scammed, the grandfather continued to send money.
‘I don’t know why. “They get so stuck in your head that you’re at the boiling point all the time and you lose the ability to think clearly,” he said.
Besides losing money, the scam also strained his relationship with his daughter Tamika, who immediately told him that Charlotte wasn’t real.
His daughter said she became “less tolerant” when she found out he was selling his car and said the whole ordeal has “damaged” their relationship.
Queensland’s grandfather said he is now “a few weeks away” from living in a tent and being forced to give away his beloved parrot.
The pensioner wants people to ask for help ‘even if they are ashamed’ and hopes that because he talks about what happened, he will help others.
According to ScamWatch, more than 27,000 people nationwide have been duped in romance scams, losing nearly $20 million in 2024.
Across the sunny state, 656 people have been caught in romance scams and lost $3 million.
ScamWatch has warned Australians that a spike in cases could occur over the festive period as scammers target vulnerable and lonely people.