Los Angeles.- Brad Pitt described as “horrible” the case of the French woman who claims to have been scammed out of 830,000 euros (more than $855,000) by someone posing as the American actor, according to Variety magazine this Thursday.
“It is horrible that scammers take advantage of the strong bond between fans and celebrities,” a spokesperson for the performer said in a statement.
A few days ago, a 53-year-old French woman filed a complaint alleging that she was scammed by a person who had posed as Brad Pitt on social media for a year and a half.
As reported by the French press, the scammer had gotten the money after assuring the woman that she had to undergo surgery to cure kidney cancer and that she did not have access to her bank accounts because of the complicated divorce with Angelina Jolie.
The woman explained that the scammer, who approached her in February 2023 on Instagram, uploaded altered photos of the Hollywood star in different everyday situations and even sent her a video generated by Artificial Intelligence (AI).
Read: Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie reach agreement on their divorce
“He would send me photos and when I searched online, I wouldn’t see them. That’s why he told me: ‘These are photos he took for me,’” he explained in the program ‘Sept à Huit’.
Pitt’s statement urged his fans “not to respond to unsolicited online messages, especially from actors who are not present on social media” (as is his case).
The truth was not discovered until a year and a half later, when the media explained that the actor had begun a relationship with Inés de Ramón.
The woman, who suffers from severe depression, is temporarily staying at a friend’s house, after losing almost all of her assets to the scam, including the 775,000 euros she received after her divorce.
This case is not the first time it has happened: in September 2024, Spanish police forces arrested five people after they had defrauded two women of 325,000 euros by also posing as the actor.
With information from EFE
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