Bern
«Darling!» – Fake Ukrainian takes huge sum from 90-year-old
A woman pretended to be a refugee to an almost 90-year-old and cheated him out of a lot of money. For this she was sentenced to a suspended sentence.
published
In a total of four meetings, the accused robbed the elderly of 19,000 francs.
20min/Matthias Spicher
According to the penal order, she led the almost 90-year-old man to believe that he had fled Ukraine.
20min/Matthias Spicher
Prosecutors sentenced her to a suspended prison sentence for fraud.
20min/Matthias Spicher
A Romanian woman pretended to an elderly man that she had fled and needed money for an operation.
At several meetings, she stole 19,000 francs from the senior.
Prosecutors sentenced her to a suspended prison sentence for fraud.
The Bern public prosecutor found a Romanian citizen guilty of multiple fraud and attempted fraud. According to the penal order, she pretended to a 90-year-old man that he had fled Ukraine. She told him that she urgently needed kidney surgery and was in severe pain. She also pretended that she needed money for an apartment and for furnishings.
The 42-year-old assured the old man that he would of course get the money back. Occasional expressions of sympathy such as “Schatzeli” and “I love you” did the rest so that the old man fell for the scam. At the four meetings in October 2022, she took a total of 19,000 francs from him. At another meeting in the victim’s apartment, the attempted fraud remained.
imprisonment as a warning sign
The public prosecutor sentenced the Romanian to 180 days in prison. The execution of the prison sentence is suspended with a probationary period of two years. The 47 days that the accused spent in police and pre-trial detention will be credited to her. The public prosecutor’s office justifies the imprisonment on the one hand with the financial situation of the woman; it was “under no circumstances to be expected that a fine could be enforced”.
On the other hand, the decision has “special preventive reasons”: With a view to the “already increased culpability” – the accused chose an old and weak man as the victim and proceeded extremely persistently – a “clear warning signal should be set here”. This is only possible with a prison sentence – “especially since the accused knows very well that a fine could never be enforced”. However, she is billed a smaller amount: she has to pay the procedural fees of CHF 2,800 herself.
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