A Japanese fraudster, Takashi Miyagawa, has been apprehended for allegedly fleecing over 35 different ladies of birthday presents worth £665.
On each fauxmantic outing, Miyagawa who has been described as a serial dater pretended to be in a serious relationship with the ladies in what many has described as a romance scam.
Daily Mail reported that the 39-year-old part-time worker with no fixed address in Kansai told each of the “girlfriends” that his birthday fell on a different date so he could receive tonnes of gifts.
He reportedly met the single women while marketing hydrogen shower heads and other products for an unnamed company, and began each relationship under the assumption that marriage was in the cards.
Some of the woman that filed the complaint
Fortunately for him, his damsels — often blinded by love — were completely oblivious to each other’s existence.
In his last outing before the bubble busted, the con artiste was said to have informed his latest victim, an unsuspecting 47-year-old lover that his birthday was on February 22 as against the actual November 13 that he was born.
Another victim recounted how she was hoodwinked into believing that his birthday was in July, while a third mark was fooled into thinking it occurred in April.
Unfortunately for him, the heartbroken women ended up forming a victims’ association and filed a complaint to the police in February.
A Japanese station MBS recently released exclusive photographs of Miyagawa showing him with many different women, including one that depicts a table with two cakes and a note saying “Happy Birthday.”
New York Post estimated that the catfish’s fake romance racket must have netted him a whopping 100,000 Japanese Yuan (or $929.44) worth of presents, clothes and cash.
The Japanese police authorities, however, disclosed that an investigation into the alleged fraud charges is ongoing.
