He would take his time getting to know a potential victim looking especially for someone with a nurturing or caring nature and over several weeks he would befriend them dropping a few hints that all was not well in his life but he was soldiering on regardless. If his victim showed too much concern he would appear to close up and not want to talk any more. He was manipulating them ready for the night he would strike.

They would start to care for him, almost become upset when he wouldn't allow them to help or to talk things through him. Bit by bit they would draw some details out of him. He was ex-military, a proud man with an honourable past which had cost him much as he was now wheel chair bound. If they offered financial help he would turn it down he was too proud. He was playing with their emotions while all the time breaking down their resistance and loosening those purse strings. He didn't want financial help he wanted a huge payout and was prepared to wait to get it.

Then the night would come when he would close his trap. It was always night for the victim, when they would be most vulnerable and open to suggestion, though it may have been morning or afternoon for him. This was the time he couldn't cope any more and he would go into his performance. He would appear to be quieter then usual, There was no cheery greeting, indeed he would at first refuse a chance to play the game they had loved enjoying together. When asked if he wanted to talk he would reluctantly accept but would appear sleepy and uncommunicative. Eventually, he would reveal that he had taken tablets and was glad he could thank them for their help and support before he died.

Gripped by growing panic and bewildered by his acting his victim would promise almost anything if only he would call an ambulance to get help. They would give out phone numbers so that he could call them to talk until help arrived and just when they thought they got him calmed down he would add to the drama.

He would have rants, screaming at the system and his former employers for leaving him so beaten and at the fictitious enemy that had done this too him. Somewhere in this was a link to the victim so that they would share the guilt that in some small way they had contributed to his misery and his desperate decision to take his own life. Only through this act of desperation, would some ex-military insurance pay out and he could finally help the only other person who had ever cared (apart from the victim) and that his son, mother, childhood friend, military buddy get they help they needed for that tax bill, life-saving operation etc etc.

When she offered to help in her sheer desperation and exhaustion, as this would now be some time into the night's drama, he would reluctantly accept. Credit card details were given over and secretly efficiently processed as he apparently sobbed in her arms as he waited for the ambulance to arrive. He would continue the performance almost falling into a deadly coma as he cynically kept his victim talking and talking, all the time milking more and more information that was safely saved in her profile for future use.

She would never hear from him again, his name would never appear online, he effectively ceased to exist. She would be left to wonder and worry and have such mixed feelings when the statement for her next credit card bill arrived that she would probably write off the loss as experience.

What would you do then? Tossed around by emotions, exhausted by his performance and tiredness and perhaps even embarrassed by the loss and the fear that you've been foolish what would you do? Would you honestly remember to cancel the card and get a new one issued? Or would you be hit again when months later he would take more and more. Do you check your statements that carefully that you notice a payment every few months? Probably like most of us you are typically annoyed when bank and card statements aren't quite what we thought they'd be but you'll do something soon ? honest.

Many of his victims were paying and paying for months later. A little here and there under a range of names and companies but the total cost is so hard to calculate as he either used the personal details he gained for his own use or sold them on to others.

He was finally detected because he got greedy and came back to the same games and chat site too often. Although he changed so much including his identity, sob story, character details, he couldn't mask everything and a few tell tale phrases slipped through. These would only be recognised by a previous victim which naturally he steered clear of but the combination of a savvy woman who thought something was wrong talked to a female Operator who had been conned by him before was his downfall. Imagine his shock when he tried his suicide bid when he was told to go ahead and kill himself and end the suffering he had caused others and his dismay when local police confronted him with a full dossier.