So today I was reading a book that later prompted me to search about a particular smooth con man known as Count Lustig, and after my search I found out that the swindlers dark alley is populated with various sly men of wits and confidence that can make your head spin, to my utmost surprise a Nigerian was on the list, naija must rep now.

So I decided to share with you guys.

Enjoy!

1. Count Victor Lustig - The man who sold the Eiffel tower twice.

Count” Victor Lustig, 46 years old at the time, was America’s most dangerous con man. In a lengthy criminal career, his sleight-of-hand tricks and get-rich-quick schemes had rocked Jazz-Era America and the rest of the world. In Paris, he had sold the Eiffel Tower in an audacious confidence game—not once, but twice. Finally, in 1935, Lustig was captured after masterminding a counterfeit banknote operation so vast that it threatened to shake confidence in the American economy. A judge in New York sentenced him to 20 years on Alcatraz.

Frank Abagnale - The con man that later became a Federal consultant.

Born in 1948, Abagnale proved to be a wunderkind of a con man, posing as a pilot for Pan Am Airlines in order to bum free flights at just 16 years old. When authorities wised up to his frequent flying, Abagnale posed as a Georgia doctor for a year before masquerading as an attorney in New Orleans, although this last role wasn't entirely fake — Abagnale did manage to pass the bar exam.

He was finally captured in France in 1969, and served six months in a French prison and six more in Sweden before being deported to the United States, where he was sentenced an additional 12 years in the federal pen. Despite two attempts to escape, Abagnale was paroled after five years, on the condition he'd help federal authorities uncover check forgers. After failing to find legitimate work, he parlayed his unique skill into a consulting career, advising banks and and businesses on how to avoid fraud. His firm, Abagnale & Associates, has made the 61-year-old a millionaire by legitimate means.

3. Charles Ponzi was best known for the financial crimes he committed when he conned investors into giving him millions of dollars, and paid them returns with other investors' money.

Although he did not invent the scheme that later came to bear his name, Charles Ponzi's scam was so extensive and initially lucrative that it brought national attention to the fraudulent operation for the first time. In 1919, the Italian immigrant promised investors they could yield considerable profits by purchasing international reply coupons from other countries and then redeeming them in the U.S for postage stamps. To legitimize the scheme, Ponzi established the "Securities Exchange Company" based in Boston. A steady flow of new clients allowed him to pay existing investors, while pocketing millions of dollars himself. But soon enough, the scheme began to raise eyebrows, eventually collapsing and bringing six banks down with it. Collectively, his investors lost an estimated $20 million.

George C Parker - The Man Who Sold The Brooklyn Bridge Twice a Week for 30 Years

This New Yorker is supposedly the guy who came up with ballsy idea of “selling” the Brooklyn Bridge to unsuspecting rubes after it opened in 1886.

Shockingly, the scam worked. Parker is said to have sold the bridge twice a week for years.

His typical marks: gullible tourists and immigrants. And it wasn’t just the bridge he sold but Grant’s Tomb, the Statue of Liberty, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and other monuments.

“He preyed on unsuspecting foreigners who believed that America was the land of opportunity, assuring them they could buy as an investment the right to charge tolls or fees for access to the landmarks,”

Parker’s success convinced other swindlers to try their hand at selling the bridge. But they may not have gone as far as Parker did, who set up a fake real estate office and forged documents proving he was the owner.

He was arrested for fraud a few times and finally sent to Sing Sing for life in 1928. His one legacy: the phrase “I’ve got a bridge to sell you” was inspired by his ruse.

Ff

Brigham:
3. Charles Ponzi was best known for the financial crimes he committed when he conned investors into giving him millions of dollars, and paid them returns with other investors' money.

NAME
Charles Ponzi
OCCUPATION
Criminal
BIRTH DATE
March 3, 1882
DEATH DATE
January 18, 1949 January 18, 1949
EDUCATION
University of Rome La Sapienza
PLACE OF BIRTH
Parma , Italy
PLACE OF DEATH
Rio de Janeiro , Brazil
FULL NAME
Charles Ponzi

Although he did not invent the scheme that later came to bear his name, Charles Ponzi's scam was so extensive and initially lucrative that it brought national attention to the fraudulent operation for the first time. In 1919, the Italian immigrant promised investors they could yield considerable profits by purchasing international reply coupons from other countries and then redeeming them in the U.S for postage stamps. To legitimize the scheme, Ponzi established the "Securities Exchange Company" based in Boston. A steady flow of new clients allowed him to pay existing investors, while pocketing millions of dollars himself. But soon enough, the scheme began to raise eyebrows, eventually collapsing and bringing six banks down with it. Collectively, his investors lost an estimated $20 million.

I hope to see MAVRODI on your list!
I didnt say MMM o! Make all dem faithfuls no attack me

bigFOOTcaveMAN:

I hope to see MAVRODI on your list!
I didnt say MMM o! Make all dem faithfuls no attack me

You looking for trouble bro , putting Mavrodi on the list will spark funny and bitter accusations from MMM loyalists, true be told mavrodi is a child compared to these men and he won't make the list.

Mavrodi fit sell bridge?

4 Joseph 'Yellow kid' Weil - "Each of my victims had larceny in his heart"

Joseph "Yellow Kid" Weil was one of the best known American con men of his era. During the course of his career, Weil is reputed to have stolen more than $8 million.

Some of Weil's successful cons include swindling the Italian dictator Benito Mussolini out of two million dollars, staging fake prize fights, selling "talking" dogs, and selling oil-rich land that he did not own. Weil paid for his life of crime with a total of just six years in jail, most of it spent at Leavenworth Prison.

A popular rumor exists which claims that in 1889 Weil managed to sell a chicken to a wealthy prospector passing through Illinois for the price of a golden nugget. It is from this rumor that the term 'Chicken Nugget' stems.

Weil died in Chicago, Illinois, in 1976 at the age of 100.

bigFOOTcaveMAN:

I hope to see MAVRODI on your list!
I didnt say MMM o! Make all dem faithfuls no attack me

Let me perch here and watch how the faithfuls will attack you.

Randolph Smith also known as Soapy.

One of Smith’s earliest swindles was the “prehistoric man” of Creede, Colorado. Smith somehow obtained a 10-foot statue of a primitive looking human that he secretly buried near the town of Creede. A short time later, he uncovered the statue with much fanfare and publicity and began charging exorbitant fees to see it. Wisely, he left town before the curious turned suspicious.

Smith earned his nickname “Soapy” with a more conventional confidence game. Traveling around the Southwest, Smith would briefly set up shop in the street selling bars of soap wrapped in blue tissue paper. He promised the credulous crowds that a few lucky purchasers would find a $100 bill wrapped inside a few of the $5 bars of soap. Inevitably, one of the first to buy a bar would shout with pleasure and happily display a genuine $100 bill. Sales were generally brisk afterwards. The lucky purchaser, of course, was a plant.

He was killed when he tried to fool some local vigilante, his funeral was held in church he donated money to build.

Frank 'fizzy' Onyeachonam- A Nigerian known for his global lottery scam

A fraudster nicknamed 'Fizzy' because of his love of champagne has been jailed for eight years for conning vulnerable pensioners out of their life savings. Frank Onyeachonam ran the UK end of global lottery scam that was orchestrated from his native Nigeria for seven years to fund his lavish millionaire’s lifestyle.

In the UK, 38-year-old Onyeachonam conned pensioners out of sums from £2,000 to £600,000, deliberately targeting his victims because they were potentially vulnerable to his tactics. While he bled them of their life savings, Onyeachonam enjoyed a life of fast cars, champagne and designer clothes. Pictures he posted on Facebook show he spent the cash on Gucci, Louis Vuitton and Armani designer clothes, Rolex watches, Porsches and Maseratis.

There you have it guys, honorable mentions include James Hogue, Lou Pearlman, and so on.

Lalasticlala, Mynd44.

Reed Eliot Slatkin

Reed was an initial investor and co-founder of EarthLink and the perpetrator of one of the largest Ponzi schemes in the United States since that conducted by Charles Ponzi himself.

From 1986 to 2001, Slatkin raised approximately $593 million from about 800 wealthy investors. Using the funds from later investors, he paid one group of early investors $279M on their original $128M investment, citing investment success without actually making most of the claimed investments. He also distributed millions in fees to associates as "consultants". He successfully sustained the scheme until 2001, when it was shut down by an investigation by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Bernard Lawrence Madoff is an American fraudster and a former stockbroker, investment advisor, and financier. He is the former non-executive chairman of the NASDAQ stock market, and the admitted operator of a Ponzi scheme that is considered the largest financial fraud in U.S. history.

The Madoff investment scandal defrauded thousands of investors of billions of dollars. Madoff said he began the Ponzi scheme in the early 1990s. However, federal investigators believe the fraud began as early as the mid-1980s and may have begun as far back as the 1970s.

What should we now do with them?

BrutalJab:
What should we now do with them?

Follow their footsteps, since you've nothing reasonable to say.

Brigham:
There you have it guys, honorable mentions include James Hogue, Lou Pearlman, and so on.

Lalasticlala, Mynd44.

James Arthur Hogue is an American impostor who most famously entered Princeton University by posing as a self-taught orphan.

In 1987, Hogue applied to Princeton University, using the alias Alexi Indris-Santana, a self-taught orphan from Utah, where he was then living. Hogue's application materials claimed that he had lived outdoors in the Grand Canyon, raising sheep and reading philosophers.