Catfish victim is now in a relationship with the man whose photos were used to trick her
For once, a catfishing scheme had a happy ending
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Your support makes all the difference.A woman who was catfished ended up finding love with a man whose photos were used to scam her.
Emma Perrier, who lives in London, had come out of a relationship in 2015 when she met a man called “Ronnie” on the dating app Zoosk.
She found it difficult to meet people as she worked long hours in a coffee shop in the city and avoided clubs and bars - so opted for online dating, according to The Atlantic describes.
Shortly after joining the site, Ms Perrier matched with dark-haired Italian Ronaldo "Ronnie" Scicluna, who according to his profile, was a 34-year-old electrician living in the West Midlands.
Yet when the couple chatted, she was surprised to find he did not speak Italian.
Alarm bells rang again when the pair had still not met in person, despite speaking online for six months.
Using an app to track down the original source of the photos “Ronnie” had used on his dating profile, she found out they actually belonged to a Turkish model called Adem Guzel.
She then found his social media accounts and his model-management website.
It turns out “Ronnie” was actually Alan Stanley, a 53-year-old shop decorator from the Midlands.
In September 2016, Ms Perrier messaged Mr Guzel and the pair ended up chatting. Soon, their relationship blossomed into a long-distance romance.
Even after Mr Stanley admitted he had stolen Mr Guzel’s pictures to pose as “Ronnie”, Ms Perrier continued to speak to him online.
She eventually cut contact with him at the beginning of 2017, when her relationship with Mr Guzel got serious.
When Mr Guzel arrived in London in April, Ms Perrier met him at the airport.
“Three minutes later, I felt like I [had known] her a long time,” Guzel told the Atlantic.
The couple are still together and Mr Stanley says he is in a new relationship with a woman “younger than Emma”.
Speaking to The Atlantic about why he invented “Ronnie” to dupe Ms Perrier, he said he was lonely and lacked confidence.
“I wasn’t feeling the most attractive of people, I might say. You know, I always struggled with self-confidence and ... I was going through a messy separation and I was just feeling like I needed somebody to talk to,” he said.
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