你们有这么被骗的经历吗？被34
你们有这么被骗的经历吗？被34下Part IIP.S.：像这种较长篇幅的故事，细读下来，确实能够发人深省，感触良多。但考虑到大多数读者的阅读习惯，加之我个人时间精力有限，今后刊登内容将以小故事、笑话为主，我们也将提高刊登频率，争取尽量多地和大家见面。乔纳森与梅尔
I was Scammed by My Best Friend
被"闺蜜"骗惨后，我历尽万难夺回公道（下）
By Johnathan Walton 作者：乔纳森﹒沃尔顿
中文导语：上期我们了解到，作者乔纳森被其交往多年的"闺蜜"梅尔诈骗了将近10万美元。其实，乔纳森只是梅尔诈骗的众多受害者之一，梅尔的最拿手骗术，是先和男人发生关系，然后借机敲诈。她还冒充心理医生、癌症患者甚至通灵师行骗，其炉火纯青的骗术和演技，都能拿奥斯卡奖了。被梅尔骗后，大部分人都羞于报案揭发，乔纳森却怒而兴师。他不仅去警局报案，雇佣私家侦探调查，甚至自己开设网站，征集全球受害者线索，最终将梅尔绳之以法。
P.S.：像这种较长篇幅的故事，细读下来，确实能够发人深省，感触良多。但考虑到大多数读者的阅读习惯，加之我个人时间精力有限，今后刊登内容将以小故事、笑话为主，我们也将提高刊登频率，争取尽量多地和大家见面。
乔纳森与梅尔
Part II
下
The website showed that Mair was serving time for felony grand theft. This was no slap on the wrist.
监狱官网信息显示：梅尔在里面因严重盗窃罪服刑。这可不是什么"象征性惩罚"。
I took the day off and rushed to a Los Angeles courthouse. With trembling hands I reviewed every record I could find from Mair's case. I discovered she had lied to me about everything. I suddenly couldn't breathe.
我请了一天假，急急忙忙赶往洛杉矶法院，激动地翻阅着能够找到的梅尔案件每一项记录，发现所有的事她都对我撒了谎。我突然感觉喘不动气了。
I learned that the $50 000 I let her charge on my credit cards had gone to pay $40 000 as part of a plea agreement to a felony grand theft charge she faced for stealing more than $200 000 from the travel agency she worked for. Had she not been able to come up with that $40 000 she would have received a five-year jail sentence not the measly 30 days she actually served.
通过查阅我了解到，我让她从信用卡上透支的5万美元中的4万美元，被用来支付她被指控的严重盗窃罪抗辩协议的一部分，该罪名是她从工作的旅行社盗窃了20多万美元。如果她不能支付那4万美元，就将获到5年刑期，而不是少得可怜的30天羁押。
Her bank accounts had never been frozen. There was no wealthy Irish family or inheritance. She's not even Irish! Those were all lies she used to entrap me.
她的银行账户从未被冻结，也没有什么富有的爱尔兰家族或者遗产，她甚至不是爱尔兰人！这些都是她用来坑害我的谎言。
梅尔
I went home and collapsed in my husband's arms. "How could I let this happen to us?" I sobbed.
回到家后，我瘫倒在丈夫的怀里，抽泣着说："我怎么会让这一切发生在我们身上？"
Eventually my pain was replaced by breathtaking anger and the determination to do something.
最终，痛苦被惊人的愤怒和行动决心取代。
The day Mair was released from jail I confronted her in the parking lot outside our apartment building. She denied everything. "That's not true Johnathan! That's not true!" she protested as tears streamed down her face.
梅尔被从监狱放出来的那天，我在公寓楼外的停车场见了她。她对所有事情都一概否认，泪流满面地坚持道："这不是真的，乔纳森！这不是真的！"
But I was done believing anything she had to say. I balled up my fists clenched my jaw and walked away. We never spoke again.
然而，我不再相信她那套鬼话，握紧拳头，咬紧牙关，走开了。我们从此形同陌路。
I went to the police days later in March 2017 and filed a report. The officer interviewing me seemed skeptical that there was anything they could do. "Don't give strangers your money" were his parting words. So I started my own investigation.
几天后，2017年三月份，我到警察局报案。接待我的警官看上去满腹狐疑，认为他们对此无能为力。我离开时，他对我说："不要把钱给陌生人。"就这样，我开始了自己的调查行动。
I dug up Mair Smyth's high school yearbook and learned that she was born Marianne Andle in Maine and graduated from Bangor High in 1987. She later moved to Tennessee where according to estranged family members I spoke with she claimed she had breast cancer and allegedly scammed friends and neighbors out of thousands for "treatments." They told me Mair was oddly obsessed with wanting to be Irish. In 2000 she went to Ireland on vacation. She ended up marrying a local and stayed for nine years.
我找到了梅尔﹒史密斯的高中学校年鉴，发现她出生于美国缅因州的马里亚纳﹒安德尔，1987年毕业于邦格高中。后来，她搬到田纳西州，根据我从她久已疏远的家庭成员那里了解到的情况，她在家乡声称患有乳腺癌，据说她以"治病"为借口诈骗了数以千计的朋友和邻居。那些梅尔的家庭成员告诉我，梅尔怪异地沉迷于成为爱尔兰人。2000年，她去爱尔兰度假，最后和一个当地人结婚并在那里待了9年。
梅尔
In the same way that wooden stakes kill vampires and silver bullets kill werewolves publicity kills con artists. I began turning my pain into a profound sense of purpose. I started a blog johnathanwalton.com detailing how Mair had scammed me. Soon other victims of hers from all over the world started reaching out.
正如木棒敲死吸血鬼、银子弹射杀狼人那样，公众宣传干掉骗术大师。我开始化悲痛为极强的目的意识。我开设了微博（johnathanwalton.com），详细介绍了梅尔诈骗我的过程。没过多久，其他来自世界各地受她诈骗的受害者开始和我联系。
I heard from one who claimed Mair had scammed her out of $10 000 by impersonating a psychologist. She allegedly tricked our landlord out of $12 000 in rent by pretending to have cancer. Mair had iron-deficiency anemia and would purposely avoid ironrich foods so she could get admitted into hospitals for iron infusions. While sitting in a hospital bed she'd ask a nurse to take her picture and then e-mail that photo to her victims to better sell her cancer story. She used this particular scam a lot.
我从其中一位受害者那里了解到，梅尔伪装成心理医生，骗了她1万美元。据说梅尔还假装患了癌症，欺骗我们房东，少交了1.2万美元房租。梅尔患有缺铁性贫血，但是故意不吃富含铁元素的食物，这样她就能住院接受铁注射液注射。她让护士给她拍了在病床上的照片，然后把照片发电邮给那些受害人，兜售她患癌症的故事。梅尔大量使用了这个花招。
A police detective in Northern Ireland told me that authorities in Belfast had been looking for Marianne Smyth for years. The detective said she had worked as a mortgage broker in 2008 and had scammed many people and then vanished.
一位北爱尔兰的警察探员告诉我，多年以来，贝尔法斯特（译者按：北爱尔兰首府）政府部门一直在搜寻玛丽安娜﹒史密斯。警探说，2008年的时候，玛丽安娜在那里是一名抵押经纪人，诈骗了很多人后消失了。
All in all Mair Smyth used at least 23 different aliases and has been charged with fraud and grand theft in Florida and Tennessee.
总而言之，梅尔﹒史密斯用了至少23个不同的化名，在弗洛里达州和田纳西州被以诈骗罪、严重盗窃罪起诉过。
梅尔的各种伪装
I was determined to get justice and called the Los Angeles Police Department every day.
我每天都给洛杉矶警察厅打电话，决心讨得公道。
A year after I'd last seen her Mair was arrested and charged with grand theft for scamming me. She was released on her own recognizance. I never went near her but one month before trial Mair filed for a restraining order against me asserting that I was threatening her with violence. It cost me $1 500 to hire an attorney to fight her bogus claim. "If a judge grants the restraining order you would be prevented from testifying against her at her criminal trial " my lawyer explained.
距我上次见梅尔的一年后，她因诈骗我而被捕，以严重盗窃罪起诉。她在签署保证书后被释放。之后我从来没有接近过她，然而，距开庭审判一个月时，梅尔申请对我限制人身自由，声称我正以暴力手段威胁她。我花了1500美元聘请了一位律师，对抗她的虚假指控。律师向我解释："如果法官签发了限制令，你就不能在对她进行刑事审判时作证了。"
Could this be her checkmate move? I wondered. I was apoplectic.
我怀疑，这可能是她要置我于死地的一步棋吧？我怒不可遏。
乔纳森
Thankfully the judge refused to grant the restraining order and Mair's trial proceeded. The prosecution presented a mountain of irrefutable evidence. Though she was charged with scamming only me the judge allowed testimony from three other victims to demonstrate a pattern.
谢天谢地，法官拒绝签发限制令，梅尔的审判如期举行。公诉人出示了一大堆不可辩驳的证据。尽管梅尔仅是因为诈骗我而被起诉，法官准许另外三位受害人也当庭提供证词，以展示作案模式。
Mair did not testify in her own defense. As witnesses described how she had scammed them she just sat there with an emotionless look on her face. That was probably her biggest tell to the jury. She was a brilliant actress while she was conning people but remarkably she didn't know how to act innocent.
梅尔自己没有做无罪辩护。当证人们描述她如何实施诈骗时，她只是坐在那里，面无表情。对陪审团而言，那可能是她有罪的最有说服力的表现。坑骗别人时她是个无与伦比的演员，然而令人关注的是，她不知道如何出演一个无罪的人。
The only defense her attorney had was that I was making the whole story up. Supposedly I had persuaded all of the other witnesses—people I didn't even know before Mair scammed me—to lie under oath. He was terrifyingly convincing.
梅尔的律师所作的唯一辩护，是我编造了整个故事，假定我说服了所有其他证人（梅尔诈骗我前我根本不认识的那些人），在宣誓后去撒谎（译者按：美国法律规定，在作证前，证人必须宣誓或承诺自己将会如实提供证言）。他的说辞是如此惊人地"令人信服"。
The prosecutor went over in extreme detail each dollar Mair had scammed from me. Reliving that experience in front of a roomful of strangers ignited fury and embarrassment and regret in a new painful way.
公诉人把梅尔诈骗我的每一分钱的细节都极致地展示出来。回顾当时在满满一屋子陌生人面前的那段经历，如今以新的、痛苦的形式唤起了我的愤怒、尴尬和悔恨。
I spent two years pursuing Marianne Smyth. I had to file for bankruptcy because of what she had done to me. And the 24 court appearances I made even before the trial—for continuances pretrial motions and hearings—meant I missed a lot of work and lost even more money. Not to mention the cost of hiring private investigators in multiple states and countries to ferret out all her scams.
我花了足足两年时间追查玛丽安娜﹒史密斯。由于她对我所做的一切，我不得不申请破产。仅在判决前，我就出庭24次，进行诉讼延期、审前动议和听证，这意味着我错过了大量工作，甚至失去了更多钱，更不用说雇佣私家侦探在数个州、国家搜寻她的诈骗证据的花销了。
猫追老鼠
But it was worth it.
但是，这一切都值得。
On January 9 2019 Marianne Smyth was found guilty of conning me out of $91 784—the money she had borrowed plus thousands of dollars of interest that had accrued on my credit cards. She was sentenced to five years behind bars.
2019年1月9日，法院作出玛丽安娜﹒史密斯有罪判决，判定她诈骗了我91 784美元（包括她借我的本金及刷信用卡后产生的数千美元利息）。她被判5年徒刑。
Besides me only two of Mair's other marks reported her to the police. That enabled her to continue scamming people for years. Most of her victims like most victims of any con artist were too ashamed to tell anyone what had happened to them.
除我之外，只有两位梅尔的受害者向警局报案，使得她继续行骗多年。如同诈骗大师们的大多数受害者们一样，梅尔的大多数受害者羞于告诉人们发生在他们身上的事情。
I am now suspicious of everyone and everything. Making new friends is not something I'm good at anymore. And I'm ashamed too. But my desire to stop her from hurting other people is much stronger than my shame.
如今，我对任何人和事都持怀疑态度。我不再善于结交新朋友，也羞于结交新朋友。但是，我阻止她伤害其他人的愿望，比我的羞愧感要强大的多。
重点词语解读
问：本文第一段第一句"The website showed that Mair was serving time for felony grand theft"中的"felony"，应当如何理解？
答：Felony，在《新牛津英汉双解大词典》中的解释："a crime typically one involving violence regarded in the US and many other judicial systems as more serious than a misdemeanor."即"重罪"。例句：He pleaded guilty to six felonies. 在美国，重罪和轻罪（misdemeanor）通常根据犯罪刑罚或后果加以区别。英国法律中的重罪最初则由谋杀、伤害、纵火、强奸和抢劫等罪名构成，1967年，英国的重罪和轻罪被可公诉罪（indictable）和不可公诉罪（non-indictable）取代。
（翻译：向东 | 播音：向东）
声明：本篇英文内容摘选自美国原版杂志《读者文摘》2020年6月周刊（Reader's Digest: June 2020），仅供个人学习交流使用。作品在微信公众号“E外刊”（DONG_Talks）同步刊登，更多精彩，欢迎关注。
