Tarot in the News
Thread originally posted on the Aeclectic Tarot Forum on 18 Jun 2005, and now archived in the Forum Library.
| HudsonGray |
18 Jun 2005 |
|
This one isn't good, they caught a scammer.
http://www.thejournalnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050616/NEWS03/506160355/1017
Tarot card reader to pay -- By SULAIMAN BEG, THE JOURNAL NEWS
(Original publication: June 16, 2005)
A tarot card reader will have to pay back nearly a quarter of a million dollars to a former Nyack woman in what Orangetown police have said was an elaborate con game.
Paula "Peaches" Marion, 51, pleaded guilty to fourth-degree grand larceny in County Court in March. Her victim, Julia Marcellino, has claimed Marion conned her out of more than $400,000.
After a restitution hearing that began May 11 and was completed yesterday, Judge Kenneth Resnik ordered Marion to repay Marcellino $238,715 over four years, prosecutor William McClarnon said.
Marion faces five years' probation when sentenced July 19, McClarnon said.
Marion was arrested in Florida in December on a warrant issued based on an investigation by Orangetown Detectives Thomas Hoffman and John Lavelle. Marion also was wanted in Philadelphia on similar allegations. The detectives flew to Broward County in December and brought Marion back to Rockland.
Orangetown police accused Marion of scamming Marcellino, who is living in Florida, out of her money from September 2002 to June of last year. Marion had operated a tarot card reading store in an apartment above Temptations Cafe at 80 Main St. in Nyack.
Marcellino has said Marion brought her to financial ruin. She said Marion became her friend after an initial card reading and charting in September 2002.
Marcellino said Marion convinced her to turn over money to ward off bad omens and save her family members from illness and death. The con game also involved members of Marion's family, police said.
Marion's lawyer, Brian Kelly, argued that Marcellino brought the charges after his client broke off Marion and Marcellino's plan to marry in July. Marcellino has denied the allegation.
"We felt that this was a situation between two individuals who were lovers," Kelly said. "Gifts were exchanged. Any money given to my client should have been considered gifts. The court determined otherwise."
|
| WalesWoman |
19 Jun 2005 |
|
A fool and his money are soon parted...
Seems like not so long ago there was a similar thread about someone being taken advantage of in the same manner... I guess there is a sucker born every minute.
I can't imagine people can be so guilliable, but evidently they don't read the news and keep being taken in...
I guess that is the draw back of wanting to believe in higher powers, that they have more responsibility for our lives than we do... so those who don't want to be responsible for their own ju ju end up dishing out $ to change it.
Am I being overly insensitive? Sorry.
|
| tao51 |
19 Jun 2005 |
|
One should be careful how they use the Tarot. The retribution may be great!
|
| tmgrl2 |
19 Jun 2005 |
|
This story was all over the radio here in NY, that day I had a new and nervous sitter coming....didn't affect us...but we talked a bit about
"What is OUT there..."
terri
|
| Ace |
19 Jun 2005 |
|
They ran through it here a few years ago. did a 48 Hours show or someting with a big expose on fakes in the western and Southwest Suburbs. Sigh. People never learn as long as others offer hope. Scammers take all the credit when it works well, and give the victim the blame when it doesn't. The victim doesn't bother to think that through and realize they had been had. We all do it, just not always for psychics. Sigh.
(Waleswoman: Love your new avatar!)
Ace
|
| Tarot Sparrow |
19 Jun 2005 |
|
Sigh...I hate the negative news. It just perpetuates the stereotype that all tarot readers are con artists and that the whole thing is a scham. Although I guess positive stories won't really make people think otherwise if they already have their minds made up.
|
| Fairawen |
19 Jun 2005 |
|
The question is why the woman would pay that much money??? Talk about extremely superstious... like a human can stop people from getting sick or dying!!! Well, only if they intended on killing the people in the first place, but... come on! Especially if they were going to get married! And the reader STILL expected this gal to pay??? Did this send any messages tot his woman???
*lol* To quote a good movie: "(This act) shows a level of ineptitude that borders on the imbecilic. And I mean that in a very caring way." :P
~Fairawen~
|
| Lady Tararith |
19 Jun 2005 |
|
I personally don't think that Tarot should be used just to get money out of people
Lady Tararith x
|
| HudsonGray |
19 Jun 2005 |
|
Especially that kind of money, WHO forks over $400,000 in two years? I wonder what size the checks were, if you divide it up evenly that's $17,000 per month!
|
| Simone |
20 Jun 2005 |
|
Especially that kind of money, WHO forks over $400,000 in two years? I wonder what size the checks were, if you divide it up evenly that's $17,000 per month!
Recently, I met a lady at the Tarot section of a bookstore. We talked for a long time (found out we both had been "called" there that day, obviously we had to meet, I gave her my flyer but she has not called yet) - and she told me a story...
... of another lady she knows who is absolutely *addicted* to getting readings, to a point where she is indebted now and cannot even pay for them any longer.
I think people forking out that kind of money are not only gullible, they are kind of addicted and dependant - the lady runs to get a reading at every turn her life takes because she cannot decide on her own what to do...
There are people who do not know how to take responsibility of their own life and therefore dump the responsibility on the reader.
In that case, if they meet someone willing to exert the power over them (gullibility helps, of course), they will be in heaven: there is someone taking the responsibility for them!!
Of course the reader does not really take it, in the small not printed print of the "contract" it says that you have to do what I say, or else ... ;)
There are always two sides of the coin, and a scammer finds the gullible ones to take advantage of.
So it is our responsibility to be honest. As well.
|
| ricardozen |
20 Jun 2005 |
|
In every business in every point of this world there are good professionals and bad ones. When people come to me and say something like that, that all readers are scammers and the likes, i usually compare it to car salesmen and lawyers. Those rob people in daylight and no one do nothing about it. We try to make a living in a decent way and we're disciples of the devil..
oh well..
Ricardo
|
| Marina |
20 Jun 2005 |
|
In every business in every point of this world there are good professionals and bad ones. When people come to me and say something like that, that all readers are scammers and the likes, i usually compare it to car salesmen and lawyers. Those rob people in daylight and no one do nothing about it. We try to make a living in a decent way and we're disciples of the devil..
oh well..
Ricardo
Oh, but one can't get money for reading Tarot, you know, because you don't go to a university to learn Tarot, just like you do to be a lawyer. ;)
Kidding...i think many Tarot readers are nice and do want to help people. But...c'mon, they gotta make their living somehow! Unfortunately, we live in a world where money is really important...you cannot expect tarot readers to live out of photosynthesis!
~Yuko
|
| PlatinumDove |
20 Jun 2005 |
|
There are good ones and bad ones in any profession. In my non-tarot profession, I have been with alot of really good ones, and there are those really bad ones that don't gove a crap about anything.
|
| Alta |
20 Jun 2005 |
|
darn, they caught me. :)
|
| Ace |
20 Jun 2005 |
|
Some people are very unhappy. They go to a reader who tells them that it really isn't their fault and the reader can fix it...if the client will pay enough money. So desperate are these people they will keep paying and so low is their self-esteem that when the "reader" says it is The client's fault if something didn't work, they believe these villians and pay more for better results. It is similar to what happens with cult followers.
Ace
|
| Umbrae |
20 Jun 2005 |
|
Being scammed is never the victim’s fault. Don’t blame the victim.
It is our own colleagues that give us a bad name. Look around.
|
The Tarot in the News thread was originally posted on 18 Jun 2005 in the Talking Tarot board, and is now archived in the Forum Library. Read the active threads in Talking Tarot, or read more archived threads.
|
