I fucking hate writing about old people getting scammed. It’s even worse when they’re terminally ill, so this story’s a double whammy. Why would I be writing about this on a metal site, you ask? Well it’s because the cosmic shitstain that did this pretended he was former Deep Purple guitarist Ritchie Blackmore.
ccording to a report in The Sun, 81-year-old Valerie Horwood was scammed out of £140,000 after the aforementioned fuck-knuckle messaged her on Facebook claiming to be the guitarist. Somehow, they got Horwood to go to the store and buy a ridiculous amount of Apple gift cards. Apparently, fake Ritchie Blackmore said she’d get her money back and then some.
As is common in stories like this, the scammer demanded the woman remain quiet about the interaction because he was a celebrity and didn’t want the negative press. Unfortunately, the damage was done by the time Horwood asked her family for £2,000 to pay her bills.
Horwood’s daughter Debbie said she was shocked to see that her mother’s bank account was wiped clean when she looked into why she was asking for help.
