Catfish Catch Up

For those of you who haven't been up to speed with my recent dalliances in online dating involving being 'groomed' for a month by someone who had stolen an innocent man's photographs, before reading on, have a little read of what happened here:

For those of you who do know the story so far, you may be interested to hear about recent revelations. After spattering my blog all over social networking sites in an attempt to get some answers, I was utterly astonished at some outstanding detective work amongst my Facebook friends. One of them recognised the background of the silent disco photo as being in Milton Keynes shopping centre. After posting this observation on my wall, within hours both her and another friend had managed to locate the man in the photos and had sent me links to his profile. This I am will absolutely in awe of, and Kathryn and Louise, you seriously are wasted if you're not currently working for CID. This innocent man will be known for current purposes as CT.

On Sunday morning I wrote perhaps one of the strangest emails that CT will have ever received. 'Hello, you don't know me, but I feel like I know you. Don't freak out now, but have a little read of my blog...' Would he reply? I know I would...but this is just too fucking weird right? Right!

Sunday night, as if by magic, CT got back in touch, and I can safely say he was as totally shocked by what was going on as I was. It turns out that many of the details I had been told, personal details, about his life, likes, loves had been lifted straight from his life. Other details had come from elsewhere. But in any case that, and the fact that I had been sent around 80 photos documenting his life over the last few years, was enough to freak him the fuck out.  So where now? I've been duped by some sort of pathological liar, he's had his life stolen. Both really rather shit.

I then went about sending CT every photo I had been sent from 'Sebastian' in an attempt to piece together how he could have acquired all these pictures. I sent him as much of a dossier as I could, including the last few digits of his phone numbers in case CT could identify it as maybe one of his so-called friends who would have had access to all these pictures. But what we then found out made us both feel physically sick.

CT emailed me back with Sebastian's exact telephone number, and said it belonged to a 'woman' called Amanda, whom he had been messaging back in 2008 through another website. He had never spoken to her over the phone, but like Seb, she'd cancelled meetings on a number of occasions. It turns out we had both been speaking to the same person. But was it a man? Was it a woman? Was it a couple? CT only has one photo that Amanda had sent him, but it's enough of a start to move this witch hunt on a notch...

So now we are desperately trying to track down anyone who may have also been duped / messaged / conned / lured by either of these two 'characters'. So, here is as much as we know:

'SEBASTIAN PRITCHARD-JONES' (not his real name, of course)

Age 35

Most recently used the dating username SOUJOURN

Apparently lives in Marylebone and works in a primary school in Westminster

Speaks with a Welsh accent

 

'AMANDA' (also we presume not her real name)

We are pretty sure this picture has also been stolen for purpose, so if you recognise her as someone you know, please also let me know.

The phone number both of them have definitely used is 07*** 228 114. They may have also used a phone with the number 07*** 068 375, the number used to send me threatening messages.

If you have either been chatting to either of these people, or someone with a phone number that looks like it may be the same, then please please PLEASE get in touch...CT and I know we can't have been the first and we certainly won't be the last, and we want to stop this person before anyone else gets hurt, conned, emotionally involved or have their time wasted. For all we know, this person could even be dangerous. So please, we ask you kindly, spread this around your social media, copy in @C_T_S if you're on Twitter. It helped me track down the innocent man whose photos have been stolen, I know we can find out more about what this person(s) has/have been doing, and to whom. Your help has been invaluable thus far, so let's kick this virtual witch hunt up a gear.

Mr #5 - Snowglobes and Sweetness

You may be asking why, after my recent Catfish debacle, that I'm so willing to take the plunge back into the metaphorical dating pool. Well, I figure why not? I've already sussed out one of the weirdos, I'm pretty sure I can sniff out the rest of them. So now, I am prepared. Oh yes, I've got armbands on. Famous last words? Probably...


The preamble:

Mr #5 was actually one of the very first boys I started messaging during the #52firstdates project, but our delay in meeting is all to do with a 2 week holiday in Dubai (his, not mine), and an all-consuming dating-related nightmare (mine, not his).  From the off, I liked the sound of this lad. We had the same taste in comedy, and he had a charmingly colloquial way of messaging. And not even one sniff of a LOL. And he looked cute to boot. Nice. Before he went away, he'd promised me a drink on his return if I was still interested, and I said only if he brought me back a snowglobe of the Burj Al Arab.  He trotted off to the Middle East, I trotted around London town for a wee while, and needless to say, he got back to the UK, got back in touch, communication recommenced, and finally we sorted ourselves out a little date.

The man:

Age:28

Profession: Still strangely cryptic...in short, I still have no bloody idea! Not for want of asking...I suspect it's something a little underwhelming, but as long as it's not a primary school teacher, I couldn't care less!
Random factoid: Is living with a terrorist. Well, for 'is' read 'suspects he might be'. So maybe less of a random factoid and more controversial conjecture...

The date:

Once again the venue was my choice, somewhere near work, but given that I was running late from work and he was more than happy to pop along Waterloo-wards, it all worked out rather well. I met him outside the bar, and to my overwhelming relief, he looked exactly like he was supposed to. And he was very cute, neatly packed into a polo shirt and crowned with a rather sweet flat cap. Already my faith in the male race was more than just restoration-in-progress. Once inside, not wanting to dally, he ordered us a cheeky bottle of vino. Nice - clearly not too frightened of me at first sight to commit to more than one drink. Conversation was not a problem at all, I rather boldly/foolishly bulldozed in there immediately with the ridiculous story of my ongoing date-fright with Mr/Mrs #2, and he was very entertained and incredibly forgiving that I'd buggered him around in finally getting round to a date. We covered a lot of mutual ground, arachnophobia, Paranormal Activity, lesbian double lives (friends', not our own...), why cats rule the world and the various accents of the British Isles. The bottle disappeared, and we decided on another glass for the road, and before we knew it, the bar staff were telling us to foxtrot oscar. We took the tube back as far as our common journey took us, he walked me to the platform, gave me a hug and said he'd hoped my date had been better than the previous experience. Once on the train, I got a rather sweet text to say thank you for the evening, and we both bidded each other nuhnight.

Memorable Quotes:
'Goldsmiths students scare me. Why do they need such big ginger beards?'

Events of note:

The surprise arrival of a Burj AL Arab snowglobe. Literally amazing. Funny AND thoughtful.

The verdict:

I have to say I had a really lovely evening with a guy who seemed fun, funny, sweet and understatedly charming. I don't know if he'd like to see me again, if he asked me I definitely would. But I'm not sure if I could get away with asking for a second date without looking over-keen. I'll just have to keep a sly eye on the BlackBerry just in case he decides to get in touch again...