con – Thiefhunters in Paradise

Psychic Schools or Scam Schools?

Suitably spooky site for a psychic school: Arthur Findlay College in Essex, England.

Psychic schools. Suitably spooky site for a psychic school: Arthur Findlay College in Essex, England. — Suitably spooky site for a psychic school: Arthur Findlay College in Essex, England.

A year ago, psychic swindler Rose Marks was sentenced to more than ten years in federal prison for fleecing clients of her fortune-telling business out of more than $17.8 million. She was 62 years old; she and her family had built a network of psychics, many of whom worked under the professional name Joyce Michael in Ft. Lauderdale and New York City.

One of Rose Marks’s best scams was to “see” the awful (and outrageously convoluted) future of a client, then solicit millions of dollars from the client, bit by bit, in order to perform rituals over the money before returning it. Except, the money was never returned.

At trial, victims testified that Marks “exploited them during vulnerable times in their lives. Victims said the women of the psychic’s family were masterful in their ability to use people’s spiritual or religious beliefs to get them to hand over money and other valuables.”

I always thought psychics had a “gift.”

Turns out, no. They just go to psychic schools. Or seance schools. Or clairvoyant colleges. These institutions have complete curricula of course study in, uh… conning. Courses called Unfoldment into Mediumship, Using Past Life Information in Present Time, Applying Clairvoyant Tools in the Psychic Playground, Trance: How to Sit for its Development, and So You Want to be a Medium are a small sampling from the few psychic schools I surveyed.

Rose Marks is infamous enough to have her own Wikipedia page, and lucky enough to have been trained by her own mother in the Gypsy tradition. She began her psychic career by age nine and later trained her own daughter.

If you don’t have the benefit of maternal training, there are psychic schools. All of them offer comprehensive instruction from beginner to advanced levels.

Psychic Schools

In the class called Stepping into Mediumship at MontClair Metaphysical School in New Jersey, the focus is learning how to “contact someone on the Other Side and to provide proof of their identity, personality and proof of life.”

Proof of life? The “Other Side” means the dead, right? So they’re teaching students how to contact the dead. And they must really teach that—otherwise the school is a sham.

Next, the students are taught how to prove they’ve contacted the correct dead person. Hmmm… mistakes can happen. Kind of like getting your neighbor’s mail in your box. Oops. But it’s the last bit that confuses me most: students are taught how to provide “proof of life.” Of a dead person? Is there life on the “Other Side”? From my perspective then, as an afterlife-nonbeliever, the school teaches how to scam. It is a school of scams, a college of cons, if I comprehend the concept correctly.

Or perhaps I need spiritual help.

Just last month, Psychic Gina was arrested in Fort Collins, Colorado, for bilking $37,000 from a client, with the collusion of her accomplice husband. Psychic Gina Marks is a member of another Marks family’s fortune-telling business; if and how they are related to Rose Marks is unknown.

Who would pay a psychic thousands of dollars for aura-cleansing, curse-lifting, love-finding, or to get through the ordinary difficulties of life? Usually those desperate in the areas of love, loss, health, or career. In the usual progression, the victim visits a psychic storefront for an inexpensive palm reading. Talented fortune-tellers assign homework to their clients, and persuade them to return repeatedly for convoluted rituals that escalate in price. Often, the psychic promises that the funds will be returned when the client’s problems are solved. Countering the failure of promised results, psychics convince clients to return by threatening certain catastrophe, calamity, and misfortune.

It is these advanced fortune-making skills I’d like to read about in the psychic schools’ syllabus: the inveigling, up-selling, cold-reading, deceit, and trickery. Which classes teach those vital skills? What about marketing, costuming, decor, and special effects?

The Psychic School in northern California offers many classes, all by telephone. One is Create Magic and Miracles. Is that the one in which you learn how to make teacups tip over and tables float? Most classes are $200, or you can take the two-year Teachers Program for $4,800. The Psychic School’s site carefully describes each course as self-healing, self-improvement, self-knowledge, and self-awareness. You study to be a psychic in order to read only your own chakra, energy, and dead people, right?

See your money-making abilities skyrocket

However, the Psychic School does point out that “with the development of your clairvoyant abilities, the decisions through which you create your life come with ease, your creativity and money-making abilities skyrocket….” I take that to mean that as a graduated “psychic” (the Teachers Program ends with a “Psychic School Certificate of Graduationg” [sic], there’s no end to the creativity you can use and fees you can charge to scam your clients. Becoming a clairvoyant, you will “create a life filled with insight, creativity, and miracles.” Sounds great!

Let’s have a look at the Berkeley Psychic Institute’s Clairvoyant Training Program, which the institute also refers to as “psychic kindergarten.” It must be child’s play! But no. It’s a two-year, four-phase program of intensive learning and “hands on training from high caliber gifted psychics,” and concludes with “Uncovering your deepest challenges, moving through the fire and slaying the dragons.”

Berkeley Psychic Institute operates the DejaVu Psychic Hotline, where graduates can get instant employment doing telephone and email readings. Email readings? Yes, for $25, one can order an “Email Trance Medium Channeled Healing.”

“We do not consider ourselves as fortune tellers. We are fortune creators,” says the DejaVu Psychic Hotline website. Whose fortunes are being created?

Arthur Findlay College, pictured above and about an hour north of London, calls itself “The Worlds Foremost College for the Advancement of Spiritualism and Psychic Sciences.” Not only can one study mediumship, but also trance mediumship, in which “you will be connected to spirit working with spirit and supported by spirit.” Sounds complicated. And that is the clearest line in the entire course description. Is that an example of the obfuscation taught in the institute? Vital skill for a clairvoyant.

Perhaps the most important course for a psychic medium is Mediumship – Polish Your Performance. Since mediumship is learned—not an innate gift—one must study and practice to become convincing when channeling a spirit from the Other Side. This is “essential for customers not only to return but recommend you to others,” the Arthur Findlay College site says. I’m guessing there’s some overlap with trance mediumship. Arthur Findlay College is international and holds week-long sessions in a multitude of languages including Japanese, Swedish, Italian, Norwegian, German, French, and Finnish. It even markets a course especially for senior citizens.

What do Psychic Schools cost?

What does it cost to become a clairvoyant? A basic week-long course at Arthur Findlay College, say Mediumship & Spiritual Development, costs £570 (about $845) with room and board, double occupancy. Add £9 per person if you want a room with your own bathroom. With more than 80 courses available, a wannabe-psychic can spend a pretty penny.

But everyone knows that a solid education leads to a solid career. Just a few years ago, Psychic Michelle Morgan, of Tarzana, California, raked in almost a million from a single client, a young man whom she determined was suffering from a love curse. Psychic Michelle was patient; she kept her 25-year-old mark dependent on her rituals for two years, urging him to borrow more and more money to fund his psychic sessions. The skills she honed allowed her to entrap and ensnare her victims and exploit them for much more than they were worth. Like all those in her field, silver-tongued Psychic Michelle’s talent was unctuous smooth-talk, glib persuasion, and creative conning. Presumably, the 25-year-old million-dollar-client wasn’t Psychic Michelle’s only client.

So what does a clairvoyant college curriculum really teach? How does an institute prepare a student medium for a career in clairvoyance? Does it really teach curse-lifting, money-purifying, and soul-swapping? Are the students taught how to scam and con their clients? Or are the students themselves scammed by the schools?

Unethical Blogger

Steal. Drink and snack from the hotel mini-bar, the unethical blogger advises in his unethical December 10, 2014 article. Go ahead and have a beer and a candy bar, then deny it at check-out. You’ll get it free!

Swindle. Use a depleted debit card to buy drinks on a plane. Free booze, yay, worth committing fraud for!

Cheat. Walk into a luxury hotel you’re not staying in and take advantage of guest services like free breakfast, the concierge, and luggage storage. They’ll never know!

Lie. Tell the airline gate agent you have a peanut allergy and need to board first to wipe down your tray. Yeah, get that overhead bin space before the honest people get there!

Scam. If your “expensive” item breaks prematurely (an iPad is hinted), go buy a new one, repackage the broken one, and return it for a refund. Sweet dreams, if you can sleep after that one.

And on and on. Like, buy travel gear and return it for a refund when you’re done with it, the unethical blogger advises. Take an empty first-class seat on a plane and try to get away with it. Pay $20 to have your tires rotated when you need parking in a high-priced city.

Unethical blogger

Some people should not be journalists. Some journalists should be decommissioned. This guy, this Mike Richard, is one of them.

I’m not in the habit of slamming other bloggers. But it is my custom to report thefts, cons, scams, and the fraudsters who commit them. Mike Richard may or may not use the methods he espouses; he does call them “useful travel hacks.”

Richard’s headline says it all: “20 Totally Unethical (But Useful) Travel Hacks.” He’s recommending these “travel hacks” even though they’re unethical.

I try to live by a simple little motto: “What if everyone did this?” Would I want that world? If everyone shouted, littered, took a stone from someone’s yard, lied, cheated, stole…. Just…try to be decent.

I grew up with several versions of The Golden Rule. Simply put, treat others as you’d like to be treated. Reciprocity. It makes the world go ’round.

I have little issue with paid placement presented as personal opinion—that’s the way of the world. The way of blog-whores. But this unethical blogger will apparently say anything for money. He calls it paid advertising. No wonder his blog has only one advertiser, despite his plentiful pleas for ads. Well, he has three if you count Anthony Bourdain and a quick-print service.

Unethical and illegal. Steal. Cheat. Lie. Commit fraud. But sure, Mike Richard says, they are, “entirely useful… for shameless budget travelers”. I must not be the only one who finds this to be irresponsible journalism. And not the only one to find it repugnant.

con fraud scam travel

Three-card monte expert Rod the Hop, R.I.P.

Rod-the-Hop, three-card monte, card mechanic, slot mechanic

They’s ony three kinda men I won’t play with: That’s a po’ man, a blind man, an a police-man!

Rod the Hop, my Las Vegas three-card-monte informer, died last month, aged 56. He was a card tosser whose demonstrations proved that drills teach skills for life. He set up in areas with less police presence, favoring the sidewalks outside large factories, especially on payday, “where there’s eight hundred people going to lunch and they have to walk by you,” he said.

“A real good spot is outside military bases, where you’ve got a lot of young, naïve kids with nothing much to do and a little bit of money to spend.

“The moves are easy. You can learn it in a day and be good in a week. It’s the presentation that’s important. You have to have unflinching audacity and unmitigated gall. I don’t get intimidated.”

I love the way Rod spoke.

He was renown as a “card mechanic,” which is a card manipulator, as entertainment and teaching, and/or cheating in card games. As a card mechanic, Rod the Hop worked both ends. He was loved by the worldwide magic community; and had four felony convictions for casino cheating.

He was also renown as a “slot mechanic,” which could mean slot machine repairman but, in Rod’s case, meant he was a convicted slot machine cheat. Just last year he had the honor of becoming person number 34 in Nevada’s Excluded Person List, aka “the Black Book.”

He told us he tore apart and studied slot machines in his apartment, so he had to use a friend’s place as his “official” address so his parole officers wouldn’t find them.

Travelers may encounter three-card monte games anywhere. Players are purposely given a glimpse of the target early in the scramble, a skillful slip is performed by the tosser, and players thereafter carefully track the wrong object with confidence.

I’ve called three-card monte a “game” but, like the three-shell game, they’re games of no chance: tricks and traps. You’ll see other players win and walk away, but they are, in fact, shills. You cannot win. If you win once, it’s at the tosser’s pleasure in hope you, or someone in his audience, will bet big.

Advice from a three-card monte expert

In the words of Rod the Hop

The object of three-card monte is to make money. Each person in the crew gets an equal end. Some days it’s good and—it’s a street game so obviously you can only make as much money as what a person has in their pocket. But if you make two or three hundred dollars apiece a day, then you’ve done what you set out to do. Most of it has to do with grift sense, and your con and your presentation. That’s more than the skill factor, I would say.

It’s just a hustle. I mean, you just do the best you can and you prey on tourists or suckers that don’t know they’re breathing air.

What I look for in a sucker is, they’ve got money, number one. And that they’re a sucker. I don’t have a conscious thought pattern that goes through my mind when I see a sucker. I know a sucker when I see one. I just do. I’ve been doing it so long, I know a candy bar when I see one. That’s all there is to it.

But by the same token, I know someone that’s not a sucker, or might be a cop, or somebody that knows the game. I can just feel it. I just know a sucker when I see one and my crew does too. You know that when you pick a crew. I don’t go out and say, yeah, he looks like a pretty good thief and has a lot of grift sense, I’ll get him. The deciding factor whether you have a good crew or a bad crew is how much grift sense all your partners have. But most of the time you’re not going to hook up with someone that doesn’t have grift sense.

You’ll find the game in the back of buses, train stations, things like that. Very seldom do you see it in the streets, cause if it’s windy it’ll blow the cards open.

I used to go outside a factory. Believe it or not, all you have to do is set up a box and start throwing cards and people will just stop by to see what you’re doing. You don’t have to say anything. Then you start betting with the shills. And pretty soon people get to realize that it’s a betting game. I’ll keep throwing it, and my shills will be betting, and they’ll be winning and the sucker sees them winning, and so they want to bet. And I might even let the sucker win some if I see other suckers that might have more money.

So, the red card’s on the bottom of the two cards and the black card’s on top. When I throw the cards down, I’ll throw the top card instead of the bottom card, which is the red card. But first, just to get into the rhythm of it, I’ll do it for real. I’ll throw the red card on the bottom, and let them watch where it is, very slowly, and they’re watching and wondering where the red card is. And there’s no question where the red card is.

And they’ll want to bet, so I’ll say, well here, let me do it again. And then I’ll pick them up and they’ll say, oh gosh, I was right. I knew where the red card was. And then I’ll do it again, and now they’ll want to bet. When I don’t want them to win is when I’ll throw the top cards. And then obviously they’ll lose.

You would think that a normal person would think, wait a minute, I knew where the red card was. I bet on it and I lost. Why? Well you’d think a guy would just quit. But no, not suckers. Suckers go, ‘wait, this time I’m really going to watch him.’ And then they’ll bet more money, and it just goes on and on until they don’t have any more money. So I try to entice as many suckers as I can to bet on it. Then, when everybody’s out of money, I take the cards, stick them in my pocket, and walk away. And then we’ll go somewhere else.

I’m where there’s people. Where there’s people there’s money, and where there’s money there’s me. And that’s where you do con games. You can’t do it if there’s no customers. Where there’s people, there’s suckers, and where there’s suckers, there’s people like me.

The reason people try to beat this game is because of the skill of the operator. It’s my presentation. I say, ‘look, I want to show you something.’ First off, I say ‘this isn’t three-card monte.’ Because then you’re thinking, this is not three-card monte. I tell them that you win on the red and you lose on the black. Now watch. Here’s a red card. I’m just going to set it right there. Then here’s a black card and I want to set it right there, and just switch them. Now where’s the red card? Will you bet on something like that? Well sure you would, if you were a betting man. But if you’re not a betting man, you’re not going to do it.

And this is a cliché that everyone uses, that you can’t beat an honest man. Well, you can’t beat someone that’s not trying to win your money. You can remember that. As a hustler, and doing the three-card monte, I cannot get my money from someone that’s not trying to get my money first.

This is a real old game, this three-card monte. I know it’s at least a hundred years old. It’s in a book a hundred years old, published in 1902. But each generation that’s never seen it before thinks they can beat it. There will always be suckers.

Look, three-card monte is a great little hustle in the street. And frankly, I don’t do it any more because there’s not enough money in it for me. It’s only as good as how much money a person has in their pocket at that time—right now. How many people walk around nowadays with eight hundred dollars in their pocket, or a thousand? Or even three hundred? You know what they got? They got about six dollars and fourteen credit cards. That’s what people have nowadays. They don’t carry around cash. The only people that carry cash nowadays are criminals.

The one good thing about three-card monte and the three-shell game and the short cons like that, is it’s a good training ground for con men, for grifters. It’s a prep school, if you will. Most people grow out of it.

If you’re a tourist and you see a three-card monte, don’t stop and look at it and think, well I know that he throws the top one sometimes and maybe sometimes he throws the bottom one, or whatever. I’m telling you right now. Do not play it. Cause it’s a guarantee, you cannot win. It’s simple as that. And that’s my advice. I can promise you, you cannot beat it. Just go on down the road when you see it.

Like Rod the Hop, Bob Arno, the famous pickpocket, is also known in and has deep knowledge of the worlds of magic and crime. Watching Rod work, Bob was impressed with his coolness, his social-engineering, his roping-in of “suckers.”

I was impressed with his patter. Here are a few of his lines, usually delivered in a rapid-fire drawl while his hands were flying and his mind was sizing up potential marks:

“This here ain’t no three card monte, this here’s the Mexican pitti-pat, where you win on the red and you lose on the black…

“Watch me now, I’m gonna race ’em and chase ’em, so watch where I place ’em…”

“If you gotta lotta nerve and you gotta lotta plenty, five’ll getcha ten and ten’ll getcha twenty…”

“I’ve played this game with Yankees and Southerners, Senators and Governors. Money on the card or no bet, where’s the red? If I can bluff you I can beat you. Come on bet five, bet ten! Ho down now, get your chicken dinner in the center, where’s the red?…”

[Thanks to Paul Chosse, who thought to put these lines in writing back in 2005.]

Rest in peace, Roderick William Dee.

Adapted from Travel Advisory: How to Avoid Thefts, Cons, and Street Scams
Chapter Eight: Con Artists and Their Games of No Chance

Bob Arno con Las Vegas scam three-card monte

Devil’s Breath robbery/rape drug, aka burundanga

Devil's Breath drug, burundanga, scopoamine

Devil’s Breath drug, aka burundanga

Hard to tell fact from fiction when researching “the world’s scariest drug” called Devil’s Breath, burundanga, and scopolamine. The second- and third-hand reports, of which there are many, seem to be well-intentioned warnings and FUD (fear, uncertainty, doubt).

The dosing methods and effects on the victims are duly terrifying. But what good is a warning if there is no possible way of protecting against the event? How can one prevent a stranger from blowing a bit of powder in one’s face? Or tainting a card or paper with the dust and showing it to the mark? “Excuse me, do you know this address/store/location?” —and you’re done for.

One thing is certain though. This 35-minute documentary about Devil’s Breath is fantastic, whether true or dramatized. The characters in it are all credible. The victims are believable and the perpetrators are colorful and convincing. Why would perps reveal the awful details of their criminal trade? Well, that doesn’t surprise me, given my experience making documentaries about thieves.

You probably know scopolamine as a drug for motion sickness. Perhaps you’ve worn the patch on a boat or ship. Although reports of criminal use of scopolamine are not new, and the video’s been around for a while, I’ve posted it here because I think the documentary is so good.

My friend Carolyn Hamilton, who lives in Ecuador, just mentioned that warnings of Devil’s Breath are swirling. Reports or rumors, I’m not sure. Carolyn photographed the brugmansia tree soon after moving to Ecuador, simply because of its beauty. Later, in a native plants class, she learned that “people plant it outside their bedroom windows so they will sleep better at night! Among the indigenous peoples it’s considered good luck to have one planted at your doorstep. And it’s known to be poisonous.” The photo above is from Carolyn’s neighbor’s yard.

Have any of you been drugged with Devil’s Breath? Have any of you heard a first-hand report from someone else who was drugged?

Edit 12/13/15: The New York Times just published an article, The Swindled Samaritan, which tells a first-person account of burundanga-drugging. The victim’s apartment was totally emptied by the drugger-thieves and the victim had no memory of the event. Her apartment lobby video showed her bringing the thieves in, and the doorman described how those thieves carried out her possessions.

con drug scam thieves

The three-shell game – part 3

The Pea Game

Shills and Shells

Serge, a pea-gamer in Copenhagen. — Serge, a three-shell gamer in Copenhagen.

“It’s the talk that’s important,” Serge insisted, about the pea game. Each forceful word sent a curl of smoke into his own eyes. “Not the hands. The skill is the talk.” His fingers idly spun and twirled a matchbox as he spoke. “Why you want to know this? Why you ask me?”

Because we’d watched him work the crowds earlier in the day, watched him cheat a steady stream of happy-go-lucky vacationers. Because we’d watched his team of almost a dozen men take in bets of $3 minimum, up to $75, and no one ever won. And because we hadn’t expected this opportunity, this impromptu interview with an eminent operator.

It was past 10 p.m. when Bob and I began our stroll up Copenhagen’s Vesterbrogade, away from Tivoli, away from the maddening throngs of holiday-makers, away from the Swedes who swarm over by ferry or the new bridge for a night of cheap beer. The wide avenue got darker and quieter as we walked west, the shops more utilitarian and drab.

As we approached and passed a small restaurant, a diner at an outside table leered at me, swinging his huge head like a dashboard-dog’s as I passed. His lewd look was piercing enough that I turned back, only to see the man’s head swiveled backwards on his shoulders, eyes still fixed on me.

“I’ve got to go talk to him,” Bob said abruptly. Strange: I could have sworn he hadn’t noticed the man’s stare; neither is Bob the type to challenge a man for a glance. Feeling hostile and squeamish, I hung back, concealed and feeling protected by a sidewalk sign.

Pea game: A three-shell game in Copenhagen. — A three-shell game in Copenhagen.

Bob was smiling! I crept a little closer. Speaking in German. I made out a bit of it. Bob was asking the man about immigration policies in Denmark, but I hadn’t the faintest idea why. They spoke for several minutes before Bob rejoined me.

“Who is he?” I asked, half mad, half curious.

“One of the three-shell guys we saw today.”

“You’re kidding, a pea game guy! Did you ask him about it?”

“No, I just asked him about immigration. He’s from Kosovo.”

“But let’s go back and ask him about the pea game!” I said, going from zero to zeal in an instant. “What luck!”

We returned to the con man and his partner as they sat before empty dinner plates, each enjoying beers and cigarettes. The big head swung around to look me up and down, unapologetically. Perhaps it was second nature for him to appraise his opponents.

“Serge” was reluctant to spill his guts to strangers. It took considerable chit-chat before he warmed to us even a bit. Our conversation shifted back and forth between elementary English and rudimentary German.

Gently, we hinted that we’d seen him in Strøget, the pedestrian shopping street, that afternoon. He looked from me to Bob, questioningly. Yes, we’d seen him doing the three-shell game; he appeared to be quite proficient. We saw him take in large sums.

Serge smiled nervously, trapped in his seat as Bob and I stood at the edge of his table. His younger partner sat silently, lacking English and German.

“I make the game also,” Bob confided, “but only on stage. I’m a magician.”

Serge visibly relaxed a notch. He balanced his cigarette pack on its corner and spun it under a fingertip, considering.

“There is not trick,” he tried, “just talk and fun.”

“I know the game. I’m interested in you. How many in your team?”

“Eight. Sometimes ten. Many men to share money.”

Serge had been operating the three-shell game for twenty years. First in his native Kosovo, then in Germany for six years, and finally in Copenhagen. Having fled the war in Yugoslavia, he had no papers in Denmark, he told us. What else could he do? How could he earn money?

“This job,” he said, “it is just to make fun for the tourists.” Palms up, fingers spread, shoulders hunched. “People see that it’s easy to win; they want to play.”

This is Part 3.
Read Part 1.

Excerpt from Travel Advisory: How to Avoid Thefts, Cons, and Street Scams
Chapter Eight: Con Artists and their Games of No Chance

con copenhagen denmark three-shell game

The three-shell game – part 2

How the 3 shell game works.

3 shell game in Barcelona. — Three-shell game in Barcelona.

Video tape is a wonderful diagnostic tool when it comes to sleight of hand. In slow motion, we can see the phenomenal skill behind the Copenhagen teams’ manipulation. In other words, they do more than simply mix up the boxes with great speed and confusing baffles. They provide onlookers with fleeting peeks of pea as it’s shuttled around the mat, as it’s switched from box to box, moved from corner to corner. The player knits his brow in concentration, trying to follow its progress. The operator’s hands stop. The player is sure he knows where the ball is. Or is he? He hesitates.

If a player is about to make a winning bet, a shill quickly intercepts by turning over one of the boxes, throwing down his money, and ending the round. House odds rely on the operator’s ability to hoodwink the spectators with bluffs and psychology.

In New York and Las Vegas, the 3 shell games are played curbside, with bottle caps and a ball of sponge. The Spanish gangs we’ve studied in Barcelona’s Plaça de Catalunya are a brutal incarnation. They use vegetable props: the thick ends of carrots or small potato halves hollowed out to make shells. The game is played standing, on a rickety cardboard box-cum-table. Spotters are vigilant and malevolent. They want a crowd, but scrutinize the gathering individuals. Anyone who doesn’t appear to be a happy-go-lucky tourist-type gets a threatening once-over, an in-your-face stare, or a menacing growl. Cameras are blocked and overly-curious non-players are swiftly made to leave.

All 3 three shell gamers use the highly sophisticated techniques of professional magicians—or is it the other way around? In any case, it’s a method that ensures the punter will never win. The pea is manipulated by any of several methods, some of which use principles of magic I will not divulge except to say they employ a simple gimmick which is neither smoke nor mirror. The most common trick utilizes a miniature version of palming; you can call it thumbing. It allows the operator to sneak the ball out of and into any of the three shells or boxes. He can place it in a seemingly impossible location and guarantee a player will never win.

At the shrill whistle of a Spanish spotter, spectators see more magic. From within their very midst the operator vanishes and all traces of his game disappear. A flash and puff of smoke are all but real. Gaming pieces are gathered or flung away, and the cardboard box is flattened and tossed against a tree or trashcan: non-incriminating evidence. The team disperses like panicked pigeons and, when the coast clears, reforms its gambling gaggle.

3 shell game in Copenhagen. — 3-shell game in Copenhagen.

In the aftermath one day, Bob and I found a young German tourist weeping on a sidewalk bench. A girlfriend tried to comfort her, though she, too, was distraught. Through angry tears, the girl sputtered her tale: she’d lost too much money, goaded and cajoled to bet in a fast-paced game she only vaguely followed. She’d been separated from her friend, surrounded by strangers, and pressured to play.

This is Part 2. Read Part 3.
Read Part 1.

Excerpt from Travel Advisory: How to Avoid Thefts, Cons, and Street Scams
Chapter Eight: Con Artists and their Games of No Chance

Barcelona con copenhagen denmark scam spain three-shell game

The three-shell game

Pavement wagers.

Copenhagen’s pedestrian shopping street is an ideal venue for the three-shell game, also called the pea game. Several competing crews set up there. They choose locations in the middle of a block along the narrow lane, which is swarming with jolly people from all over the world, shopping, slurping ice cream, and munching ambrosial Belgian waffles as they meander.

Three-shell game

A pair begins the game: a barker, and an operator. The operator drops to his knees, produces a small rubber mat not much bigger than a mousepad, and begins manipulating his pieces. Instead of the traditional walnut shell halves, he uses three matchbox trays reinforced with tape. His pea is an aluminum foil ball.

He slides the boxes madly around his mat, his hands a blur.

“Lef’, ri’, mi’l! One, two, three. Where’za ball?” He is sloppy—on purpose? One box goes sliding off the mat.

Immediately, a man places a bet and wins. A shill. Another man, another bet, a loss. Laughter rings out, but it sounds hollow and false. Hands fly over the mat and in the process, a box is briefly tipped, revealing the ball.

Quickly, an audience gathers. Everybody knows: a crowd draws a crowd. Excitement builds. Money changes hands. Bills are flashed and stashed.

“Totto-lotto, mini-casino! Wanna play? Twenny bucks!”

“Just looking.”

“Lookie-cookie. Sir! Wanna play? Where’za ball?”

The barker’s narration lures. The operator’s manipulation tempts. Imagined winnings seduce. It looks so easy: you can see the ball! Bets are placed: an easy win, a stupid loss… and soon enough, a tourist tries.

Five team members immediately close around him. They joke in any language, whatever is called for. A moment of suspense and camaraderie is staged. The operator is on the ground with his game, kneeling before his rubber mat, hunched over his boxes and ball.

“One, two, three, four. Lef’, ri’, mi’l! Where’za ball?” He’s tightly surrounded by the six standing men: the barker, the transitory player, and some shills. For a moment, no one else can see the game. The player chooses, a cry goes out in sympathy. The circle opens and the spectators are once again included as the loser slinks away.

But wait! Arms around the player’s shoulders, a conspiratorial back-pat. “You can do it! One more time, double or nothing!” So encouraging, so friendly, who’d guess these guys were in on it? Moments later, the player turns away, shakes his head, wonders how he could have lost so much so quickly.

Bob and I run after him.

“How much did you lose?”

“Fifteen hundred crowns!” About $260.

“Where’re you from?”

“Bhutan.”

“Why did you play?”

“I’ve never seen this game. It looked fun.”

“This is one game you can never win.”

“I know that now!” He hikes up his backpack and strides away.

Bob and I follow our noses to a waffle stand and wait for a fresh one hot off the iron. A rosy-cheeked girl hands it over, steaming and blackened, caramelized surface stuck to its parchment wrapper. Standing on a street corner, we savor the chewy sweetness of this European street snack. It has no relation to American waffles.

“See the guy in the pink jacket? Bob points with his chin, chewing.

“No.”

“There near the trash can.”

“That’s an orange jacket.” I reach for the waffle.

“Orange, then. He’s a spotter.”

“For the three-shell guys? How can you tell?”

“Just watch him. And his partner over there, in plade.”

“Plaaaaad.”

“Plaaaaad.” He wants to get the word right next time. But he won’t. “They’re looking for police. They were there before, too.”

We finish the waffle and watch a while longer.

A crowd forms around a three-shell game in Copenhagen.

“Now!” Bob says, and we’re off. The orange and plaid guys walk full speed up the lane, weaving deftly through the oblivious crowd. We follow in their wake.

The spotters reach the tight knot of people gathered around their colleagues, but they don’t stop. They don’t even pause. They hurry to the next corner, to alert their bookend pair of spotters. Yet, the gaming gang has seen them and that’s all the signal they need. They scatter. In the blink of an eye the game is over, the gang is gone, and the crowd is left wondering what they were gathered for, if anything at all.

This is Part 1. Read Part 2.

Excerpt from Travel Advisory: How to Avoid Thefts, Cons, and Street Scams

Chapter Eight: Con Artists and their Games of No Chance

con copenhagen denmark scam three-shell game

Avoid becoming victim of theft and scams on vacation

On the set before filming this live segment for ABC News, Bob Arno stole a wallet from one of the camera operators. The producers asked him to do it.

Bob snuck away with the wallet, brandishing it to the other nearby staff who’d gaped as the theft occurred. They were unaware of Bob’s topic—theft and scams—or at least of his skills.

Almost simultaneously, a uniformed security guard blasted into the studio—the scene of the crime—having witnessed the thief on his monitor.

“He was ready to throw your criminal butt out of our studio,” laughed host Susan Casper.

The wallet was presented to the cameraman on-air.

advice con pickpocket scam travel tv

Barcelona Street Scams

“I, too, was a victim of Barcelona street scams…” said more than a hundred people. And they described their own thieves, con artists, fake beggars, purse snatchers, scammers, fraudsters, pickpockets, and thugs. The page, Barcelona Scams, is riveting reading!

My great friend Terry Jones has just packed up his Barcelona life after 15 years of loving life in that great city. While he’s moved on to exciting challenges—he’s starting up FluidInfo—everything he’s acquired in Barcelona had to go. Along with about 3,000 books, he parted with his collection of Barcelona street scams. He gave them to me.

We met though thiefhunting about ten years ago. Terry describes the odd convergence of our ancestral histories here. While Bob and I go looking for thieves, Terry doesn’t make any special effort as a thiefhunter. He’s simply observant. He sees scams and cons all around him (and you).

Barcelona Street Scams

Have you been to Barcelona? Were you pickpocketed or hustled out of money? Tricked, conned, or scammed? If so, did you report it to the police? (I’m asking for survey purposes.) Take a look at Barcelona Street Scams. Add your own Barcelona street scams to this page. Just scroll down to the comment section below. And please do mention whether or not you bothered with a police report. And if so, how you were treated by the police.

Thank you for sharing your Barcelona street scams!

Barcelona con scam spain thieves

Money-changing scam

Some years ago, before Bulgaria was part of the EU, Dodie B. and two male friends visited one of that country’s small port towns. She had a $100 bill with which she hoped to buy euros. (Not a smart strategy, exchanging one currency for another currency in a country that uses neither, but that’s not the point here.)

The first two foreign-currency-exchange booths Dodie tried refused. They would sell her only Bulgarian money for her US dollars. Eventually she found a closed money exchange kiosk where a man was changing money on the street in front of the shop. She asked him if he would give her euros for US dollars. He said yes.

Dodie’s two friends wandered a bit away when she asked the rate. He quoted a price and she thought to herself, wow, great rate, and agreed. He counted out the euros for her and put them, folded, on top of his wallet. She held onto her $100 bill. They joked and bantered a bit, until Dodie finally said hey, are you going to give me the euros or not? She started to put her bill into her pocket.

Just then there was shouting. “No, no money change on the street!” She grabbed the folded money and the man took her bill. Another man, large and intimidating, was suddenly looming over her, shouting that she cannot change money on the street. She walked toward her friends and the goon followed, uncomfortably close to her. She shoved the cash deep into her pocket and walked faster. When she reached her friends the thug turned and left.

The friends asked what took her so long and she explained, shaken but happy to have accomplished her goal. She took the cash out of her pocket and saw right away that she’d been scammed. The pile was made of one 5-euro note wrapped around a pile of worthless old Yugoslavian bills, taped together. Of course the goon was gone, and so was the “money changer.”

Her friends wanted to go to the police, but Dodie was afraid to, since changing money on the street is a crime. Dodie still has the bundle of bills and promised to send me a photo of it, but I got tired of waiting.

The critically-timed loud and scary threat by a third party is typical in many scams, and is designed to conclude the deal in a rush and quickly separate the vic from the perp. The interrupting third party always seems to be an uninvolved stranger, or a pseudo cop as in this example. But he’s always part of the game. Note also the con man’s intentional establishment of a friendly rapport with his mark—that’s the CONfidence-building that gives the con artist his title.

con con artist money scam

PICKPOCKETS, CON ARTISTS, GANGSTERS, THIEVES, AND TRAVEL

Psychic Schools or Scam Schools?

Psychic Schools

See your money-making abilities skyrocket

What do Psychic Schools cost?

Unethical Blogger

Unethical blogger

Three-card monte expert Rod the Hop, R.I.P.

Advice from a three-card monte expert

In the words of Rod the Hop

The three-shell game – part 3

The Pea Game

The three-shell game – part 2

How the 3 shell game works.

The three-shell game

Pavement wagers.

Three-shell game

Avoid becoming victim of theft and scams on vacation

Barcelona Street Scams

Barcelona Street Scams

Money-changing scam

Buy our book of thieves!