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The Fake Socialite Who Scammed New York's Elite - The Vault - YouTube
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When Anna Delvey arrived on New York's party scene in 2016,
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she turned a lot of heads.
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She was name dropping New York's elite,
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staying at lavish hotels,
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getting $400 eyelash extensions,
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and eating things that weren't on the menu at some
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of New York's most expensive restaurants;
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places I couldn't get into if I offered to pay double and sit in the kitchen.
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She often tipped in $100 bills even for things people don't tip for.
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Point is, she had all this money
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but no one around her really knew where it was coming from.
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I heard her parents were Russian oil billionaires.
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Excuse me, I have to get a drink.
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No. I heard they're billionaires but in green solar energy.
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Bye. I said bye.
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Bro I heard her parents were diplomats and she got
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all her money from a trust fund bro. You spot me bro?
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Actually, none of those are true.
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Anna Delvey's parents are everyday people.
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Her dad drives a truck in Germany.
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She's just a really good liar; allegedly.
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And those lies defrauded banks, hotels,
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restaurants out of hundreds of thousands of dollars.
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Everyone I'm Patrick Jones and welcome to the Vault.
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[MUSIC] Today we're talking about Anna Delvey,
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who for years tricked the New York party scene into
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thinking she was anyone but who she actually was.
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Her story is wild and fascinating.
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Okay friends, buckle up because here we go.
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[BACKGROUND] Anna is all over the party scenes in New York City and the Hamptons.
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Art gallery openings, expensive dinners,
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luxury gyms, the Surf Lodge in Montauk;
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you name it, she was there.
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At this time Anna had a big goal.
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She wanted to buy real estate,
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specifically a building on Park Avenue South in New York City.
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It's really big and features a 19th century church on the property.
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For you non New Yorkers, this is prime.
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If this property was a monopoly,
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you'd want to own it.
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You'd want to build hotels on it and you'd
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want to throw your success in your grandma's face.
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Anna was telling anyone who would listen what her plans were for this space.
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She saw it as a dynamic visual arts center that would include art exhibits,
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pop up shops, restaurants,
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bars, a bakery, and a juice bar.
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But again, buying that space would be really expensive.
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To help her land this prize location,
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Anna talked to banks about loans,
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sought advice from financial counselors,
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and even hired a PR company.
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Seems like she was gaining momentum and then poof!
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[BACKGROUND] She leaves New York,
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telling some friends she needed to leave the United States briefly for Cologne,
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Germany as part of a visa issue.
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In February of 2017,
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Anna came back to New York and checked into 11 Howard.
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From there, she racked up a lot of bills.
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She would attend expensive personal training sessions
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[BACKGROUND] and eat at Le Coucou which is a restaurant owned by 11 Howard.
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Meaning she could charge these meals to her hotel bill.
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At the restaurant, Anna was a regular and charming enough that
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the head chef wouldn't mind making her elaborate things that weren't on the menu.
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I don't think they'd even allow that at Denny's.
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[MUSIC] Now we've hit the first patch of trouble for Anna.
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11 Howard realized they didn't have a working credit card on
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file and her bills were piling up.
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Don't forget her Le Coucou bills are on that tab as well.
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Such a rich privilege to be like,
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"yeah, just put that on my tab."
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While the rest of us are getting yelled at for trying to get free refills at Mickey D's.
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Still Anna was able to buy herself some time by wiring a portion of her tab to 11 Howard,
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but not enough time and not enough money.
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During this controversy, Anna left the city on a $35,000 private
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jet ride to Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway annual stockholders meeting
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in Omaha, Nebraska.
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Yes, I know.
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She's having money problems and also spending $35,000 on a private jet.
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We'll come back to that, I promise.
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[MUSIC] When she got back from Nebraska,
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Anna connected with Rachel Williams,
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a photo editor at Vanity Fair.
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In May of 2017, Anna, Rachel,
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and a few other people went to Morocco and stayed at an exclusive resort.
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We're talking the top of the top.
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Unable to afford the trip herself,
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Rachel wrote in her Vanity Fair article that Anna essentially said,
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No trouble, all on me.
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We're talking airfare, hotels, dinners.
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Rachel had a sugar momma taking her on the trip of a lifetime.
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Maybe you can see where this is going because this is the Vault,
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a show about crime and not a show about people having super fun times and trips.
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During the trip, the hotel started hounding Anna for a working credit card;
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which she didn't have.
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They were polite about it at first thinking it was a misunderstanding.
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But eventually the hotel came down on their group hard.
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People from the hotel were fired for this.
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There was a lot of pressure here.
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So the staff cornered Anna and Rachel in
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their room and demanded someone hand over a credit card.
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That person ended up being Rachel.
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Rachel describes Anna as annoyed that the hotel was holding her up and said to Rachel,
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Listen, it's just a little mix up.
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Can you cover this and I'll pay you back in a week.
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At the time, Rachel was making under 60 grand a year and was now
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in the hole for more than $62,000.
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If you want more details on the trip,
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there was a great article in Vanity Fair about it all.
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[MUSIC] When Anna arrived back in New York City in June of 2017,
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she couldn't go back to 11 Howard because they locked her out and took all of her stuff.
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So Anna checked into another luxury hotel, The Beekman.
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But got the boot from them too.
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There she had racked up a bill of $11,000.
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I still can't believe these places let her go without a working credit card on the spot.
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But that's the thing about Anna.
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She was so good at playing
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this rich character that these places just assumed she was good for the money.
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Meanwhile, Anna's situation was becoming more dire.
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Her biggest goal, the property on Park Avenue South,
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was sold to someone else.
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The thing is, if that venture was successful,
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she easily could have made enough money to pay everyone back.
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On top of that, the press caught up to her.
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The New York Post came out with an article asking who this woman was who
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keep staying at luxury hotels only to stiff them on the bill,
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and the press weren't the only ones.
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Turns out the New York D.A.
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was already on to Anna.
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Anna was arrested and charged with grand larceny,
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falsifying documents, theft of services, and other charges.
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She allegedly bilked somewhere around $275,000 from banks,
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restaurants, hotels, and friends like Rachel.
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Anna, whose real name is Anna Sorokin,
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was born in 1991 in Russia and now she could be facing as much as 15 years of jail time.
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Don't forget, a lot of what she was trying to do centered
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around buying property for her Visual Arts Center.
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In late 2016, she tried to secure that funding by going to National Bank and asking for
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a 22 million dollar loan and she allegedly went into those meetings with
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documents claiming that she owned 60 million British pounds in assets.
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In one of the most amazing examples of playing it cool,
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she was successful in that meeting.
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National Bank only wanted Anna to wire them $100,000 which would
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cover their legal fees and also their costs of due diligence in investigating.
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Coming up with that money wasn't particularly hard.
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She went to Fortress bank and allegedly said something like,
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I have a loan coming for 22 million.
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I just need $100,000 and when that loan comes in I'll be able to pay you back right away.
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Fortress was in and it took that money and
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gave it to National Bank so they could investigate her.
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There's also instances of her depositing
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fake checks to banks like City Bank and Signature Bank.
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Somehow she was able to pull funds out before the banks realized the checks were bad.
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That's why Anna always had cash on her.
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She never had credit cards.
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She didn't have credit and that's how she built a reputation.
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People saw her flashing cash all over town.
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But everything came crashing down.
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By February of 2017,
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she pulled out of her deal with National Bank.
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At that point they had gone through $55,000
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of the $100,000 she gave them to look into her.
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That 45 grand coming back to her bought her some time with 11 Howard,
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that's why she was able to wire part of her bill as she went to
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Nebraska but as we know. Not enough time.
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Without the national loan she really was doomed.
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But there's another twist, she owed Rachel,
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several hotels, the PR company she hired,
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restaurants where she threw parties.
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Remember that private jet?
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Yeah. She somehow got that trip on an IOU.
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With all the press covering Anna's story,
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she seemingly has turned into the celebrity she pretended to be.
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There is even a reported Netflix series in
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the works where Anna will be played by Jennifer Lawrence.
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That's as celebrity as it gets.
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If there was ever a movie about The Vault,
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I'd be played by Macaulay Culkin.
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[MUSIC] Anna set trial in early of 2019.
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It was a bit of a circus.
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[BACKGROUND] As Anna hired a fashion coordinator to dress her,
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and a very flashy lawyer who began
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his opening statement by talking about Frank Sinatra's New York New York.
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In fact, Anna delayed the trial several
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times because she didn't like what she was wearing.
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In the end, Anna was found guilty on eight charges.
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She was found not guilty on another charge of
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attempted grand larceny for attempting to obtain
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that 22 million dollar loan and also not guilty for
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allegedly stealing the $62,000 for the Morocco trip from Rachel.
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Anna Sorokin's been sentenced to four to 12 years in jail.
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She must pay $200,000 in restitution and a $24,000 fine.
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The thing is, she would have served less time had she accepted the plea deal.
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It offered her just one year behind bars.
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In an interview with The New York Times,
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Anna said she wasn't sorry and would probably do it again.
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However, she may not get the chance because once she's released from prison,
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US Customs and Immigration says,
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they'll look to deport her back to Germany.
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Let's hope they're paying attention over there.
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[MUSIC] Thank you everybody for watching The Vault.
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If you liked what you saw, please like, comment, subscribe.
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If you have stories that you'd like to see us animate and
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have fun with that are related to financial crime,
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we'd love to hear about it.
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Who doesn't like a good true financial crime story. Thank you very much for watching.
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