Born in 1785, French Anthelme Collet visited, in 1812, the Spanish
region of Valencia with the fake title, name, and position of Count Carlos
Alexandre de Borromeu, general inspector of Napoleon Bonaparte’s army in
Iberian Peninsula. Displaying several medals on his chest, he presented a false
document forged by himself. He said he was required to reorganize the army in
Cataluña. Majestic, with airs and graces, the swindler was delighted to see the
troops parading in homage to him. Before leaving Valencia, he got hold of
twenty-thousand francs, requested from the regiment’s safe.
In Avignon, the “city of popes”, the fraudster managed to put his hands
on one hundred and fifteen thousand francs, recurring to the same process.
Anthelme Collet, always boasting the title of count, fake names and
positions, could enjoy the luxury of having honor guards and listened to the
epic sounds of military bands, and people’s praises.
In Montpellier, the city of the notorious university and the splendid
gothic cathedral, he presided a feast in his homage, in which the applauses
echoed as thunders. All of a sudden, a police force entered the place and
arrested him. General astonishment. Taken to the city hall, the trickster
stayed in the kitchen, instead of being arrested at a cell, and did not think
twice before escaping as a cook.
In his Memories, written in
prison, this deceiver tells he had been a soldier, marquis, Army officer,
typographer, monsignor, Napolitano priest, and even a police officer from
Dordogne, Southeastern France department.
Convicted to serve twenty years of compulsory labor, Anthelme Collet
died in 1840, during Louis Philippe time, the “bourgeois king”.
* * *
Dear reader, now I will introduce you to charlatan Don Jaime Addison de
Peralta-Reavis, who in the year of 1888, called himself Baron of Arizonaca and
Caballero de Los Colorados. In fact, his name was Jim Reavis. He showed up in
Phoenix, capital city of the American state of Arizona. He claimed to be the
legitimate owner of a land measuring ten thousand acres, where farms, copper,
gold, and silver mines, and Southern Pacific railways were located.
This rogue, former coachman in Missouri, eager to piss in gold chamber
pot, produced fake documents that revealed simply this: a vast extension of
land had been donated to his ancestors in 1748, by King Ferdinand VI of Spain.
The rascal was aware that according to the Gadsden Agreement and the treatise
of Guadalupe Hidalgo, the United States’ government was obliged to acknowledge
the property right and bonds of the acquired territories.
Master at the art of documents falsification, the former coachman earned
millions of dollars due to agreements to properties re-purchase. However,
thanks to the efforts of the journalist Tom Weedin, from the journal Gazzette in Florence, Arizona State, the
fraud was discovered. Jim Reavis, convicted, entered Santa Fe Penitentiary in
New Mexico State.
* * *
Admire, after Jim, the Scotsman Arthur Ferguson’s natural guile, gifted
with an ingenious ability to convince the incautious. He was, in a certain
sunny morning in the 1920’s, at Londoner Trafalgar Square, at a short distance
from Lord Nelson’s statue, placed over a
50 meter-high column. Then he saw a wealthy American from Idaho contemplating
the statue. Arthur pretended to the square guide and lamented near the American
man:
“What a shame! This monument will have to be sold, along with the four
lions made by sculptor Edwin Landseer, due to England’s debts!”
He informed that the government had assigned him the uncomfortable
mission of negotiating the sale of the most famous character of British navy’s
statue.
“For how much?” –inquired the millionaire.
“Only six thousand pounds.” –the trickster answered with a sad
expression.
In an open way, the American asked him for priority. Ferguson said he
would telephone his boss, in the sales department. He walked away, and when he
was back, he assured:
“The government agreed.”
Before taking the simple man’s check, he handed him the name and address
of the company in charge of disassembling and sending the statue to the United
States.
Short time later, the victim found out, through Scotland Yard, that he
had been fooled…
Arthur Ferguson made other victims in London: an American man paid him a
thousand pounds for the Big Ben, the big bell from Westminster Palace, and a
third one paid him two thousand pounds for the main building of British
Monarchy, the Buckingham Palace.
Afraid of being caught by Scotland Yard, Ferguson boarded to the United
States in a hurry. In Washington, he rented to a cattle raiser for the period
of 99 years, for one hundred thousand dollars, the White House. And at meeting
an Australian man from Sidney, he offered to sell the Statue of Liberty, because
the New York Port, he explained, had to be broadened and the monument removed.
The guy accepts the deal. As the money coming from Australia took long to
arrive, Ferguson got impatient, causing suspicion to the son of the kangaroos’
country.
Arrested in 1930, the cheater served only five years in prison. He died
in 1938.
*
* *
Rival to this Scotsman in the art of cheating, the false worker of
French Ministry responsible for the preservation of public buildings, “count”
Victor Lustig, born in Bohemia in 1890 and dead in 1947, he stimulated five
scrap metal traders to “buy” the Eiffel Tower, 320 meters high. The swindler’s
argument: it needed to be put down, because its preservation would be too
expensive. The buyer’s advantage: the tower was made of ten thousand tons of
excellent iron.
André Poísson, a rich entrepreneur, “buys” the tower. The “count” grabs
the check with the bulky amount and his suitcase filled with francs. Quickly,
Victor Lustig cashes the check and runs away to Vienna, along with his
accomplice, the thief Dan Collins. They were never caught…
* * *
How about us, Brazilians? Have we got a swindler superior to all of
these? Yes, really superior is Paulo Coelho, because none of the others could
make it rain, the wind blow, and become invisible as Paulito Coelhito declared
to be capable of, on an interview to Playboy
magazine (issue 27, October 1992). Thousands of fools believe in this fib, and
delight in it. A liar can always find, no matter where he goes, complete retards
to admire him.
Another superiority of our trickster: he has never been arrested, as it
happened o Anthelme Collet, Dom Jaime Addison de Peralta-Reavis, and Arthur
Ferguson… Wow! How lucky Paulito is!
