This man is worthy of the title of king of con men. During his life he has made a fortune by deception, which allowed him to buy and change mansions and women like a glove. He even cheated Mussolini himself. He was nicknamed the yellow kid because he often wore yellow ties and scarves. This man was born in 1875 and lived to be 100 years old.
One of his most popular scams was selling stray dogs. Imagine Joseph-an elegant man in an expensive suit with a hat-walks into a bar with a well-groomed dog. There are gold medals hanging from an expensive leash. Joseph orders a drink at the bar and proudly tells the bartender about the dog's pedigree, every award that hangs from that leash. Brags about the loud and epithetic shows and competitions he and his dog have felt he and his dog have been in. Then left the dog under the pretext that he needs to leave not long to the bank. Unfortunately, four-legged dogs are not allowed there. He left some money for the bartender to look after his friend and went to the bank.
While the dog owner was solving his financial problems, another respectable and expensively dressed man came into the establishment. He also ordered a drink and talked to the bartender. Seeing the dog, the man excitedly and emotionally rejoiced that he had been looking for such a dog for a long time. He had been looking for something like this for 6 years and finally he got lucky. He began to persuade the bartender to sell him this dog. Sell it to me for 50$/100$/300$. Naturally, the bartender realized that the owner would be back soon and he couldn't sell it. Which is what he tried to convey to the man. In the end, the man would leave $50, along with a business card and say. Dear, if you persuade the owner, the remaining $250 will be yours.
After the man leaves, of course, the owner comes back. And he starts whining and complaining to the bartender. "I'm broke! I'm a pauper. How am I supposed to live? He feels sorry for Gray! God, poor Gray, he's gonna have to share his master's fate. Naturally, the barman offered to buy the owner a dog from him. My wife had wanted one for a long time and Gray would be fine with them. He'll be in good hands and everything like that. In the end, they agreed on 200-250 dollars and the old owner of the dog went to kill himself with grief.
And by the law of the genre. Naturally, the number on the business card was wrong. The bartender couldn't get through to the dog lover and all that. So working with an entire dog shelter, Joseph managed to sell 7-11 dogs a day.
Fred Buckminster is Joseph's right-hand man. He was Joseph's partner in the dog scam. The story of their partnership has not gone unnoticed. After all, just for a second, imagine Fred is the ex-cop who arrested Joseph for fraud. But Joseph managed to buy Fred for $8,000. When Fred took him to the station, Joseph gave him $8,000 and said it was his earnings for the morning. And he said Freddie, you can get the same amount every morning if you agree to work with me. We already know the result.
The couple went on to pull off a number of other big scams. A little later, they managed to pull off a scam that set the whole of America on its ear and inspired Hollywood to make a movie. The couple created a one-day bank for a single purpose. They hired fake fraud actors as the bank's staff. There were fake accountants, bank employees, security guards and even regular bank customers were fake actors.
The essence of the scam was as follows: They rented space on the site of the relocated Muncie National Bank. All for the sake of one big client from Canada, who came on Frank's recommendation. The client was a millionaire from Canada who didn't read the newspapers and didn't know that the bank had moved. The millionaire visited the bank in question to buy oil plots at a bargain price and on a recommendation from Frank. When the luxury car arrived at the entrance to the building, the Canadian did not suspect anything and under the imposed scenario purchased fictitious documents for oil plots for 400,000 dollars. You bet he did, because Wale and Frank offered him a discount of 80% if he paid cash. The scheme also allowed the Canadian to avoid taxes.
To pull off the scam, Wale and Frank spent $50,000, and were up $350,000. And that wasn't the biggest payday of all. It was Wale's regular monthly income.
Wale became famous for being able to fool the most famous dictator of the 20th century. Benito Mussolini. Wale visited Italy disguised as a mining engineer. Then got a meeting with Mussolini and posing as an expert was able to sell the dictator the idea of developing the Colorado Mines. The mines promised tens of millions in profits to Mussolini. Wale was able to sell Mussolini fictitious ownership rights to the mines and thus earned $2 million.
The Yellow Kid's life was beautiful and full of color, but he met old age horribly. He was famous all over the world and arrests were made wherever he was seen. He died alone. No one ever trusted him. At the age of 101, he was buried in the most squalid and pauper grave.
