The Cancer Healing Scam: Part 2
63 min
•Dec 22, 20255 months agoSummary
Part 2 of a true crime investigation into a spiritual healer named Grant who manipulated a cancer patient into refusing medical treatment, leading to her death within six months. The episode details the family's discovery of Grant's deception, including a secret marriage to another woman living nearby, and their ongoing legal battle to prevent him from inheriting the victim's estate.
Insights
- Medical manipulation and financial exploitation often occur together in predatory relationships, with abusers targeting vulnerable people during health crises
- Spiritual wellness and alternative health communities can be exploited by bad actors who use credibility markers (scrubs, titles, social media) without actual credentials
- Family members face an impossible dilemma: pushing too hard against a manipulator risks alienating the victim, but staying silent enables abuse to continue
- Legal systems may prioritize spousal rights over wills in probate cases, allowing abusers to inherit from victims even after death
- Social media presence and follower counts are easily manipulated and should not be used as indicators of expertise or trustworthiness in medical/wellness advice
Trends
Rise of unqualified wellness influencers claiming medical expertise without licensure or credentialsExploitation of alternative health trends (natural healing, spiritual wellness) as cover for financial and medical abuseInternational marriage fraud schemes targeting financially stable older womenPredatory use of social media platforms (TikTok, Instagram, Facebook) to build false authority and monetize health misinformationElder abuse through medical manipulation and medication interference in intimate relationshipsGaps in legal protections for adult children when parents are being manipulated by romantic partnersDifficulty prosecuting international fraud and marriage crimes due to jurisdictional and documentation barriers
Topics
Medical manipulation and abuse in intimate relationshipsElder abuse and financial exploitationUnqualified wellness influencers and health misinformationInternational marriage fraudProbate law and spousal inheritance rightsSocial media credibility and follower manipulationCancer treatment and medical decision-making under duressSpiritual wellness community exploitationPredatory relationship patterns and love bombingFamily intervention in abusive relationshipsEvidence gathering and investigation techniquesGrief and trauma while pursuing justiceAlternative medicine vs. conventional medical careNarcissistic personality traits in abusersLegal remedies for marriage fraud
People
Lena
Guest sharing her family's experience with a manipulative spiritual healer who contributed to her mother's death
Tessa
Guest sharing her family's experience with a manipulative spiritual healer who contributed to her mother's death
Grant
Subject of investigation; claimed to be a supernatural healer, gave unauthorized medical advice, and manipulated vict...
Bruno Groening
Nazi-era healer whose photograph Grant had taped above his victim's bed; died of colon cancer despite claiming healin...
Mackenzie
Co-host of The Dating Detectives podcast who conducted investigation into Grant's background and credentials
Quotes
"He's someone who maybe gives it a little bit of a bad name, I think. Hey, we say trust but verify, like verify, verify, verify, this guy was not verified, and it's really sad what it led to."
Host•Early in episode
"I definitely blame Grant for her passing because like I said, this could have been prevented. At least we would have known if they would have tried the chemo when when they found out who knows where we'd be today."
Lena or Tessa•Mid-episode
"She was the love of my life."
Grant (at victim's funeral)•Late episode
"I'm doing a lot better thanks to these doctors and God and, you know, basically telling him, no thanks to you."
Victim (in text message to Grant)•Mid-episode
"Consider the source. Exactly. I think, I mean, I'm so sorry. I think it's all a scam. I don't know if he believes what he's saying or if he's just aware of the scam."
Host and guest•Late episode
Full Transcript
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With EverPure, you're not just in the race, you're built to win it. The following program contains names, places, and events that have been anonymized or fictionalized for the purposes of protection and safety. The following program is provided for entertainment purposes only, and any commentary from the hosts are strictly conjecture and should not be held as making any definitive statements about the truth or identity of any particular individuals or circumstances. If you or a loved one are involved in an abusive relationship, please call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233 for support. Happy dating detectives Monday, but I gotta tell you, I'm not so happy about this episode. This is a sad one. Most of them can be sad in some way or another, but this one is, it's sad, but it's so important. I'm so grateful that they are sharing this with us. Yeah, and we've only heard the first half so far, so now we're gonna get into the second half. Thank you for patiently waiting for part two. I mean, listen to part one, if you have not, the quickest recap ever. We have sisters Lena and Tessa, their mom who was, you know, had a career, had a life, was totally independent and great, started dating a guy named Grant through the Reiki world and like the spiritual wellness world. He claimed to be an up-and-coming supernatural healer and started giving some medical advice he definitely should not have been giving. I feel like people like him are why people have a hard time believing in other stuff, you know, like believe in what you want, but he's someone who maybe gives it a little bit of a bad name, I think. Hey, we say trust but verify, like verify, verify, verify, this guy was not verified, and it's really sad what it led to. So there's, we've talked about cancer and definitely a lot of hospital and medical stuff and medical manipulation and abuse and- Just terrible, terrible stuff this guy did and I just, we're devastated for them, but I'm so grateful for their bravery and their courage in sharing this. So without further ado, shall we do part two of this episode? Let's do it. So at one point we actually were like, I wonder what his motive is. The Poe family was just sharing their thoughts like, do we even know if he's still married in another country? You know, and so that's when we decided to do our own little investigation into this guy. We kind of all, the Poe family was just sharing their thoughts like, do we even know if he's still married in another country? You know, he has, you know, the whole reason why she can't be on his social media is because he didn't want the ex-wife to see her on his social media and then she would cut communication off with his kids. So the theory came up of maybe he's still married over there and we don't know and what's his motive here? You know, has he done this to other women? Who knows? Oh sure. Well, I'm curious, Mackenzie, if you were a PI, like theoretically, you are a PI, finding out if someone's married in another country from the US, how would you go about doing that? It's hard because it's a whole nother government. So it's a whole nother set of laws. It's a whole nother set of red tape. Like it's a whole nother everything. It's so hard. It's not impossible. It's just hard. Well, some of our family members knew someone who knew someone in that country. And they're like, we need his alien ID number in order to look that up. So we're like, okay, how can we ask mom for this information without alerting her that we're doing a whole fledged investigation? So I kind of brought it up and I'm just like, so, you know, how a while back we were talking about why he doesn't put you on a social media and I'm like, what if he's still married in another country? So I'm like, I can actually ask my friend who might still have a connection over there and mind you, I had already asked her. So I'm just like, you know, and she's like, ooh, that's actually a good idea. And I'm like, oh, okay, she's open to the idea because our mom was like a little investigator. She loved the good exactly. That's what I was just I love her. Gotta say I love her. She is literally like, she'll find out anything about anybody. That's why this whole thing is crazy because for her to get duped by this guy is weird. Yeah. So I'm like, okay, I talked to my friend and she needs a alien ID number. I'm like, how do we get that? And she's like, all right, so my keys, she's like half spare key in this locker in my building. Go in the house between this time. He's usually not well, he's not there. Oh, yeah. And I'm like, oh my God, I'm so nervous. I'm like, okay, okay, okay. So I find the locker, I unlock the stain, I find the key. I'm literally sweating because I'm so nervous. And I'm creeping into their house and like, just like kind of like, I love Lena's just in the background laughing. I've been obsessed with both of you. It's like the smallest little noise. I'm like, oh my God, what was that like, you know, so it was tense and I'm snooping through all their stuff. But the thing that scared the crap out of me is I walked into her room where they sleep. And the first thing I see was this weird photo. It was black and white of this scary looking man that was taped above her side of the headboard, like where she sleeps. It was taped on the headboard on her side of the bed. Wow. And, and I'm like, ew, so evil. He scared me. I'm like, this, he looks like one of those, I don't know what movie I can think of, but a devil almost like a human form of a devil, like an elongated chin. Yeah, like, I don't like it. He looked really, it was scary. And it was printed out and taped up there. Yes. Yes. Yes. And I'm like, I like, actual photos of this, you can literally send it to you, just for visual. Yeah, I will send them. And so I'm like, ew, what I got freaked out. So I'm just like looking through drawers, like after seeing that, I'm like, I want to get the hell out of here. I don't know what it's all about. Yeah, there's gonna be like a booby trap. My thought was, what if he's doing a curse on her, whatever, like, I don't like that creep me out. So I'm like, ew. So I took a picture of it. Yeah, she took a picture of it and sent it to me. I'm like, what the hell? What is that? We do reverse image and it is actually some, is it some German guy or right? He was a Nazi. He was a Nazi. A Nazi? Yes. Yeah. Oh my God. That was into natural healing or something. And ironically, he died from colon cancer or something. Right. Yeah, he was a healer. So I asked my mom and Mike, were you aware of this photo that's taped over your side of the bed? Who is that? And she goes, no, that wasn't there when I left, but that's who he idolizes. Like he's some healer. Like a healer. She told me. No, she told me, oh, he tells me stories about him all the time. And I'm like, but mom, you know, he was a Nazi. And she's like, Oh, I didn't even know. Like, she doesn't, she didn't even look into it. I mean, wait, was it Bruno, Bruno Groening? Yes, I just google it. See how easy it was to google that. I looked up Nazi natural healer and I saw like a few big names and I was like, they don't look like devils. No, guys, look up Bruno Groening. This guy looks, I get why you're freaked out. Yeah, he's creepy looking. Finding the perfect doctor through ZockDock is kind of like going on an amazing first date. 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And then I see he has a box of antibiotics that he got from the country that his son lives in, because it's in another language. But typically you'd need a prescription for that antibiotic here, but over there you don't. So he's just bringing it on over to America. And I'm just like, is he also giving me his little quote unquote patients that he sees? I wonder if he's like, I'm healing you with this concoction that I made myself, but it's really just an antibiotic. He's throwing something else. Wow. Yeah. I found that, but I didn't find what I was looking for. So without it, we weren't able to pull up anything. So our cousin started looking into trying to see what she could find out on the internet. She went down like a rabbit hole and she ended up finding his baptism certificate. I don't even know how she did that. Yeah, I don't either. But she found it. It has his name, it has his date of birth, like, you know, important stuff. But she ends up digging around on the internet. She first started on Facebook and was able to see what his kids looked like and then was able to match it with another profile that she found. And those same kids were in it. And she does end up finding his ex who he claimed still lived in that other country. But she's actually living a few hours away from us. No, she's not. Yep. Yep. Tell me everything. Walk me through the whole Facebook page. Three hours away in Orlando. Stop. Well, okay, so what's on the social media that we find of hers? What's her deal? We see her pictures and stuff with his kids that he was supposedly sending money to, you know, the other country and we're just like, what the hell is going on? I was actually in shock that she was here in the state just a few hours away. You know, I always kind of suspected that they were still either together or married. But I really did think that she was in a different country. And what is he doing on his whole days that he's gone for a whole literally 12 hours? Like he could easily drive up there and drive back. Yeah. And one day that was my theory. I don't know. But oh, yeah, I mean, it's not but not possible. Yeah. But are they still together because he was living with your mom? Right. And does she even know was she in on it? Those were all these things that were like going through my head. Yeah. Has he done this to other people? We don't know. And our cousins, they're close to our whole families are very close. And she brings it up to my mom like, Hey, I kind of found this because we didn't really want to bring it up to her because she might have been like, No, but if our cousin maybe brought it up to her, she'd be more receptive to it. So she did. And so according to my mom, this woman would hold their kids over him. Like if you don't send money for support, then I'm just going to cut off all communication. And you won't see us again. And that was the main reason why their relationship had to be a secret. That's why he couldn't post her or show her on social media. And the whole time, my mom's sending money for the kids. So when my cousin broke the news and, you know, showed her and sent her all the screenshots, like, look, she's right here in her backyard. Basically, I think my mom was also really shocked. She didn't really say how she felt. But you can just tell that it definitely infected her. And I think she was maybe a little ashamed of how things turned out. Because, you know, she spoke so highly of him. Like, how do you go back on all the praise that you gave him? You can't really. And she ends up talking her into, hey, listen, he's bad news. We've found out a lot of stuff. And the fact that he was the main person convincing you not to go through a treatment and stuff like that, he might be trying to maybe get you sicker for personal gain. And the whole time I was even saying, I'm like, do all of your followers know that your wife is in the hospital dying from cancer? No, that wouldn't be good for his business. Right. And not great. And at one point while she was there, we found out that he was holding a seminar, one of those days charging $100 for an entry to his seminar. He was holding a whole seminar. So he did. And he really thinks he's somebody. But she was just like, all right, yeah, I see it. And by that time, we had already blocked him. He wasn't coming over. And he wasn't reaching out to her anymore, either. So that kind of hurt her. You could see it. Like, it's just because she knows it's not right. It wasn't right for them to be together. It still was like, you know, he's not even reaching out. And she was in love with him. Yeah. So she thought, I feel like. Is she starting to think about divorcing him? So yeah, our cousin actually convinced her. After hearing just a little bit, she was like, yeah, I'm all in. Let's start the process. And the lawyer was hired. She kind of came to terms and was more pissed off. And she's like, all right, yeah, like, finally he texted her. It's like, oh, how are you feeling? And she responded. And I remember she seemed really proud of this message. She's like, I'm doing a lot better thanks to these doctors and God and, you know, basically telling him, no thanks to you. I'm doing so much better because of everyone else. I love that. Yeah, she was like so proud of that text. And I'm like, yeah, you tell him. So he said something to the effect of like, oh, someone must have your phone because you would never say something like that. He could not believe it. But I mean, I feel like that's how you were feeling the whole time he was with her. You're like, exactly. Did someone take her phone? Yeah, yeah. Who are you? Right. Man. But yeah, she was doing a lot better. She definitely had a different attitude towards the whole treatment plan. And she was more open to what the doctors had to say and trusted them a little more. She was able to get a second round of chemo. And she was starting to do better. Her doctor was telling us it shrunk. Everything is looking better. We were like, oh my God, you're almost out of the woods. You know, everything is going to be good. Everything's going to be fine. And they were like, all right, we could start talking about discharge. And it was at that point where she's like, I'm not going home back to that. She refused to go back to her own home. Yeah, which yeah, because she was suffering so much there because of him. Yeah. Yeah. So her best friend and her mom, they were in the home health aid business. And she's like, listen, you guys work, you have the kids, you guys have stuff going on. She can come back to our house. We have those hospital beds already. They lived on a ranch. We're like, oh my God, that sounds so peaceful and so much more relaxing than maybe even being at one of our houses. And they have the experience to do the home health nursing. We felt comfortable with that. And she went back with her friend and maybe two weeks go by. And we were like, you know, it worked, it's working. But there was just so much damage done to her liver that things were just starting to slow down and shut down. And it literally was like maybe from one week to the next that it was such a big decline. She started having these symptoms of not being able to breathe and her lungs were filling up with fluid again. So they took her straight to the ER again. So she's back in the ER for the third time. But at that point, she was just not doing well at all. They couldn't give her another chemo round because she just wasn't in a condition to she had had a lot of fluid buildup. There was just so many things going on. Again, we had him blocked from that hospital. He wasn't, he didn't even know where she was actually. Good. One day, yeah, from the time that she was even with her friend, he had no idea. We didn't tell him anything. No one told him where she was. And at that time, one of the nurses comes up to me and she's like, since you guys have power of attorney for her health, please sign this DNR. Please don't make me have to do CPR on your mom because if I do, she's so fragile. The CPR is going to kill her. Please do that for me and for her. Are you guys just standing there in shock that this has happened so fast? Yeah, extreme shock because it's it's only been what like a six month, not even like five month period. We're in November at this point from August when she got taken to the hospital the first time where she had a call for the ambulance. We're in November now and they're like at this point, all of her organs have shut down. Oh, she's not able to swallow anything and those are signs of end of life. So she's not going to be healthy enough for another round. And you know, this is it, unfortunately. So the doctor is going to come in in a few to talk to you guys about hospice options. So yeah, it was really tough to like even hear that decide what to do. Yeah, like our mom was literally alive and well just months before she had just went to my daughter's graduation. And she was completely, you know, she was starting to feel sick and so so it's just like what happened so fast. I'm so sorry. This is nightmare. Nobody wants any part of this and then add to it. I mean, to use the nurses words the drama of this guy. Yep. Like I don't know how you process that. It was it was a lot at once. I can say that that myself and the entire family was frustrated, really angry that this man took it upon himself to play doctor and make it seem like he had things under control when all of this could have been prevented simply by just listening to the doctors and we're like, so she has to do something to protect her stuff because she just agreed to a divorce and we reached out to the lawyer. He was nice enough to come to the hospital room and do her last will and testament and, you know, she was able to sign that and it literally says in theirs, I'm specifically leaving out my husband's because at this moment we're currently separated. So there's no question at all like, oh yeah, for sure. I'm so glad that you got that to happen for her. That's like she has said that weeks earlier, but like she's so rapidly right. Yep. So she she was able to do that and the lawyer is like, I don't know what you want me to do. I can still file this divorce, but it's going to be more symbolic than it is helpful because you know, it's not going to finalize right because she's not she was not doing well at all. Yeah, so he's like, so we can either do this or you can keep me around for probate after because obviously you're going to need it. So we're like, yeah, I guess so. But we did end up putting her in hospice and she passed away shortly after, you know. Oh my. It just felt so unreal. It didn't feel real. You just feel numb. Everything happened so fast. So you don't have time to process what just happened. How did we get here so fast? Like if you would have asked me a year before that, I would have never in my wildest dreams thought that we'd be where we were at having to make funeral arrangements. I'm like, I'm still a kid. My mom was the one who usually arranged funerals in the family and and now we're sitting here arranging hers and like so soon. Just yeah, very surreal. I'm so sorry. I mean, this wasn't supposed to happen. Right. We didn't think it would happen. Never. So quick. I never thought this was how this would happen ever. Right. It was just like man just came into our lives and like tornado. Literally. It's gross. I definitely blame Grant for her passing because like I said, this could have been prevented. At least we would have known if they would have tried the chemo when when they found out who knows where we'd be today. He knew what he was doing. I know I know for a fact. I think he saw like she got sick and he was like, aha, perfect. Yeah. Maybe he didn't see that he she was going to get sick. Nothing like that. But he definitely knew what he was doing because she had retirement. Yeah, she had a job like you know, she she was completely settled. She didn't need him at all. Yeah, she didn't need him at all. He knew her. She was completely with her life and he just came around and now he's taking whatever he wants. Basically, well, let's I want to give you the space to talk about losing your mom and like dealing with that. And then how do you go through grieving when you're also trying to uncover the truth of this guy? That's a good question. That's a good we yeah. That's the thing is that that is the problem. We're like in limbo right now. Apparently where we live, they hold a marriage higher than a will. And just because that wording is in there, doesn't protect everything 100%. So we were told by her attorney that in Florida, if there is no prenup prior to the marriage, the spouse is entitled to everything unless there were children, then the children are entitled to a percentage of that as well. So it gets split up. In this case, she had two children and a husband. So it got split up three ways. So he was entitled to elect his 30%. So he's still living in her condo and he won't leave. So we can't even properly grieve because in America, I feel like it's normal for children, adult children, to go to their parents' homes after they pass away, go through their belongings and kind of like use that moment as like you go like you talk about memories like you know, fine stuff. Remember this. And we have not been able to do that because since she passed away, yeah, when we reached out to him, we're like, hey, when do you think it's a good time? Like we just kind of asked him like when's a good time? We weren't asking if we could come. We're asking when we could go over, go through her stuff. He's just like, oh, I'm not home. Every time we ask, he's like, I'm not going to be home. I'm not there. No. And then eventually it got to a point where you guys don't need to come here. And we're like, what? It was her house. Yes. Her house. She's owned that place way before he was even around. And we're like, we want to go through our mom's stuff. That's not a question. We need to do that. And he's just like, that's okay. I'm boxing everything up. Just give me an address so I can drop it off. First of all, don't give him an address. It's like, I don't want him to know anything about your lives. We didn't. But it's just so disrespectful. You're just going to box up my mom's stuff. How do you know what we like? That's not okay. Yeah. It's not your stuff. Number one, that whole place she furnished, I mean, it's all her things in there, probably all kinds of memories. It's just sick. And you're not even coming at him fighting for the house back. No. You're just wanting her stuff, which I don't like that he kept the house. Just the fact. I know. I asked him, I go, what are you hiding that you don't want us to go over there? And that was my biggest thing. And it took a few months for us to even reach out to him, just because it's really hard to even speak to this man knowing what he did. But at the same time, he has the upper hand. We have to kind of play nice, keep things civil. And it just even reaching out, it took a lot out of us just to do that because you don't want to be fake with this person. But you also know that he can do whatever he wants. He has the upper hand in the situation and he's very, you know, he's spiteful. Mackenzie, if you had to pick a favorite snack, what would it be? That's a hand. That's not fair. But I think sweets, anything sweet. I don't know. This is hard. 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So I was like, hey, I was wondering if we could just me and see how we're doing all this because we're obviously grieving. It took us months to even contact him in this way because this is a lot. And he's like, oh, okay, yeah, I'll meet you guys. And we get there and he's got his little smirk on his face as usual. And we start going through a couple things with the attorney and we made sure to have a translator there because he doesn't speak English. So the translator's there, the attorney starts speaking and then the translator starts going or whatever. And he stops the translator and is like, no, no, I understand him. And so speaking English. What? Yeah. So we're like, oh, wow. This whole time we looked at each other and we're like, what the fuck is happening? We're like, wait, so you know English? Like, oh, he was fluently like fine, like going on. He didn't pick it up on Duolingo in the last few years. Like here and there. But completely understood everything the attorney was talking about and speaking in English to us. And your mom didn't know that because it sounds like she was weird. She told you she said she very weird. She kind of was just like, oh, yeah, he can kind of speak it. Yeah, like a little bit. No, no, this man had a whole conversation with us and the attorney and demanded money. And he had no idea that she had a will until my sister brought it to his attention. And he was even like, she didn't have a will and my sister's like, but she did. And she specifically said that she wanted her kids to have everything. So when he found that out, at first he was trying to play it like, I'm not trying to go after anything. I just want to stay in this condo that I've been living in for the last four years. You know, it's my home. Me and my sister were just going to offer him some money to help him move out and maybe find a place enough to get him started. But we didn't feel like he was entitled to anything. And if he wasn't going to fight us on it, we were perfectly fine with that. But we were going to offer him enough to at least get himself set up somewhere else because she did not want him to have that condo. She made it very clear that she's like, he does not deserve that at all. So it was just so crazy because when we're in this meeting, he's just like, yeah, your mom specifically said that if anything would happen that, you know, she wants me to stay with the condo. He even said, I tried telling her, no, you know, everything should be left to your children. And she insisted that I stay with the condo. It just, it just sounded so ridiculous because it's not anything my mom would ever say. She was worried about that even from before they got married. She even asked an attorney like, Hey, are my property safe in the event I pass away or we get divorced? And whoever she spoke with said, yeah, that doesn't count because it was before the marriage. And then it wasn't until after that she finds out that that's not true, that he is entitled to a percentage of it. And then all of a sudden at the end, he's like, well, you know what, if they give me 50k, we can settle this. I'm sorry, what? Okay, just pulled it out of. Yeah, like, okay. But okay. And we're like, all right, cool. In my head, I'm like, all right, well, if we sell the condo, then you can get 50k, right? And he's like, no, no, why would I wait for that? Just you can get it from the family. Yeah, we're like, what are you talking about? Isn't that like not on the table too? It's like, it's her money that you guys are talking about. You can't just be like, but let me go to the other people in the family and like, I'm just confused. He's such a dingback. If she signed a thing, they said, no, no. Well, it doesn't matter. It's they didn't have a green up. Marriage over will, you said. Yep. Marriage over will priority. So we were like, we're gonna just hold off on that. And we're gonna talk about it. Because I don't feel comfortable just agreeing to it. So we were like, no. And it's been a couple of months after that. What was it? Like a month or maybe like a month. All of a sudden he has a lawyer because at that time he didn't have a lawyer. What's going on on his social media through all of this? Oh, funny. You should ask. Yeah. So his Instagram non existent, like he hasn't posted anything. Facebook nothing. We just his attorneys told him to probably, but guess what? Now his TikTok is blown up. Oh, geez. So now he does only TikTok stuff that we found out. Wow. Okay. So we're still doing it. Tess was talking about, you know, oh, he has all these followers now all of a sudden. Oh, no. And he stopped responding to my message. That's like up until a time he was responding to me passive aggressively, but then after that, nothing, nothing, nothing. There's no update. We reached out just to see if he was respond. She wrote him like, hey, so we're going to do a ceremony to spread our mom's ashes. Would you like to be there just to see if any response out of him? What does he want to be there? Like, is he really there for our mom? Because he hasn't brought up any kind of, oh, well, I want some of her ashes or anything like that. Nope. He didn't even respond. He doesn't. You know, he doesn't care about that part. On her birthday this year that it just passed last month, we did a little cake for her and I sent him a little video. I go, hey, we celebrated our mom's birthday today, just in case you forgot. And he just left me on red. He didn't even say anything. Oh God. At all. But it's just so disgusting. Hard to believe that someone's brain. Oh, he's so like his TikToks now are like, does this little inspirational videos every morning and he'll be like sitting at the pool at our mom's condo. Oh God. So you know he's there. Yeah. Like he's discussing. So our lawyer advised us to just give him what he's asking for because he could take a lot more. He's entitled to a lot more. But we were just like, no. Like we don't really care. It's about the money, the stuff. He should not be able to get anything at this point. He came here with barely anything. And now he's just like some superstar benefiting off of the death of my mom. So now we're trying to look more into this marriage with the woman my cousin found. But even though she lives in Florida, they got married abroad. So it's been really difficult to find the records. But we really don't want to give up on finding out whether he's still married or not. Because technically if he is still married and never got a divorce, that would mean that their marriage is, you know, it should be voided in the United States. And therefore he can't get anything. And then it's also considered marriage fraud. So I feel like we feel like that would be justice for us, justice for our mom, for the family that had to go through all this, losing her so young. So we're still looking around and trying to see how we can prove that or what information we can get on that situation. But again, it's international. So it's really hard. Well, what do you, what do you like people? There's a lot of people like him, as I'm sure you know. Right. That TV show on Netflix, Apple cider vinegar. Did you hear about that? It's not this exactly, but it's just about an, it's based on a real story about an influencer who lied about having cancer and claimed to have cured her own cancer with nutrition. And liked the fame. And I mean, how many people did she hurt in that, just in the, spreading that message? Like what does this every single day? And he, and he like will go to a clinic quote unquote, where he works. And that's where he does a lot of his videos, sitting in a chair looking like a doctor. In the scrubs, in the scrubs. It's, it's sick. How do we get people to not follow them? Because it's not like we can take a license away. There's no license. He's got no license. I know. He's got free speech. But he can wear scrubs. I'm so sorry about the consequence of his. Right. I hate that he's just getting away with all this stuff. Like that's crazy. We just kind of want to know, has this happened before? Is he doing this to somebody else right now currently? Does this sound familiar to you? Any of our listeners? I think it could be his following people that don't know him personally taking his advice, as well as people in his life. It's a lot for us. It sounds like he's a sweet talker maybe, and he knows how to, you know, how to pray on those unmet needs and get people to listen to him and. And all this natural healing. Like if you're not a very popular. It is, it's trendy. Yes, it's very trendy. Mm hmm. People want to be healthier and prevent certain things. And they're going to listen to all this stuff. Not saying that it's like all BS, but you know, right? There's a certain point. Like consider the source. Consider the source. Exactly. I think, I mean, I'm so sorry. I think it's all a scam. I don't know if he believes what he's saying or if he's just aware of the scam. Yeah, I mean, I think he actually believes it, but also has a hint of like, you know, evil. Oh, for sure. Well, if he's got pictures of Nazi doctors above his bed. Yeah, there's no redeeming that. That's insane. What I mean, as a family, how are you guys doing? This is not something that I can even imagine. Well, we're still going through it. Nothing has been finalized. Like we're still going through like probate. We still have not even been able to go to my mom's house. Yeah. We don't have any of her things, nothing. That is so hurtful. It's really hard to grieve while still having to deal with this man because I feel like from what I've seen people who lose their parents, how they grieve, they're able to go through their parents' belongings. They're able to talk about old memories. And I feel like that was taken from us. We didn't get to do that. God, I, we, I, It takes a slap in the face. But he spoke at her funeral and we didn't invite him. Like he just showed up there. Oh, he did come to the funeral. He showed up, our kids like spoke and stuff. And then he decided to come up and speak and all of our uncles just got up and walked away. What? It was, yeah, it was a little dramatic. But what did he say? He was just like, oh, she was the love of my life. And he got up there like nothing. No shame. Just went up and was like, oh, she was love of my life. Oh, like, it was really sick. Like he plays the part. Like he is like going through it all the way to the end. I think it's interesting that he even started his relationship with her with his sob story, his trauma. He healed himself. Like that's what they do. They know how to make you feel sorry for them, inspired by them. And like then they know, they know what's best for you and they want what's best for you. Sounded like he did that thing where it's kind of like an us against the world mentality. And he probably said things that were very untrue about you both and your intentions and the doctor's intentions. It's just devastating. Oh man. I'm glad you started and talked about how social and wonderful your mom was because I think it comes up a lot where people are really kind people and want to believe in other people. And that is taken advantage of, but it's not a weakness. She was optimistic and kind. And he saw that. It's so sad that what was so beautiful about her is what he used. You guys. Yeah, I definitely see that. And everybody knew that about her. Like, oh, she would just go do anything for you. Like if you needed something, she's going to go do it for you. And he could see how her family felt about her too. So I think he took advantage of that. So me and my sister, I don't think we'll stop looking for what we're looking for. We kind of are just very optimistic that something will come up. Something's going to come up and expose the truth behind his motives. And so it's really hard, but we're not going to stop until we find it. This is a lot to unpack. I'm so sad. I mean, let's just start and say, and their mom. I mean, like, I'm so sorry to them. And also, I can't imagine how they must feel as far as like, first of all, how do you be there to support someone when you can see that clearly something isn't right? But we've talked about how it's so important to just say, hey, I'm here for you instead of girl, he's bad for you. You need to get out. Like that doesn't resonate as much as just being there. But in this case, they lost their mom. And I can't even imagine how that must feel. It's an impossible situation because they obviously regret not pushing harder to interfere. And yet they felt in the moment, if they were to push harder, they would push her away. And then they'd have nothing. And in this case, they ended up with her dying and like, it's nothing either way. I don't. This was legit a double-edged sword. Yeah, let's talk about how like throughout this period, which was six months, she was dead within six months. That's very quick. Yeah. In hindsight, like I'm looking back and I'm with you, like slipping her in the mushrooms and the all the pills and things that were incompatible with the care that she needed was poisoning her. And I do think it was intentional. You know, it's all alleged this is entertainment for Spitz is only, but it seems like he wanted to kill her and take her house and money. And yes. And let's talk about not to mention her age. Can this be considered elder? Right. I was thinking about that. So in the moment, like we said, COVID added distance. Like they weren't getting all of the information right away. They were getting information through other people, through her, whatever. Yeah. I was thinking like, could they call? What would happen if they had called the police and said my stepped out is abusing my parent, my mom? Well, hopefully they would have opened the mushroom stuff. Yeah. Hopefully they would have opened an investigation, right? Like that would be something that I would expect, right? Well, so, okay. In the event that that happens and the mom is not agreeing with the fact that it's abuse, you know, like the mom is like, I guess that's part of it. She's being manipulated. That's part of the abuse. Yeah. So what would, if somebody's in this position as a PI and a criminal nerd, what do you think? Like just document everything? What advice do you have for somebody that might have to go through something like this? I would say, like I've always said, call the cops. And okay, so just like cyber crimes, cops might not know exactly what is considered elder abuse, especially something that's prolonged like poisoning or something where he's giving her mushrooms that may or may not be abuse if she takes them willingly on her own or whatever. But I feel like the squeaky wheel gets the grease. So if you just keep talking and keep complaining, eventually someone's going to look into it. And I feel like in that case where these girls, it's hard because you know that something's wrong, but also like we talked about before, how do you say something without them thinking that you're interfering too much? But you can call the cops, make a report, you can, I mean, complain to the hospital staff and just make it known that this is something that you know. They do it eventually. Yeah. Like this is something that's not okay. They need to know. I don't know. It's terrible. The fog of being in that while also being in the loss of your aunt and trying to navigate what's going on with your mom. Like there's emotion and there's practical and like what you do. And now they're still in it. They're still in it. I mean, they're grieving while pursuing justice with him and navigating even what happened. Like I don't, it didn't. It's just, it's just a lot to carry and just for them to know that this is still ongoing. And I imagine, I mean hindsight, hindsight's always 2020 and we always look back and go, oh gosh, I wish I could have done differently. So you're carrying a lot of guilt even though it's not their fault. You still carry a lot of guilt for what could I have done differently? And just to know that this guy's still out, I hope they get the justice that I hope he gets what he deserves. Oh my gosh. I hope they get the justice they deserve. Okay. I'd also love to talk about the world of social media and influencing in medicine and wellness because oh, the pipeline, the pipeline, it is really easy to go from switching from coffee to tea to swearing off all doctors. And that sounds crazy to a lot of you. But I think we all know people or somebody that's like susceptible to that or weird, like the minute you think you're not susceptible to that, we say this all the time, whether it's saying I'll never get dogfished or just I'll never fall for a conspiracy theory, that's when you become more vulnerable. Trust and verify. Like you've got to really be wary of people that are good salesmen. Yeah, salesmen. Yeah, sales people. Okay, I want to go ahead. You really do have to look out for that. Like there's just... Well, it's so dangerous. And this guy was literally wearing scrubs. Yeah, you know he was definitely trying to make people believe he was something other than what he was. And that's all there is to it. Like you'll never convince me that he wasn't trying to make people believe that. So there's a guy named John of God that I went down a rabbit hole researching a couple months ago. There's a podcast called Maintenance Phase and they do an episode about it. If you'd like to listen. He, I mentioned him, I think on the episode, but he's a crazy case of a guy. I forget what country he was in, but he would basically claim to perform surgery remotely. And he would be like, here's what's going to happen. You have this horrible issue. You're going to buy my herbs, which you have to buy them for my wife. So it's like, okay, that's where he's making money. You have to drink these herbs for like 24 hours and then go to sleep. And then people would wake up and they'd claim that they had gone through like exhaust, deep exhaustion. Like they felt like their body went through surgery and they were healed, but like nothing happened. And then he would have people come to his location and they had to like wear white and sit in a room and he would perform a quote surgery on them all at the same time and like touch their eyeball. He did a thing with the eyeball. And then he was charged for sexual assault of almost 100 people at one point and is now in prison, obviously. Oh my God. But that's a crazy story. And then also I looked up the guy Bruno Groening that he had taped over his bed. Oh yeah. Yeah. You'll see. Also charged with sexual assault and then died from stomach cancer at age 52. So there's something tied. There's a, I'm not, I'm just saying what I'm seeing. There's a tie between some sexual and relationship and financial abuse and these healers. And I know that some people, I'm not saying alternative health and medicine is all bad, but just something to note. And then my last rec, the TV show Apple cider vinegar on Netflix, which you should watch. Oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I forgot about that. Apple cider vinegar. I saw that and then I made it. That's based on a real, a real influencer who claimed she cured her cancer by eating fruits and veggies, which. That's why you have to like, I always say consider the source. You have to consider, okay. Where is this information coming from? You know what I mean? Is this someone that like, you just have to consider it. Like if you look at someone who has, that's why people that have so many followers, people look at them and go, oh, they only have like 700 followers, but this one has 100,000. But they're saying the exact same thing. Who do you believe more? You're going to believe the person has more followers because like, oh, they, but that's not necessarily the case. But check their engagement. You know, I've worked in social media marketing a long time. They've been buying those followers. If they have 100,000 followers and 10 comments, something's off. Okay. The math ain't math. The math ain't math. There are ways to fact check this. And in this world of AI and social media, like it's getting harder and harder. I just, I hate this. The story, we're sorry. This is a sad story where we're not necessarily ending it on like, whoo, here's what you can do to prevent this in the future. It's like, right? It's getting scary. That's just the fact. Anything else? I mean, he, I just said he prayed on her kindness, targeted her 100% and kindness is not a weakness. Yes. 100%. It's the problem not her. Yes. Something I have to remind myself because it's very easy to think, put up walls, don't be kind, and then you'll never be preyed upon. But even, even like they'll, they'll find ways. I hate this. Like it sucks to, it sucks to be like that. But also, I mean, I know. I think you can be cautious and kind at the same time. Yeah. You have to be. Yeah. But I'd rather stop. I'm going to focus my energy on stopping the dogfish because I think everybody listening here, we're, we're the group, we're the group that are smart enough to take our own steps to protect ourselves in the ways that are best for us. And we can collectively recognize that the real problem is the perpetrators. Yes. But I think they're doing the right thing by their mom and hopefully to feel better on themselves to know that they're doing something for her that will help them kind of see that or help, help get justice. You know what I mean? He's doing prison. Oh, I'm so mad. I'm so mad. I hope they get access to their mom's stuff in that he is stopped because I don't want him to do this to other people. But yes, we say this a lot. We try to share messages to our guests if you send support or if you have experience that might relate to what they've been through. So you're welcome to comment or send on Patreon or Spotify has comments or email us if you want to share a message of support to Lena and Tessa. You can also share your own story. Yeah. If you have your own story, just email us. We'll send you a message. Yeah, and if you have your own story, just email us. Investigate at the datingdetectivespodcast.com. Thank you to Lena and Tessa for sharing this. I can't even imagine how hard what they went through it. But you know, I'm glad that they had each other to kind of go through it with. But man, that's devastating. I can't even imagine. I know. I know. This is important though, the medical manipulation. That reminds me, I'm having more self-defense stuff coming up. Oh yeah. I'm going to do a Los Angeles workshop on January 11th and then I'm going to do one in Las Vegas in February, February 22nd. So if you listen in the Vegas area, I'll be posting about it. But my family lives in Vegas. So I was like, wait, I'm going to do one here too. Yeah, we need it. And we're going to keep, I want to keep the Don't Get Killed Club going because it's so amazing what you've done. Yes. I want to do it with you. That would be so much fun. It'd be really great. Anything else we got to tell people? We love you. I don't think so. We love you so much. Thank you so much for listening and for supporting us and sharing us on your socials and for the positive reviews and the five stars on all the apps we appreciate you. Thank you. And happy holidays. Happy Halloween. Enjoy your time. Thank you. As always, just your friend and your mission. Thank you.