Believe it or not, a bride from Britain faked terminal cancer in order to collect $11K to make her dream wedding come true.
She was sentenced to 5 months in prison for her scam. The district judge Nicholas Sanders told the woman, Toni Standen, 29, that what she did was appalling.
Woman Faked Cancer to Raise Money for a Wedding
The judge told Standen that he’s thankful they don’t often have to sentence someone with that high degree of greed, shamelessness, and betrayal of friendship to her friends and community.
Standen was lacking shame because she kept on taking money from people for months, explained the judge. She was also ordered to pay back around $2700 to a local businessman who donated.
As of July 2017, Standen started claiming she has only two months to live because she had cancer.
She also said it went to her bones, brain, pretty much everywhere. And, she went to that extent of shaving her head and regularly updated her friends with a lot of clarity and details about her condition to ensure there’s no doubt.
Believe it or not, she also gave two interviews for two newspapers, including the Liverpool Echo.
The friends opened a GoFundMe page to ensure the couple has ‘a wedding they deserve’ and Standen accrued more than $11K for her big day and also scored a honeymoon in Turkey.
James, her 52-year-old ‘unassuming’ husband was among the scammed when they wedded last summer in a Catholic church in Widnes.
Her friends started raising suspicions this year after she defied ‘her condition’ without explanation and traveled to Europe. And then, she claimed to have caught COVID-19.
How Was Standen’s Scam Revealed?
Everything was revealed when two of her friends decided to confront her during a group phone call. This is when she told them it was all a lie.
She says she’s now embarrassed and broken and struggling.
She said she doesn’t know if she will be divorcing Jim; however, she says she won’t blame him if he does decide he wants one.
Her husband was there at court to support her when she finally told the truth-nothing was true.
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