Featured Image Credit: @bobbysmurdyyy/TikTok / GoFundMe
Topics: News, US News, Social Media, Cancer, Crime
Niamh Shackleton
Topics: News, US News, Social Media, Cancer, Crime
A woman who swindled over 400 people out of thousands of dollars by pretending to have cancer has received her sentencing.
Madison Russo claimed to have pancreatic cancer, leukaemia and a football-sized tumor wrapped around her spine and documented her illness on social media.
She later set up a GoFundMe page, where she raised almost $40,000 from donations from 439 kind-hearted people.
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But it was later revealed that Russo was never actually sick and the whole thing was a scam.
As per a police news release from earlier this year, a subpoena for medical records found Russo had 'never been diagnosed with any kind of cancer or tumor from any medical facilities within the Quad Cities or surrounding cities'.
The 19-year-old was later charged with theft.
In light of her arrest, GoFundMe issued a statement and reassured Russo's donors that they'd be refunded.
“GoFundMe has a zero tolerance policy for misuse of our platform and cooperates with law enforcement investigations of those accused of wrongdoing," the company said in a statement issued to CNN.
"All donors have been refunded and we have removed this fundraiser. The beneficiary has also been banned from using the platform for any future fundraisers.
"GoFundMe’s Giving Guarantee offers a full refund in the rare case when something isn’t right; this is the first and only donor protection guarantee in the crowdfunding industry.”
Several months on from her arrest, Russo has received her sentencing and has managed to avoid any jail time.
Russo was handed a 10-year suspended sentence after pleading guilty to first-degree theft in June.
She agreed a plea deal on Friday (October 20), and as part of the deal she must pay $39,000 in restitution and a $1,370 fine.
Her sentencing also includes 100 hours of community service.
Russo's attorneys requested that the conviction be wiped from her records if she successfully completes her probation, but Judge John Telleen denied it.
Speaking in the court, Telleen said: "Through this scheme, you deceived your friends, your family, your community, other cancer victims, charities and strangers who were motivated by your supposedly tragic story to donate to help support you."
While she pleaded guilty to theft, Russo said she made up the cancer story not to make money, but in an attempted to 'get [her] family back together'.
“A lot of people have made speculation as to why I did this and how somebody who looked like they had everything together could have such a mess," she told the court on Friday.
"I didn’t do this for money or greed. I didn’t do this for attention. I did this as an attempt to get my family back together.”