Yahoo News Eamonn Holmes left "suspicious of everyone" after £60,000 con
This Morning co-presenter Eamonn Holmes has reflected on the effect being scammed out of thousands had on him.
Chatting to The Sun about the 2014 incident – which saw him conned out of £60,000 – Eamonn suggested the experience has left him "suspicious of everyone and everything".
The Northern Irish 59-year-old explained: "The effect it has on you is that it makes you suspicious of everyone and everything and you feel very, very vulnerable."
Eamonn was leaving the Sky News studio when he got a phone call from his bank regarding some suspicious activity. He said: "I get this call and they say to me, 'Mr Holmes, this is your bank here, have you just bought £25,000 of paving stones and 400 metres of wood panelling?'.
"We were in Dubai at a Bedouin experience. And the guy said to me, 'I can't get a signal on the machine, I have to go to the top of that sand dune to get a signal'. And I thought, 'That's where it happened'. But it didn't happen there."
As it turns out, the con had actually taken place back in Belfast, where the conman posed as Eamonn for two weeks holed up in a hotel. There, he ran up a huge bill including spending £25,000 on a marble fireplace.
"The guy with the brain hacks your account," Eamonn elaborated, "the Mafioso lot pay him money, they take your details and they live off them.
"It was the most ridiculous situation, but the scandalous thing is that when it went to court the judge said it was a victimless crime - because they will say the bank will reimburse me and I could afford it."
The conman ended up serving no jail time, although he was initially handed a two-year suspended sentence.
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