Linda Nolan conned by hoaxer who pretended to be Manchester terror attack victim

Linda Nolan has revealed how she was conned by an internet hoaxer who pretended to be a victim of the Manchester bombings.

The former pop star, who is suffering from incurable breast cancer, spent almost a month exchanging hundreds of messages with the fraudster on Facebook.

She would even spend hours on the phone talking to a young woman she thought was lying in hospital after protecting her sister from the explosion that followed Ariana Grande’s concert in May.

‘This is a vile human being. How sick can a person get?’ Linda told the Sunday Mirror.

‘I think she’s sick in the head – not only to jump on the bandwagon of the Manchester bombings when there are so many real victims, but to pick on somebody who has recently been re-diagnosed with cancer.

Linda continued: ‘I confided in her and we formed a strong bond. I wanted to help her and I thought we had a connection. But it turned out I had been fed a pack of lies. It’s very hurtful and sinister.

‘I am going through my own troubles trying to deal with my treatment so this is the last thing I need.’

The fake Facebook account belonged to ‘Mia’, who reached out to Linda claiming her sister Emily was her ‘biggest fan’ and was ‘having surgery tomorrow to amputate her right leg’.

Over their hundreds of text messages Emily claimed to be so badly hurt she had to have a heart valve replacement and her kidneys removed.

She said she had developed Addison’s disease.

Linda was also told by ‘sister Mia’ that Emily was only being kept alive by a life support machine.

Linda said: ‘My emotions were very high at the time. I was trying to deal with myself and the anniversary of my sister Bernie’s death was coming up, so I just thought, “It’s nice to be nice”.

‘I wanted to reach out and support her. I thought I was helping this poor girl.’

But after arranging to visit Emily in hospital, Linda was contacted by another fake Facebook account pretending to be Emily’s friend Luke, saying that Emily had passed away.

‘She must have panicked and thought I would turn up at the hospital when there was no one there,’ Linda added.

And it wasn’t until the official death toll of the Manchester bombing failed to rise, that Linda became suspicious and discovered her newfound ‘sick’ friend was merely a hoax.

‘I felt sick to my stomach, then embarrassed I had fallen for it. Her motive was probably to have a good laugh at my expense,’ she said.

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