Nicole Hayden of Palm Beach, Florida was the intended victim of a global catfishing scam that ended up with her reeling in the man of her dreams.
Hayden, a single mother of two, tells ClickOrlando that a man who called himself Marcus started sending direct messages to her Instagram account.
She says the messages started out casual, before flying into romantic overdrive just days later.
“All of a sudden, it was starting to become really heavy,” she recalled. “‘I love you, I want to marry you.’ I immediately knew something was wrong.”
When Marcus wanted to meet her family for Thanksgiving she wisely decided to block him.
Unfortunately, before she had ended the “relationship,” she’d sent him a photo of herself at the beach, which he altered into a version that made it appear as if she was posing nude. He then threatened to send it to her family unless she paid him $6,500.
Hayden never paid them and to this day, her photograph has never emerged on social media sites.
A short time later, however, the photograph of the man used by the imposter showed up on her Instagram account as a possible dating match — only this time, he went by the name Alex the Officer, a.k.a. Alessandro Cinquini, a veteran officer with Carnival Cruise Line.
In an unlikely twist of fate, Hayden started messaging, FaceTiming and then dating the 27-year-old Italian, now living in Miami.
They have been dating since January and have decided to go public to warn women that Alessandro’s photograph is being used by hundreds of imposters every day.