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DaveOJ12 t1_jcwsndh wrote

Tell us something we don't know.

6

supercyberlurker t1_jcwspa5 wrote

Replying to InternetPeon (#2,276,280)

Yeah, from my perspective he never lied about being a con artist.. and like a true con artist, what we thought was the con wasn't the true con. In the end he gets this movie made about him and we're all going "lol but it's fake"... well... yeah? That just proves he's good at being a con artist!

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AndyB1976 t1_jcwthk2 wrote

So he lied about his lies and had a movie made about his lies starring two of Hollywood's top leading men. How much did he make off the movie? Sounds like a rather successful con.

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halfanothersdozen t1_jcwwn0y wrote

Wait I thought all movies had to be real? You're saying this whole thing was fiction? How can this be?

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LivingLawfulness t1_jcwydfx wrote

These people really thought a con artist had to be honest about the shit they do

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vineyardmike t1_jcx9kz7 wrote

He had a pretty good career working in preventing fraud. I guess he decided that he had to beef up his credentials by claiming he was much more successful as a check forger then he actually was.

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abyess t1_jcxhfcl wrote

This is actually interactive art over decades

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chazwomaq t1_jcxjzhr wrote

The grammar is all wrong. He didn't "lie about his lies". He lied about (some of ) his claims. Lying about a lie is telling the truth.

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BriskHeartedParadox t1_jcxldqq wrote

I kinda respect this. Skipped the criminal part and went straight to reformed.

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gordo65 t1_jcxlofn wrote

I think the reason so many people are convinced is that weaving in the story of being pursued by the FBI gives the impression that the stories are confirmed by that agent, when in fact we have only Abignale’s word.

And of course, the stories are really fun, so people want to believe them.

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TigerUSF t1_jcxqfhs wrote

The real con was the grift we had along the way

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Competitive_String75 t1_jcxqkdi wrote

He is a complete hypocrite as I listened to him once on stage at a conference pleading with the audience to follow some societal normalcies

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DJWGibson t1_jcxw18c wrote

>A new report from the New York Post claims that Frank Abagnale Jr actually 'lied' about his 'lifetime of lies'.

This makes it seem like this is a new revelation, but people have been calling bullshit on him since his memoir was published in the 1980s.

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ThatOneThingOnce t1_jcxyqda wrote

Replying to vineyardmike (#2,277,538)

I'm pretty sure he didn't even prevent fraud or work for the FBI. Like, his ENTIRE story is made up, save the part that they made a movie about him and his lies.

>Journalist Ira Perry was unable to find any evidence that Abagnale worked with the FBI; according to one retired FBI special agent in charge, Abagnale was caught trying to pass personal checks in 1978 several years after he claimed that he began working with the FBI.[34] Dating back to the 1980s, Abagnale claimed that Joseph Shea, an FBI agent, had pursued him for 5 years (between 1965 and 1970).[106] Abagnale claimed that Shea befriended and supervised him during his parole.[5] When Catch Me If You Can was released in theatres, though, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported that Abagnale and Shea only reunited in the late 1980s, almost 20 years after Shea arrested him. Abagnale spotted Shea at an anticrime seminar in Kansas City and sought out Shea to shake his hand.[107]

>When the film was released, an FBI spokesperson acknowledged that Abagnale had given lectures at the academy "from time to time," but denied that Abagnale had been given commendations by the agency as claimed in the film's marketing.[108] At no point has the FBI made an official statement corroborating Abagnale's biographical claims, nor has the agency confirmed his extraordinary claims that he was sent into a military base as an expert on missiles, and into a secret lab in New Mexico.[53][109] Abagnale has claimed in public lectures that he was discussed in detail in a coffee-table book celebrating 100 years of the FBI.[53] However, Abagnale's name does not appear anywhere in the official book celebrating 100 years of the FBI.[110] In his public lectures, Abagnale has taken on a pseudo-spokesperson role for the FBI. In discussing recruitments, he states, "currently [2017] we take 1 in 10,000 applications."[53] Abagnale made this same claim of 1 in 10,000 applications to Idaho Statesman journalist Michael Katz in 2019.[111] Overall approximately 11,500 applications per year are made for 900 positions at the FBI (2018 statistics), which is about one in 13 applicants.[112]

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Abagnale

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virgilreality t1_jcxyril wrote

In a completely unrelated news story, Donald Trump just named him head of his election campaign.

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AndroidDoctorr t1_jcy243k wrote

No shit. The whole time I was watching that movie I was thinking "how do they know this happened? Because he said so?"

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nknecht1 t1_jcy3fzk wrote

Yeah this makes a lot more sense honestly

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colemon1991 t1_jcy6zf7 wrote

We've known this for at least a decade. I'm pretty sure it came out after the movie's release.

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DFWPunk t1_jcybnu1 wrote

Author discovers that something we already know wasn't true, isn't true.

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0le_Hickory t1_jcyeptx wrote

Yeah. I thought we all knew that he was an unreliable narrator.

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PlayTheHits t1_jcyggkg wrote

To his credit, Abagnale prefaces his book by saying he interweaves fiction with the facts. The genius is he never specifies what percent of the writing is what and invites you to fill in the blanks. Naturally most of us like the romantic idea of the sympathetic conman and decided that 90% of what he said was true. Then, upon learning this is not the case we feel (gasp) conned.

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sugar_addict002 t1_jcyqp2i wrote

New York Post

kind of like believing Fox News when they say stuff

1

itoleck t1_jcyr1xj wrote

The next thing you are going to tell me is that cocaine bear didn't really do cocaine. 🐻

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jbh70 t1_jcyyg4c wrote

What????? How can this be?? A know liar lying about his life. Shocking!

1

woodiegutheryghost t1_jcyzeh0 wrote

Replying to BriskHeartedParadox (#2,278,020)

Except he was a fucking creep.

> University of Arizona officials acknowledge that Abagnale had interacted with 12 female students.[34] Abagnale has openly acknowledged that he performed examinations on young women while impersonating a doctor: "When the girls came by, I always gave them a thorough examination and sent them on their way.

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GiraffeandZebra t1_jcz4qw7 wrote

FOR FUCKS SAKE WE KNOW. WE KNEW 20 GODDAMN YEARS AGO.

Now stop posting this shit on every fucking subreddit.

−1

Throsty t1_jcz6obq wrote

It was George Santos all along!

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JauntyTurtle t1_jcz9esz wrote

He pretty much admits that it's all fake in the intro to his book.

1

MrWindblade t1_jczawhr wrote

I really liked the movie, and I believed he did some of those things - like impersonating different people and doing check fraud - but I figured most of it was massively embellished to make a cool movie.

Too many of the things they claimed he did were impossible to get away with unless everyone else in the universe was dumb as hell.

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not_a_droid t1_jczd2xh wrote

That’s meta as shit; Charlie Kaufman weeps

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vineyardmike t1_jczgflg wrote

Replying to ThatOneThingOnce (#2,278,756)

I was thinking more about his personal business that seems to be focused on speaking engagements.

One takeaway I got was you're better off using a credit card than a debit card because you have no liability on a credit card for fraudulent purchases. The caveat would be that you need to pay your credit card on time.

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HistoryBuffLakeland t1_jczkslk wrote

Not only was he a conman, turns out he conned everyone into thinking he was a conman.

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FriedrichHydrargyrum t1_jczl79c wrote

Well duh.

His book/movie were very entertaining, but it’s not wise to believe the self-proclaimed king of liars is telling the truth.

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shady8x t1_jczo3ja wrote

Sounds like someone should make a movie about it... but seriously Catch Me If You Can was really good so I ain't even mad.

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grandFossFusion t1_jczqaw2 wrote

There is no fucking way at least quarter the movie is true. If he had really tried to scum air companies for millions, he would quickly have been found dead with a bottle of nice Champagne up his ass

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DamonFields t1_jczr7y9 wrote

When liars speak, it really doesn’t mean anything.

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Zeothalen t1_jczvgow wrote

Oh no the guy who told lies is a liar am shocked

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ToDandy t1_jd00cpx wrote

When you lie about your lies so well that your lies can be used as the basis of a Hollywood classic- are you really a fraud of a conman?

1

LuckyDuck4 t1_jd00qp1 wrote

Replying to inaddition290 (#2,281,007)

Tbf when Hollywood advertises something as “Based on a true story,” that is almost always a clear indicator that it is either completely fictional, or takes so many liberties with the actual story that it is practically fictional.

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scipio0421 t1_jd017zu wrote

Wait, the guy known for being a conman was conning us? Shocking.

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jestenough t1_jd04alz wrote

Now do Ferdinand Demara and “The Great Impostor.” Sounds like although some suspected his claims, there was mostly truth, enough to follow him around and make his life difficult. There was a book that vouched for him.

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Hospitalwater t1_jd0ndlo wrote

Con artist conned people into thinking he was a bigger con artist than he conned and conned his way to a successful con artist. What a legend.

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Bear_nuts t1_jd0wlv7 wrote

Lmfao how he got “caught” is the funny part. Dude attended a talk in 1981 and been a hater since 😂

1