Psychic Arrested for Palming $800,000 From Brainwashed Divorcee; Busted When Trying to Give it Back; Should Have Seen It Coming

A psychic was arrested in South Florida for casting an expensive spell on a superstitious divorcee. Over the course of nine years, the psychic palmed more than $800,000 for protection against black magic, the evil eye, voodoo curses and misfortune. The Santa Clara County woman said the psychic brainwashed her. Gypsy hypnosis scams have been reported in Russia, Korea, China and in New England. The psychic, named Peaches, says she planned on giving the money back after she cleansed it, giving a new meaning to money laundering.

The psychic was arrested on suspicion of grand theft and extortion. The prosecution enhanced the charge with an “aggravated white collar crime” statutes because the “psychic scam” came to more than half a million dollars.

The Psychic who was arrested, Peaches T. Miller, 33, of Miami, also goes by the name Shanna Young in her ads, which the woman saw in About India. The psychic was arrested Saturday in Florida's Broward County. The psychic is being held in Santa Clara County in South Florida. She is being charged with pulling a “psychic scam” on the vulnerable woman, whose identity has not been disclosed. Psychic Peaches will be transported to California within two weeks if her extradition is approved. The psychic is set for a hearing on Thursday.

Psychic scams have made headlines in major cities like New York, Chicago and Boston. Psychics scammed $2 million out of believers in San Francisco in a rash of psychic racketeering. The Sunnyvale case is different because the psychic who was arrested was working alone. In May, a British man said he was hypnotized by a psychic to leave his wife and children. They moved in together and he paid for her to take mediumship classes. One morning he woke up to find her gone and himself almost penniless. The psychic charged him with harassing her and her parents, as well as reporting her to the papers and to the Spiritualists Workers Association. The psychic also had him charged with threatening to kill her.

Cherie Bourlard, a Deputy district attorney, said she gets a lot of psychic scam complaints and she thinks this should serve as a warning. She says people should only go to psychics of fortunetellers for entertainment, not to expect anything more.

Cherie Bourlard said "This is a big business and it's all rip-offs. If you have personal problems and have to spend money, seek counseling or a credible therapist. There's a common thread of gaining a victim's complete trust through carefully managed manipulation. It's more than $800,000. We could not just walk away from this case, we had to do something about it."

Court documents say the victim went through a messy divorce and was trying to get custody of her daughter. In February 2002 she answered an ad in India Abroad for services by "Psychic Shanna."

The victim said the psychic work started small. She paid $175 for a psychic phone reading. The victim said in the court documents that over the course of a few weeks she felt she was becoming “brainwashed” into thinking her ex-husband was casting voodoo curses on her. The victim said the psychic also made her believe that ex-husband was abusing their daughter and that she "could not question the Spirit in this work" if she wanted full custody of her daughter. The psychic also warned her to keep her daughter free from "negativity energy." The victim said she was manipulated into thinking that the psychic was her only way out.

The psychic allegedly convinced the woman to buy expensive "mirrors, tabernacles, tassels, etc. which were made of gold and silver and needed to be imported from Italy and Spain ... so that Peaches could 'work' with these materials and vanquish the 'evil.'” After nine years, the bill came to $838,390.

The victim gave money to the psychic from February 2002 to November 2010. She wired the money or mailed checks ranging from a few thousand dollars to as much as $70,000. The psychic said she was "blessing" the money in coffins and that she would return the money. The victim extended her credit and took out home equity loans to keep up the payments. She said she was so much under Miller’s influence that "she didn't make any decisions in my life without first obtaining her approval." The court documents say she couldn’t even buy a new home without asking the psychic first.

At one point Miller returned $15,000 to the victim when she complained that she was in a financial bind. Private Investigator Bob Nygaard, who specializes in psychic scams and who helped build the case against Miller, said this is a way the spiritualist could demonstrate “good faith” and keep the scheme going.

The scam came undone when the psychic intuited that she was losing the widow as a client because her daughter was about to be an adult and no longer subject to the custody case. Once the psychic tried to repay the money the alleged victim got suspicious. The psychic hired a lawyer and tried to arrange repayment with the client. That’s when the victim caught on, hired Nygaard. Nygaard concluded that “the repayment plan was Miller’s attempt to reduce possible criminal charges to a potential civil action.” He brought the case to the FBI and Santa Clara County prosecutors. They put out a warrant for Psychic Peaches arrest.

Had the psychic not tried to pay the woman back, she would not have been caught.

by Tony Sokol