Mum of two left penniless by Tinder scammer

A mother of two says she was left penniless after giving her savings to Tinder predator Christopher Harkins in a fake investment scam.

The pair matched on the dating app in London in 2020. Caitlyn - not her real name - told how the fraudster and rapist initially tried to talk her into going on holiday with him - a regular ruse of Harkins, now 38.

When she said she couldn't afford a holiday, he offered to "help" by doubling what money she had via his foreign currency exchange business.

She's one of four women the BBC is aware of who were targeted by Harkins in the capital - where he fled to after his crimes were exposed in Scotland.

Caitlyn is one of half a dozen women who shared their traumatic, and often bizarre, experiences with one of Scotland's most prolific romance fraudsters in new BBC Disclosure podcast: Matched with a Predator.

Introducing Matched With A Predator

She said: "At the start I thought he was very gentlemanly. He was being flash with money.

"He was telling me his business was doing very well and making lots of money. He said he could help me to raise money."

Harkins used the fake name Christopher Telfer when speaking to Caitlyn, who had recently split from the father of her two young children.

She sent him £3,132 in total. "This money was so precious to me," she said.

"I felt very vulnerable at the time because of my situation and he kept offering to invest my money and make more from it. I was naïve. He said to me that whatever money I had, I could send it to him. He wanted to help me."

When Caitlyn began asking for the money back, Harkins told her his bank account had been frozen.

He insisted she had to give him more, in order to get the initial investment back.

Caitlyn said: "I was getting very nervous by now. I had given him all the money I had.

"I was very stressed and worried. He was constantly asking for more money but I didn't have any. He kept saying I could take out bank loans and overdrafts."

Over text message, Caitlyn asked Harkins to prove the investment wasn't a scam. This suggestion seemed to trigger him.

"He got super angry. He said, 'Don't speak to me like that, you're going to regret speaking to me like that'.

"I was very scared of him at that point. After I refused to send any more, he got very aggressive."

At one point, Caitlyn's home situation became very difficult. "I was desperate," she said.

"I said to him, 'I'm begging you, I'm really having a difficult time, I have two children, I'm not working'. I was saying, 'Even £200, even £300, just a little bit', but he didn't reply. He completely ignored me."

Harkins blocked Caitlyn's number. She says she was too scared to report him to the police. She never got a penny back.

"Afterwards I just felt so stupid," she said.

"I couldn't even tell anyone for a while. I was so embarrassed. It was a nightmare. Only one friend knew. It was a very horrible time in my life."

This pattern of behaviour was typical of Harkins, who the BBC understands targeted at least 30 women in a raft of crimes spanning almost a decade. He used dating sites such as Tinder to seek new victims.

Harkins is currently serving a 12-year prison sentence for crimes against 10 women in Scotland, including rape, assaults, recording intimate videos without consent and defrauding more than £214,000 from women he met online.

On his dating profile, Harkins presented himself as a jet-setting, business-owning "gym rat", but in reality he was a prolific and predatory fraudster.

His scams included pretending to book romantic holidays and asking for money for his business because his bank account was frozen.

In other cases he pressured women to take out loans of up to £12,000 to give to him. He also used their identities to take out loans himself. One woman was forced into bankruptcy while others spent years paying off debts, suffering mental health issues as a result.

Many of the women targeted by Harkin were too ashamed to tell family and friends of their ordeals.

After being exposed in a newspaper and arrested in Scotland in early 2020, Harkins fled to London and began using a fake name.

The BBC understands Harkins spent time in London throughout his life as his father lived there.

Despite the legal threat hanging over him, Harkins continued his scams in England.

In January 2023 he was jailed at Isleworth Crown Court for a separate fraud after conning £16,700 from another woman.

The BBC's investigation uncovered further alleged frauds by Harkins of almost £70,000. The BBC wrote to Harkins in prison to ask about these allegations. He did not reply.

Caitlyn learned about Harkins' other crimes after reading a BBC article in January. It was an emotional moment, realising for the first time that he had targeted other women too.

She added: "I shared it with my friend group and finally told them all what had happened.

"I've decided to report him to the police."

If you have been affected by any of the issues raised in this article you can find details of support on the BBC Action Line.