Scam Artist Terry Johnston

[technetronic]

Hi my name is Martina and I belong to the North Texas Church of Freethought
in Irving Texas (http://church.freethought.org).  I need your help in
prosecuting a scam artist who goes by the name of Terry Johnston.

In short Terry Johnston called our church line indicating that he had full
blown AIDS and needed help.  Here's what he told me when I called him back.
He indicated that he had made a trek from Baltimore to Dallas in the hopes
of reconciling with his Christian family.  He hoped that his family seeing
his horrific state would make amends with him.  It took him 4 weeks to make
it to Dallas due to several hospital stays which had totally depleted his
funds.  His family let him stay one night and then kicked him out.  A friend
put him up in a hotel room and someone else has secured him a bus ticket
back to Baltimore.  All he needed from us was 3 days worth of food money for
his bus trip back home the next day.  My boyfriend and I agreed we would
give him $40.00.  When Terry seemed very unhappy with such a small amount of
money, told us he was to weak to meet us in the hotel lobby and other
various oddities our suspicions of a scam were realized.

My boyfriend and I starting surfing the net.  We found the 4 Web sites below
were Terry using the same name has pulled the same scam for the past 3
years.  His targets are mainly UU, pagan, atheist and other organizations
that are open to the gay and lesbian life styles.  Feel free to do your own
search and let me know what you find. We only spent about an hour searching.

I had hoped that this documentation would be enough to get him arrested.  We
contacted the authorities and filed a police report.  The police went to the
hotel manager and got Terry's personal information, physical description and
so on.  Unfortunately, because I know its a scam my giving him money now
would be considered entrapment. The swindle department in Dallas and other
various law enforcement agencies I called stated the best thing we could do
to put a stop to this scam was to contact as many organizations as possible
and have them file similar reports giving authorities as much information as
possible.

If you have heard of this guy or have donated any monies to him please file
a police report in your area.  We could then get enough evidence to have him
arrested, fined or at least make him come up with a new scam.  It is
realized he moves from place to place but if he is using the same name and
story it won't be long before he is caught.  If you run into him don't let
him know we are onto him.

I have been working with Detective Grady at the Dallas Swindle unit
214-671-3511.  You can email your police report numbers to him at
address@hidden and he can take it from there.  If you would let me know
that would be great too, that way I can pester Mr. Grady a bit to insure he
doesn't forget about us.  There are only two guys in that department so if
no one answers the phone just call back, should you wish to speak with Mr.
Grady yourself.  They are swamped though.

Now for the final hitch, one of the 5 Web sites makes a claim that they knew
about this scam but helped Terry anyway because he really had AIDS.  They
say they visited him in the hospital.  If they are just saving face I don't
know or maybe he was there for a drug overdose; who knows.  Of the people
who saw him they indicate he looks very thin and sickly.  I called a local
AIDS organization and they stated for someone to have full blown AIDS for 3
years and be living in various hotel rooms all across the US would be an
extremely difficult and very doubtful.

I cannot thank you enough for your help.  Any information you could email me
would be most appreciated.  If possible keep the subject line the same
because I am sending this email to 1000's of organizations nation wide.

Should you wish to send me information confidentially go to my web page and
fill out my contact form. http://www.technetronic.net/martina2

All of our organizations have worked hard to give back to our communities it
is hoped you agree that this swindler should not be allowed to take
advantage of our philanthropy.

Web sites mentioning Terry:
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Aegean/5649/AllAreWorthy.htm

http://www.betwixt.org/fullarticle.asp?ID=61

http://www.ucc.org/ucnews/oct00/letters.htm

http://216.239.37.104/search?q=cache:IcT4NdryfYYJ:groups.yahoo.com/group/Cir
cles-EBSN/message/1354%3Fsource%3D1+%22aids%22+%2B+%22hotel+room%22+%2B+%22c
hurch%22+%2B+%22scam%22+%2B+%22money+for+food%22&hl=en&ie=UTF-8