This week on The Perfect Scam.

One of them was a guy who was raising money to get his dog's vet bills paid and he was the one who injured the dog.

He was charged ultimately with animal cruelty for that.

Just a horrible case and a crazy case where a woman has raised money for her son's funeral,

when in fact that boy had been adopted by another family and the adopted mother saw this campaign and her son was portrayed as having dying.

Welcome back to the perfect scam. I'm your host Bob Sullivan.

It's the holiday season and who doesn't like a heartwarming story.

A few years ago, it seemed all of America was mesmerized by just such a tale.

It ticked all the boxes, charity, second chances, veterans, and

outpouring of love, but it was all based on a lie. Today as you settle in for your holiday break and perhaps work on your giving plans for

2024 we revisit this feel-good tale gone bad as a, it's wonderful to have a generous heart to share

with strangers in need, but it's also important to maintain a healthy skepticism.

So let's go back in time to Thanksgiving 2017 when a young

woman named Kate McClure says she ran out of gas on Interstate 95 late at night

along a not- great stretch of highway near Philadelphia.

A homeless man who was a veteran spent his last $20 to help the woman. He went up to her and told her to stay in the car and went and got gas for her.

That's Scott Kofina, a lawyer in South Jersey near Philadelphia.

And he's talking about a homeless man that Kate McClure would find out was named Johnny Bobbitt.

Bobbitt says at the time he's done selfless gestures like this before.

I always try to go up and offer, you know, help to people.

You know, sometimes people take it, sometimes they don't.

But you know, in this case, she, you know, she needed to help, she took the help.

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