Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
The public has had a long-held fascination with detectives. Detectives see a side of life the average person is never exposed to. I spent 34 years as a cop. For 25 of those years, I was catching killers. That's what I did for a living. I was a homicide detective. I'm no longer just interviewing bad guys. Instead, I'm taking the public into the world in which I operated.
The guests I talk to each week have amazing stories from all sides of the law. The interviews are raw and honest, just like the people I talk to. Some of the content and language might be confronting. That's because no one who comes into contact with crime is left unchanged. Join me now as I take you into this world.
The bad guys always target vulnerable people, and no one is more vulnerable than someone looking for love. When former detective Kylie Dennis found out her mum was a victim of a romance scam, she decided to use her skills as a detective to expose the scammer. Today, I speak with Kylie about her police career and the world of romance scammers.
Working now as a private investigator, Kylie has made it her life ambition to expose the low lives behind these scams and stop them from taking advantage of vulnerable people. Have a listen to what she has to say. It will shock you and educate you about this growing despicable crime. Kylie Dennis, welcome to I Catch Killers.
Thank you. Very excited to be here. Thank you.
Well, I'm glad. I like it when guests say they're excited to be here. I am excited. It'd be terrible if they go, oh, yeah. Anyway. Now, former detective. Yes. You left the police. Yes. You bought a pub. Yes. And then became a private investigator. Yes. And your main focus is romance scammers.
Yes, absolutely.
Romance scams. Just give us a sense of what we're talking about if someone says a romance scam.
Well, I sort of deal with that digital romance scam, the one that you go online, dating profile, fake profile, you engage with that profile, believing it is who they represent themselves to be on a dating app. And then they take you off the dating app and take you into this dark world of conversations.
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Chapter 2: What sparked Kylee Dennis's investigation into romance scams?
And saying that you're not sure how much has been reported, I would imagine if I naively went online dating and was scammed, it's not the type of thing that you'd put your hand up.
No. That's the hard part is that if you do get scammed, you're very much, you're upset, you're embarrassed. And it doesn't matter whether it's, and we spoke about shopping. I love online shopping. So I've been scammed with that and I tell everybody about that, but I haven't reported that.
So, you know, and I wasn't embarrassed because that was my own silly fault with a glass of wine, but... Some of the best bargains are done when you've got a glass of wine in your hand at 10 o'clock at night. Oh, yes, yes, yes. I've got to stop doing that, but that's a whole different podcast. So... I didn't report that because I didn't need to report that.
But I understand with someone who's lost $100,000, you know, that sense of shame because then they then talk about how stupid they are internally, not externally, what we say as a community. So that's why they don't go forward. And report, because it's hard to sort of then relive it.
Yeah.
Because you've got to go through the tick the boxes.
Well, we're not just talking financial loss here. It's emotional.
100%.
Yeah.
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Chapter 3: How do romance scammers manipulate their victims?
Again, that's another podcast. Yeah, it's interesting. And I don't know why... I don't know whether is it internally with a female that they don't report as much as what a man... I'm not too sure why that is. All my female victims have not reported. Yeah. And that is that deep sense of family.
Yeah.
You know, the internal, you know, fight within themselves. The men sort of go, oh... After they've accepted it, they go, okay, well, I think I have to.
It's interesting. I don't know. I'm surmising here. But I think you see an elderly man and all of a sudden a young, attractive woman's fallen madly in love with him online. And it's almost like the men culture can almost laugh at each other about it. Oh, I got taken for a ride there. Yes. Probably it's more deep when women have genuinely looking for the love, the companionship.
And that might be why they sit on it more so than the men.
Yeah, I think so. I think so. Look, I talked the other day about the halo bias. We all have that within ourselves. And within that romance world, well, that exacerbates a bit more because there's someone that's come online and visually they look trustworthy. And as a female, you sort of look at that and go, well, here's this photo. You look trustworthy or you might be a doctor or whatever.
So they will engage with that where – If it was at a bar, at a pub, there is a high likelihood that, not being disrespectful, but a 78-year-old woman is not going to go up to somebody who is, you know, in their mid-30s.
Whereas us blokes, we're stupid enough to think, oh, yeah, I'll have a go. Okay. All right. Well, this is about romance scam. I don't want an attack on our stupid sum men. Sum. Not all men.
No, no.
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Chapter 4: What is the emotional impact of falling victim to a romance scam?
100%.
And what went down at the police stations back in those days wouldn't stand up to any scrutiny.
No.
But in the same regards, it was the values of the society at the time.
Absolutely. But it also, certain parts of it. So I did a piece the other day about community-based policing. Yeah. And I remember back then walking the beat. And I know we can't do that now because we're understaffed and all that. But back then we went to the pubs. We sat down with the licensee who just happened to know everything that fell off the back of a truck. Yeah.
We went to the local shops and we had coffee or we'd go down the street and meet up with Mary who's there and says, I need to tell you something. Come inside. But we gathered intel and we gathered it in a very basic way. But that intel formed amazing jobs that created lockups that were brilliant.
I was always, always surprised where a crime had happened and detectives or police that have been in the area for a long time would go out or instantaneously say, this is where we've got to go. These are the people who have done it. And that's that type of community policing you're talking about.
Absolutely. And I think – and that's where we fail a little bit more now that we don't want to do. You know, sitting in the pub is deemed as, you know, corruption. Or, you know, even going to – in Marrickville, they'd have the closing down of, you know, KFC. I mean, high-end food quality, you know, like so good. So they'd either – you know, you'd ring the local cops –
the local fireys or the ambos. And they do a rotation. We've got leftover buckets of chicken. Would you like some chicken? Like, oh, high-end stuff. But, you know, we'd be out patrolling and doing stuff. So, yeah, sure, why not? Let's pick that up.
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Chapter 5: What are the common red flags of romance scams?
We know that they are there. Intel has said that, you know, they're going to be thinking of doing something. We'll just back off. You know, so it was just, I think it was a very well-oiled machine back then. But again, we didn't have phones. Yeah. Social media. We didn't have any of that. But policing was policing. And it was good. It was hard. Yeah.
You still had to run after them and chuck fixes.
Well, I like the fact that sitting down speaking to a former cop that enjoyed it because I still think it's one of the world's best jobs, policing.
For me today, it is one of the saddest things that I never got to spend more time than what I did. I still to this day...
bleed blue no matter what yeah i can i can see in the way that you're talking about your body language that you enjoy that um detectives what where how did that start because you you went into uh a listing which is preparing to be a detective so i started i sort of put my foot in it
I wanted to do it in Marrickville when I was junior. And then that happened when I went into Flemington. I sort of put my hand up then and said, I'd like to sort of do that A-list and go through the bullring and all that sort of stuff. So that was that slow process there. And I trained at that stage.
I did the Special Forces Undercover Commercial course for the operation for us to do three months in a pawn shop. So I did that there. And then I went and trained in the negotiators as well. And then that sort of all just, I don't know, it was like my next.
You got the taste of it.
My next step was I knew I was always going to be a detective. And without me knowing, I sort of followed my dad's footsteps. You know, he worked at Newtown. He was at 21 Division. I was at Marrickville. I went to Flemington. Dad was at Flemington. Then he went to Auburn. Like I wasn't sort of realising that that was the steps that I was taking. He went to the crime squads and all that. Yeah.
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Chapter 6: How can victims cope with the aftermath of a romance scam?
And we did. We collected everything that was legitimate and also stolen.
So basically, I understand pawn shops and how they work, but it's where people come in with property. Yes. that they want to sell the property or hock the property there and come back and buy it off you.
Yes.
And at the time, you're talking about the amount of stolen properties, heroin was still in the streets, armed robbery, break and enters were a big thing. Huge, yes. So someone would break in and steal the VCR and take it to the local pawn shop or jewellery. And you guys were in there pretending to be just the daggy type people that are running a pawn shop. Yes.
and dealing with these people and asking, where did you get that from?
Yep. And because they would just talk to you. Yeah. Because you'd be sitting down with them and they'd come in a couple of times and some were legitimate people. So, you know, you just said, oh, okay, I just want to, you know, put this for three months. And we ran the business like a business. Yeah. So you still had to ticket everything.
So people still had to have their – if they wanted to just – get a bit of a loan and we had to do the loan and everything. We had to cash everything up. So it was really like a proper business. But we also knew when, you know, naughty Fred came in, we knew, okay, he's done a break and enter and slowly they'd start telling you a bit more information.
So of course then you're creating Intel reports, you're understanding processes, you're understanding exactly what they're doing and, And we just kept all the property and everyone got it back. Well, most people got it back. I mean, that was another process to then give it all back to the owners.
Well, I remember there was a big resolution day where we got called in, people not working on the actual operation. There's a job. Everyone needs to be in here at 5 a.m. in the morning. We'll tell you what about then. And we got handed briefs of evidence.
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Chapter 7: What approaches can be taken to prevent romance scams?
And I still remember locking up people and it was, I shouldn't say fun people, but it was fun.
Yeah, it was.
Because we got photos of the people coming into the store, the property they've sold, knock on the door and, yeah, where'd you get this from? And so many people got locked up from it, didn't they?
And they knew they had no way of saying no, no, no, because everything was there. Everything was digitised. Everything was recorded. And I don't believe our statements were anything – too big. I think we just did more contemporaneous notes at that time because everything was recorded anyway. So look, it was a great operation. It was a very successful operation. My belief it was very successful.
I know after that I went to another one, Northern Beaches, that was a flow-on effect from that. And more of that investigative side, not the undercover side. Okay.
So you enjoyed doing that covert work?
No, not really. Oh, okay. Well, no, that was fun. I was never – and I remember training doing undercover. Look, I was never good at drugs. I'll be honest. That was just – no, like weights. No, no, give me jewellery. Give me clothing. I just was never going to be a drug operative.
Yeah, yeah.
And we had a couple – we had a girl that trained with us and she was a tiny little thing. And I mean tiny. Yeah. And I used to say to them, well, I'm too fat to be a druggie. I do not look like a heroin junkie. There was never going to be any reason for me to look like a heroin junkie. So I was never going to go down that path.
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Chapter 8: What lessons did Kylee learn from her mother's experience with a scammer?
I love that. Tell us about that.
They are just the most amazing team. You know, there's a team of... You've got your four with your bosses and everything. And, you know, you're on call every six weeks. And, you know, I used to... I've been called to go to Bankstown Airport where I jump on the plane with the, and they were men, boys in black then with the police dog.
And then you'd go on this tiny little plane and you have to fly to Orange. I mean, it was just... That is a magical team. I mean, I'm sure they're still, they're magical today. They work hard. You know, we're smart. We know what we need to achieve. We achieve it together as a team. You know, you still got your primary, your secondary, you do your Intel, you've got your doctor.
Like everybody was there and the boss would just, the boss was always there. So it was one of the saddest things that I lost when I left the cops was the negotiators.
Yeah, I know. And you're involved in the thick of it. I was in the tactical side of it. So I was laying out in the bush while you guys are talking to the crooks. But you're getting a first-class seat in some of the big crimes that are going down and big things. So I can imagine the excitement from it. It is. A lot of pressure there too, but...
Especially, there was a job in Northern Beaches and he had taken hostage his girlfriend and he had a knife and he was harming her whilst they were talking. And that was a very intense job. And it was a bedroom. So, you know, you guys were there. The negotiators are still talking at the door. That was a very intense job because you guys couldn't go in there because he's got the knife.
You had no means of... Getting into that room before he took her out. So, you know, you're right. You're right in the thick of everything. And there were a lot of funny times when I did a job where one of you guys had had a vasectomy and he was in a lot of pain. That's not funny. Oh, it was funny because we're trying to negotiate.
He's moaning because he's got to have an ice pack and he's there going, could you hurry up? I mean, they were the good times.
I must admit, sometimes when Suja's out in the bush where you didn't have the telephone communication or radio, it's on the loud hailers. And laying out there, if it was cold or hot, I'm laying there thinking, oh, for fuck's sake, give me the loud hailer. I'll talk them out because, yeah, I know you've got a certain... Could you just hurry up?
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