Yana Demiduik

Victim Location 94947

Total money lost $300,000

Type of a scam Romance

I am reporting this romance scam this on behalf of my family who believes our uncle is deeply involved in a romance scam with a woman named "Yana Demiduik" who says she is in Russia.

She contacted him on Facebook at some time in 2017 and their conversation moved to email. She created an email address ([email protected]) and proceeded to woo him. He later announced to the family that he had fallen in love with this woman and was bringing her to the United States to marry him.

At first we thought this was a mail order bride situation and we’d listen patiently when he talked about the process of bringing her to the U.S. In about a year we realized he was wiring her money (could never mail anything because everything sent in the mail is supposedly "stolen" in Russia). We have asked if he talks with Yana on the phone and he says yes, but then says it is too expensive for her to talk on the phone.

After a while his bank stopped allowing him to send money, so he started recruiting friends to send money–and then their banks blocked them. Here it is 2020, and we know he has changed banks 3 times. He was banned from Western Union and just got blocked from Money Gram. He is calling in favors from friends now getting them to send the money… not even to Yana anymore, but Yana’s "sister, Rita," and now to Rita’s friends, who then give the money to Yana. As soon as Yana receives the money she immediately emails our uncle who feels happy he is helping her.

Every day there is a new story about how she will be with him within a week, but then the days go by and she is not here. The current story is that this is part of Trump’s ban on immigrants (a pretty good ruse, if you ask me). He has sent thousands of dollars to Yana.