‘She has no remorse’
A new Netflix drama looks at the shocking story of con artist Anna Delvey, who lived a luxury life at the expense of others...
For nearly four years, Anna Delvey lived a life of luxury. Clad in designer clothes, she mingled with New York high society, living in prestigious hotels and dining in the most expensive restaurants – money seemed to be no object.
She told everyone she met that she had plans to set up a high-end arts and private members’ club in New York and was looking for investors – holding networking dinners in top restaurants.
But it was all a sham – far from being a German heiress with a £50 million trust fund as she had claimed, she was living a lie. She conned banks, forged statements and cashed fake cheques. She would also tricks friends into giving her money, too.
ARRESTED
The façade came crashing down when she was arrested in 2017 for not paying a restaurant bill and, in April 2019, she was convicted of four counts of theft of services, three counts of grand larceny, and one count of attempted grand larceny. She was sentenced to a minimum of four years in prison after she was found guilty of conning businesses and friends out of over £200,000. She was released in February 2021 but the following month she was arrested after she overstayed her visa. She faces deportation back to Germany but was still in ICE custody as of October.
Now her shocking life story has been made into a Netflix series, out later this month, with Julia Garner playing the scam heiress. The actress, who met her in prison while researching the part, said, “She’s actually really sweet. She was extremely charming. She’s very gentle. But then her voice gets less soft-spoken when she wants something. I wanted to see if she had any remorse about what happened, or time to reflect.” But she says Delvey told her, “I don’t really have that much time to think.”
Anna was born Anna Sorokin in January 1991 in a town just outside of Moscow, Russia.
Her father wasn’t the business tycoon she said he was, but a truck driver who later opened his own heating and cooling business.
In 2007, the family moved to Germany and after leaving school she became an intern at a public relations firm before moving to Paris and interning at trendy art magazine Purple, which is where she changed her name to Delvey.
In 2013, she went to New York and infiltrated the New York party scene. She started touting her idea of the Anna Delvey Foundation (ADF), a private members’ club and art space, and said she was looking for investment. Former friends remember that she would only pay in cash, asking them to pay for dinners and flights on their credit cards, claiming hers were broken.
Surprisingly, friends weren’t even suspicious when Anna asked to sleep on their sofa for a few nights or for them to pay for her taxi from the airport. They swallowed her explanation that she was having trouble moving funds from Europe.
Rachel DeLoache Williams, a former picture researcher for Vanity Fair, met Anna through friends in February 2016. They became best friends, and spent a lot of time together.
DECADENT
In March 2017, Anna suggested they went to Marrakesh together. She asked Rachel to buy the flights and said she’d pay her back. When the hotel bill was presented she again said that her credit card wouldn’t work. The trip, which Rachel describes as “decadent”, cost Rachel a staggering £47,000, which she spread across two credit cards, but Anna never repaid, leaving Rachel distraught and in a financial mess.
Explaining how she fell for Anna’s lies, Rachel, who has written a book about the experience, My Friend Anna Delvey, The True Story Of A Fake Heiress, said, “She was very believable. Not in the sense that she had manners – it was the opposite, I’d say – but in that she was so casually entitled. She acted in a way that implied she
❛ I HOPE FOR A TIME IN THE NEAR FUTURE WHERE SHE CAN BE A FOOTNOTE IN MY STORY ❜
didn’t have to care that much. If somebody was walking out of a door, for example, she’d walk through it as if they’d opened it for her.”
VICTIMS
Rachel was one of many scammed by Anna – her victims ranged from banks and hotels to restaurants and even a private jet company.
She falsified documents from foreign banks showing balances of £39 million to try to secure £14.5 million for her business project. She even convinced one bank to allow her to run up a £56,000 overdraft and cashed £39,000 in bad cheques – a trick known as “kiting”. She also failed to pay a £19,000 bill for chartering a private jet and an £8,700 hotel bill.
Anna was arrested in July 2017 for theft of services when she couldn’t pay a restaurant bill. She reportedly took off to California and missed a court date.
Afterwards, Rachel – who desperately wanted the money she was owed – went to the police and told them what had happened. The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office agreed to aid officials to track down her former friend, texting
Anna and arranging to meet her. That resulted in her arrest that October in California.
TRAUMATIC
As well as helping to track her down, Rachel testified against her former friend in court. During the trial Rachel said, “This is the most traumatic thing I have ever been through. I wish I had never met Anna. If I could have gone back in time to not be where I am today, I would. I wouldn’t wish this on anybody.”
Anna was found not guilty for defrauding Rachel. But remembering the trial,
Rachel said, “She looked at me and smirked; all the mystery was gone. She has no remorse...”
After a Manhattan jury found her guilty of other charges, Delvey spent just over three years in prison. In an interview after her release in February last year, Anna still seemed unrepentant, saying, “I think regret is just a useless feeling because I clearly cannot go back in time and change anything. I did what I did. I’m just trying to fix things and move on.”
The fake heiress con artist was soon up to her old tricks though, gallivanting around New York and once more staying in five-star hotels for a month. But in March 2021, she was arrested after she overstayed her visa. She faces deportation back to Germany, but it’s understood she’s currently still in custody.
Rachel said, “I don’t think I’ll ever be OK with what happened, but at the same time I don’t think it’s productive to waste any more energy on her.
“This doesn’t get to define me, and I look forward to leaving it in the past. I hope for a time in the near future where she can be a footnote in my story, and not the main event.”
By Mel Fallowfield
● Inventing Anna, Fri 11 Feb, Netflix ● My Friend Anna: The True Story Of Anna Delvey, The Fake Heiress Of New York City by Rachel DeLoache Williams is out now