A US-born woman who disguised herself as an heiress to a $30m fortune while scamming nearly $100,000 from a television producer – who later sent her to prison and documented her misdeeds on a hit podcast – has been ordered extradited to Northern Ireland on a separate set of fraud charges.
Marianne “Mair” Smyth’s extradition to the UK was authorized by John Nivision, a US federal magistrate judge, on Thursday, more than two months after she was arrested at a short-term rental home in Bingham, Maine, court records show.
Smyth was staying there after an early release from a prison sentence for defrauding podcaster Johnathan Walton, whose Queen of the Con: The Irish Heiress chronicled his experience with her; how she allegedly ripped off others, including in Belfast, Northern Ireland; and prompted the decisive tip about her whereabouts in Bingham before her 23 February recapture there.
Nivison’s ruling did not say exactly when Smyth may be returned to Northern Ireland. The US secretary of state has the final word on extraditing accused criminals in the US to other countries.
Nonetheless, the secretary of state typically honors decisions like Nivison’s, making it an important legal victory for those seeking to hold Smyth accountable.
“It’s been said the pen is mightier than the sword, but let me tell you, the podcast is mightier still,” Walton said in a statement to the Guardian about Smyth’s extradition order. Alluding to how Queen of the Con helped authorities in the UK build a case against Smyth, Walton added: “My only desire now is for justice at long last for the victims in Northern Ireland.”
Court records recount how Smyth worked at several UK-based mortgage companies when she allegedly convinced five people whom she met on the job to give her a total of about £135,570 (or $172,000). She promised to invest the funds on their behalf in a non-existent, high interest-bearing account – but she simply kept the money for herself.
Police in Belfast moved to arrest Smyth in 2009 after the victims there came forward. But she was warned in advance that authorities were closing in on her, and she fled, going as far as killing more than a dozen dogs who were residing at her home, according to what Smyth’s daughter would later say on Queen of the Con.
Smyth all but disappeared before eventually re-emerging in Los Angeles. There, she befriended Walton – who earned his living as a reality TV producer – and convinced him that she was a wealthy Irish heiress locked in a legal battle with her family over $30m that she was supposed to inherit.
Walton gave Smyth just under $100,000, which she claimed she would use to secure her inheritance, during a four-year stretch beginning in 2013. Only there was never any inheritance. She instead used a considerable amount of Walton’s generosity to dispense with a 2016 guilty plea that she entered on charges that she stole money from a travel agency where she worked.
Ultimately, Walton investigated Smyth’s background and learned that she was a skilled swindler. Past ruses to take money from unsuspecting people included impersonating the actor Jennifer Aniston, a psychologist, a court-appointed child custody investigator, a psychic, a cancer patient and even a National Hockey League coach.
Walton also found that Smyth struck up affairs with married men and extorted money out of them to keep quiet about their dalliances.
Eventually, Walton persuaded Los Angeles police to arrest Smyth. She was convicted of grand theft by false pretense and given a five-year prison sentence in 2019. But she was freed in December 2020, less than two years later, when California prison officials released thousands of non-violent offenders from custody early in an effort to limit the spread of Covid-19 at the time.
Walton sought to warn the public about his dealings with Smyth – and what he learned about her history – first on a blog and then on Queen of the Con, was released in early 2021.
Northern Ireland authorities learned Smyth had absconded to the US through Walton’s blog. Then, the podcast prompted a listener to tell Walton where Smyth was staying, which he in turn provided to Northern Ireland police.
Police in Northern Ireland then collaborated with their US counterparts to arrest Smyth in Bingham, and they requested her extradition to the UK to face her unresolved charges there.
Prosecutors argued that Smyth’s prior convictions merited extradition. They also contended that she was still pursuing cons while in Maine, including by taking money from people who believe in the devil by impersonating a satanic high priestess.
Smyth fought her extradition, saying the evidence against her was insufficient. Yet Nivision deemed the evidence “sufficient to sustain” the fraud and theft charges against Smyth in Belfast.
Attempts to contact Smyth’s attorney on Friday were not immediately successful.
