Police arrested a self-proclaimed New York psychic this past weekend for allegedly scamming over $60,000 from a troubled woman. The ‘fortuneteller’ convinced the victim by manipulating and terrifying her. She even made her believe she had an evil demon spirit inside her.
Nicholes convinced her that the spirit was a dead baby that her mother had miscarried before her birth. She told her that increasingly expensive “demon removal work” would be the only way to remove it from her body. The 35-year-old victim began seeing Victoria Nicholes, who went by “Psychic Lisa,” in September 2013.
She went to her because she and her spouse were experiencing marriage problems. 39-year-old Nicholes allegedly convinced the victim that her husband would leave her for a younger woman if she didn’t pay to remove the spirit through the demon removal work. The victim already suspected her husband was having an affair with this woman, and Nicholes took advantage of that.
She also convinced her that if she didn’t have the demon removed, she wouldn’t be able to keep a romantic relationship for the rest of her life. Bob Nygaard is a private investigator with lots of experience in psychic fraud cases. According to him, Nicholes told the victim that she was doing “God’s work.” In addition, she told her that she had to perform other rituals after completing the demon removal work.
These rituals would supposedly occur at the altar of a mysterious church the victim wasn’t allowed to visit or see. Initially, Nicholes allegedly told the victim she needed $33,000 in cash, $1,000 for each year the victim has been alive. She said she would spend this money on special crystals and candles required for the cleansing ceremony.
The Scam Kept Getting Bigger And Bigger
Nicholes then allegedly asked the victim to buy her a Rolex Daytona Everose watch with a black dial worth $30,000. Nicholes said she needed it for a ritual that would “spring back time” to before the victim was born. This action would supposedly allow her to remove the spirit demon. The scamming psychic also told the victim that the demon removal work wouldn’t work if she told anyone about it.
The money-draining didn’t stop after the ceremony, which also involved white bed sheets and urine from the victim. Nicholes told the woman that the ceremony worked and that she removed the demon but that now in an extra precaution to “renew her marriage,” she needed to buy the psychic a $2,400 tuxedo. Once the victim realized what was happening and got fed up trying to get her money back from Nicholes, she hired Nygaard.
She needed to build a criminal case against her, so they used two operatives to conduct undercover stings. They allegedly caught Nicholes directly soliciting and receiving money from both of them. The operatives described the phony psychic as “claiming and pretending to tell fortunes, and holding herself out as being able, by claimed or pretended use of occult powers.”
Police arrested Nicholes outside her parlor at 880 Lexington Ave this past Sunday. According to police, she has been charged with grand theft, scheming to defraud, and fortunetelling. Authorities also accuse her of scamming over $62,000 from the victim via deceitful tactics. Police had already arrested Nicholes in June of this year for grand theft. They accused her of working with a Bloomingdale employee to get store credit for unreturned items.
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