Never Saw Me Coming

Author: Tanya Smith

This is an unbelievable story of how Tanya Smith defrauded the US Banking System out of millions of dollars. But the story is much more than just a clever bank heist. It starts out with Tanya growing up as a young black girl in a suburb of Minneapolis. Her father was a successful businessman and she was bored with what society had to offer her in terms of education or role models. 

Her first social manipulation was to get an audience with Michael Jackson. She tried to get his phone number and even made a trip to his residence in California without the knowledge of her parents. From there she quickly graduated to deceiving employees of utility companies into altering account information to void utility bills of friends and relatives. She would call the utility company and impersonate a co-worker who was locked out of the system. She would them ask the co-worker to perform the transaction to clear overdue bills and such.

The skills she developed while manipulating utility companies laid the groundwork for her later, more sophisticated frauds against banks, where she would execute wire transfers and siphon off millions. She posed as a colleague and asked bank employees to disclose sensitive information that she could use to execute fraudulent wire transfers. She would wire the money to random individuals who would cash them and share the proceeds with her. She employed a network of “runners” who she maintained a wall of separation from so that even if they were caught, it wouldn’t lead the FBI to her. 

She was in and out of jail a couple of times, and I highly recommend reading her book to learn the details. I couldn’t put the book down and since then have been telling everyone who will listen to read the book!