A man accused of pretending to work for Chance the Rapper’s charity was arrested on Tuesday, January 3rd, and hit with multiple felony charges linked to his deception.
According to CBS News, the suspect Demarco Franklin, 35, was charged with theft by deception, wire fraud, and false impersonation of a charity.
Franklin met a woman named Lulu Cole outside of her bank in January 2022, introduced himself as Jeffrey Washington, and offered to pay off her mortgage and cell phone bill through monies he had access to from a partnership between the Community and Economic Development Association of Cook County (CEDA) and Chance the Rapper’s charity.
Cole agreed to the help without checking out Franklin’s credentials.
Eventually, after Cole shared her information with Franklin, she received a confirmation that her phone bill was paid and payments were posted in her bank account for the mortgage.
She said she “felt ecstatic.”
Cole immediately told her sister Ibi Cole about the hookup, and she, too, despite being a little wary, gave her financials to the stranger and believed some of her bills were paid up.
The two women, unknowingly being scammed, decided to donate cash gifts to the charities he told them he worked for, so that others could be blessed.
In total, the sisters gave Franklin $70,000.
After they gave the donation, all hell broke loose. The bank reversed all the payments noting that some sort of scam was going on and that the women were even deeper in debt.
And just like that, Franklin was gone, no return calls or anything. Luckily, Lulu snapped a cell phone picture of the scammer when she first met him.
The photo helped authorities locate Franklin, noting he did the same thing and used the same name in 2008 to scam others.
Franklin has never worked with nor has any relationship with Chance the Rapper. CEDA also said they didn’t know him.
If convicted of these crimes, Franklin could serve double digits behind bars, with the theft by deception yielding a potential sentence of three to seven years in prison.
During his Wednesday, January 4th hearing, his bond was set for $50,000. No word on if he has a scam set up to satisfy the bond payment.
