A handsome 37-year-old Marine has found himself in the middle of a multi-billion-dollar romance scam.
Kagan Dunlap, from North Carolina, made a shocking discovery about 10 years ago when he found his photos were being used to con hundreds of women out of their money.
The Marine started receiving unusual messages around 2016, saying his photos were being used to catfish others on dating sites across the globe.
Dunlap, who’s been married to his wife Reilly, 36, for four years, has over two million combined followers on social media. This hasn’t stopped scammers. In fact, all his pictures and videos have given them more fuel.
One scammer even made a deepfake video of him asking for money while in uniform.
‘One time I was out hiking, and I got a call from some random person in Philadelphia saying they were talking to someone claiming to be me on Tinder, and they were asking them for money,’ Dunlap said.
‘I have no idea how they managed to get my phone number.’
The Marine first discovered someone was impersonating after he posted a picture of himself in a HUMVEE while on a field operation.
Kagan Dunlap, from North Carolina, made a shocking discovery about 10 years ago when he found his photos were being used to con hundreds of women out of their money
Dunlap, who’s been married to his wife Reilly, 36, for four years, has over two million combined followers on social media. This hasn’t stopped scammers. In fact, all his pics and videos have given them more fuel
He didn’t realize the photo showed a trip ticket with phone numbers listed on it.
A woman called one of the numbers — and it happened to be a sergeant.
‘She called him and was like, ‘Do you know this guy? I’ve been talking to him for a year and he hasn’t responded to my messages,’ said Dunlap.
‘The sergeant called me and was like ‘do you know this lady,’ and that’s when I was like ‘Oh. This is what’s going on.’
Since then, Dunlap has been contacted by hundreds of women. At one point, he was getting dozens of calls every day.
‘I honestly couldn’t tell you how many women it’s been, but easily hundreds. Easily,’ he said. ‘It’s just gross.’
Women started tracking down his wife and mom, too.
Some reached out to warn Reilly that her husband was up to no good. And even when he or his wife assured the women that they weren’t actually talking to him, some won’t let it go.
Women who have fallen for the scam have contacted Dunlap’s wife (left) to tell her about the communications. Other people have contacted Dunlap (right) to let him know that scammers are impersonating him
‘[They] couldn’t accept the fact that this isn’t actually happening. There was nothing anybody could say to change their mind or dissuade them,’ Dunlap said.
Thankfully, he and his wife have a pretty strong level of trust. ‘She understands that this is a thing that happens,’ the Marine explained.
Some women have even attacked Kagan, assuming he was the one scamming them out of money. He’s tried stopping it, but to no avail.
‘I was working with an organization that had a contact with someone in the Facebook Fraud department who could take fake accounts down,’ said Dunlap.
‘He left, though, so they haven’t been able to do much since.’
The fake profiles aren’t happening only to Kagan
‘I’ve gotten dozens of friends this has happened to,’ he said. ‘Anybody that I know that’s ever posted pictures of themselves in uniform on the internet has been affected by this in some way.’
Scammers find it especially easy to keep up a military facade with all the built-in excuses.
Dunlap has been contacted by hundreds of women. At one point, he was getting dozens of calls every day
They claim they can’t visit the victim because they’re ‘on tour’ or that they can’t video chat because there’s ‘no internet’ out in the field.
They’ll ask for money for ‘plane tickets’ or a ‘secure phone line.’ All these are lies, of course.
‘Its always some disaster befell them or their family, they can’t travel, the military isn’t paying them, or some other nonsense that’s not true,’ Kagan says. ‘They feed off people’s emotions.’
They also know victims romanticize a photo of someone in uniform and assume they’re trustworthy.
Dunlap also warned, ‘If the person won’t video chat with you, and they’re saying ‘I can’t do that because I don’t have internet here’, that’s your first red flag.’
Before internet services like Starlink, there wasn’t cell connection in remote environments. ‘But now, you can get internet in places like Syria, Iraq, it doesn’t matter,’ he said.
Scammers do extensive research on victims, looking for any information about their lives.
People who readily share personal info online are bigger targets. Scammers also target older adults and those who are likely experiencing loneliness.
Alicia Bultez, 81, met her scammer on Facebook. The profile was an Army officer stationed abroad, and Alicia, who had been single for seven years, quickly fell for him.
She sent him over $6,500 from her life savings and was almost roped into sending another $40,000. Luckily, the bank caught it and alerted her it was a scam.
Though people aged 30 to 39 reported the most fraud in 2022, people 60 and older lost the greatest amount of money to these scams.
‘They feed off their emotions and use love as a way to scam money,’ Dunlap said. ‘It’s real creepy and insidious.’
Out of the 70,000 reported romance scams in 2022, 18 percent of them were military scams.
Another 40 percent of the scams started on social media, with the scammer quickly moving to apps like WhatsApp or Telegram.
Now Dunlap is making his mission to get the word out any way he can.
‘Honestly, one person makes a difference,’ he said.