A travel agent, named Maria Silvia scammed Manchester United striker, Cristiano Ronaldo of £250,000 (N140 million) after Ronaldo entrusted her with his virtual credit cards and pin.
Maria, 53-year-old also scammed Ronaldo’s super-agent Jorge Mendes of £14,000 and Manchester United winger, Nani, of over £1,500.
Due to her wrongdoing, Silvia got a four-year suspended prison sentence on Sunday after being earlier convicted by a Porto criminal court in 2017.
A report by Sun Sports revealed that Ronaldo was targeted as a victim of Silvia’s scamming spree for three years between February 2007 and July 2010.
Quoting a renowned Portuguese newspaper Jornal de Noticias, Sun Sports reported that the 36-year-old Ronaldo submitted a statement to the police in 2011.
It read, “The travel agent had to plug the hole in the firm’s accounts. She, therefore, began to bill those trips to Cristiano Ronaldo, who had an account at Geostar and for practical reasons, handed the agent a virtual credit card and pin code. It was a green route to taking money out.”
The £245,770 scammed from Ronaldo corresponded with around 200 trips that he never made between Portugal to the US, Africa, and other European countries.
The travel agent, who currently works as a cleaner, was first interrogated in 2013 before her eventual sentence on Sunday, September 19, 2021.
As part of her court deal, she had agreed to repay her firm a sum of £7,680 sparing her prison sentence.
