Frank Abagnale

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Frank Abagnale (2007)

Frank William Abagnale Jr. (born April 27, 1948 in Bronxville , New York ) is a former American impostor and check fraudster who was active in the late 1960s to early 1970s . Today, with his company Abagnale & Associates, he is mainly active in matters of check fraud and document forgery as a consultant to various banks, airlines, hotels and other companies.

Abagnale's life was processed in popular culture in the film Catch Me If You Can by Steven Spielberg and a musical of the same name .

Life

Abagnale's father built a fairly profitable stationery store on Madison Avenue in New York City after the war . The young Frank had a particularly close relationship with his father and lived with him after his parents separated and later divorced, but was then returned to his mother's care when it was discovered that he had used his father's gasoline checks for months to get cash . His parents' divorce and the collapse of his father's business then led Frank to try his luck in New York City in 1964 with a checkbook and $ 200 in the account.

There Abagnale had to realize that without a high school diploma and with an hourly wage of 1.50 US dollars he could not lead the life he imagined. After he had backdated his date of birth by ten years in his driver's license , he opened a checking account to get blank checks that he wanted to exchange for cash with no funds. To increase his credibility, he posed as a co-pilot of Pan Am , as this profession was highly regarded in society after his experience. Under the pseudonym Frank Williams, Abagnale perfected his role as a Pan-Am pilot by familiarizing himself with the internal processes in the aviation company. This also included the free transfer of flight personnel to other airports in order to be able to take up their duties there. Abagnale, who was now wanted by the FBI as a check fraudster, used these so-called dead-head flights to expand his radius of action beyond New York and to escape his pursuers. For fear of exposure, he never flew with Pan Am himself, but used other airlines. After his identity was almost revealed on one of these flights, he went into hiding for some time. Among other things, he worked as a doctor and lawyer , albeit without a large area of ​​responsibility. Abagnale also claimed that he worked for a semester as a sociology assistant at Brigham Young University under the name Frank Adams. However, Brigham Young University denies this claim. Before he was 21 years old, he had caused damage totaling around 2.5 million US dollars as a con man in all 50 states of the USA and in 26 other countries. Above all, he used the money to finance his high standard of living .

After Abagnale was arrested in France in 1969 , he was extradited to Sweden after imprisonment in Perpignan, France , where he was held in a prison in Malmö . Eventually Abagnale was extradited to the United States and sentenced to twelve years in prison. In 1974, however, the US government offered him early release against disclosure of his knowledge. By directing his skills in a legal direction in favor of the FBI, among other things, Abagnale became one of the best-known experts in the United States.

In 1977 he appeared in the American version of the quiz show Tell the Truth , along with two other candidates; it should be guessed who was the real Frank Abagnale.

Contrary to reports to the contrary, Abagnale claims that he was never on the FBI's list of the top ten most wanted fugitives .

In art

Abagnale's life was published in a novel with the help of Stan Redding and was made into a film by Steven Spielberg under the title Catch Me If You Can , on whose screenplay he also worked. Leonardo DiCaprio played his role , his fictional opponent Carl Hanratty from the FBI played Tom Hanks . Abagnale made a cameo in the film and played a short scene as the French policeman who finally arrested him on Christmas Eve in Montrichard .

In addition, based on his biography, the musical Catch Me If You Can was launched, which premiered in 2011 with Aaron Tveit in the role of Abagnale.

literature

  • Frank W. Abagnale, Jr., Stan Redding: Catch me if you can: the true story of a brilliant deception. Heyne Verlag, 2003, ISBN 3-453-18871-3 .
  • Frank W. Abagnale, Jr .: The Art of the Steal: How to Protect Yourself and Your Business from Fraud, America's # 1 Crime. Broadway Books, New York 2002, ISBN 0-7679-0684-5 (English).
  • Frank W. Abagnale, Jr., Stan Redding: Catch me if you can: the amazing true story of the youngest and most daring con man in the history of fun and profit. Broadway Books, New York 2000, ISBN 0-7679-0538-5 (English).

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. So-called "shake checks", because the bank teller, instead of paying out the amount, usually shakes his head negatively.
  2. Ryan McIlvain: The Art of Steal. In: BYU NewsNet. BYU NewsNet., May 11, 2005, accessed April 22, 2013 .
  3. Deseret News: Did con man teach at BYU? December 26, 2002, accessed June 18, 2020 .
  4. Rachael Bell: Skywayman: The Story of Frank Abagnale Jr. In: crime-library. Archived from the original on December 21, 2014 ; accessed on June 14, 2016 .
  5. ^ Abagnale & Associates: About Frank Abagnale
  6. ^ "Gentleman criminal" from Abagnale to "Dagobert" - derStandard.at. Retrieved April 6, 2020 (Austrian German).
  7. Frank Abagnale: Comments concerning the book and the film, Catch Me If You Can