Scotland’s oldest ghosthunter has seen some sights in his time, but even he was shocked when he was targeted by scammers claiming to sell vampire blood.
Tom Robertson has investigated tales of haunted houses, mysterious mountain monsters and vicious vampires in his seven-decade career.
Now the 79-year-old from Lanarkshire believes his reputation has brought him unwanted attention from a scam artist who recently used Tom’s website to advertise the supposed sale of blood.
The online message, from “Jerome”, states that he and his friend became vampires after consuming blood ordered online and encourages anyone who wishes to be like them and who wants “wealth, health and longevity” to get in touch.
Tom said: “I think I was targeted because I wrote about a vampire investigation in my autobiography. I know how popular vampires are with young people these days thanks to films like Twilight, so I wouldn’t like to think impressionable youths would believe this person and reply to his irresponsible message.”
But after our reporter emailed the would-be vampires to express interest, it quickly became apparent that this was, quite possibly, one of the most ridiculous attempts at a scam in the history of the net.
A person using the name Jerome Samson replied, welcoming our reporter to his “temple” and requesting a number of personal details including a school certificate scan and a picture. When this was refused, Jerome said before anyone could become a full vampire, a sacrifice had to be carried out.
Tom Robertson
The shopping list of ingredients for the sacrifice included the blood of a day-old snake, a human skull and hair from a virgin not things you’ll find in the local supermarket.
Handily, Jerome said if the items were too hard to come by, a payment of £100 could be sent to a Western Union account in Nigeria and he would provide them instead.
When our reporter failed to send the cash, Jerome sent further messages saying he was still waiting to do the sacrifice.
The Sunday Post later emailed Jerome to ask him about the scam, but he failed to reply.
Maybe he’d run into trouble extracting that snake blood.
Tom, who rose to fame when he attempted British TV’s first exorcism on BBC’s Tonight show in 1963, added: “Out of all the things I’ve seen and heard over the years, this is one of the craziest.”
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