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A New York City man has been indicted for allegedly stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars from a woman as part of a “romance scam” that started soon after they matched on the popular dating app Bumble.
Brandon Dae Up Kiehm allegedly stole approximately $272,000 from a 44-year-old woman he swiped right on, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin L. Bragg Jr. explained in a news release on Thursday, December 18. Kiehm, 45, has been charged with one count of second-degree grand larceny and has since been released on non-monetary bail.
Bragg shared that Kiehm met the woman online in 2019 and introduced himself under the name “Dae Up Lee Kim.” He claimed he “was a finance professional who had graduated from Stanford.”
In February 2020, he allegedly convinced the woman to purchase a home in Brooklyn at an auction. She was traveling for work at the time of the auction and couldn’t attend, though he convinced her she had to do it.
Kiehm allegedly told her that they were the second-highest bidders and in order “to maintain that second-place spot, they needed to send a cashier’s check to the trustee of the property.”
According to Bragg, Kiehm claimed he “communicated with the broker for the property over email.” He then told the woman to sign the terms and conditions of the sale and then to send a cashier’s check for $78,250 to the person who claimed to be the broker. However, Bragg said that the alleged “broker” was actually one of Kiehm’s associates.
Two weeks later, Kiehm allegedly told the woman that the highest bid was no longer on the table. “He instructed her to send additional funds to the same purported broker, and provided her with specific wire information, including the bank and account number,” Bragg said.
The woman sent two wire transfers, with the first being $86,750 and second being $107,000. She also sent a signed contract of sale that was allegedly provided by Kiehm.
The funds were sent to Kiehm’s associates, who moved them to a joint account they shared before the money was “quickly withdrawn as cash.”
The victim eventually learned of Kiehm’s scheme when she found an ID card with his legal name on it, as well as more ID cards and “mail addressed to that same name.”
He later admitted that his real name is Brandon Dae Up Kiehm, and the woman confirmed with the broker that Kiehm never placed a bid on the property.
“Romance scams are all too common, and our office is here to prosecute egregious conduct like this,” Bragg said in the news release.
The incident is not the first time Kiehm has found himself in trouble with the law. He was previously found guilty and was convicted of grand larceny, identity theft and scheme to defraud in December 2017, according to the Associated Press.
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He previously scammed two women of a total of $49,000 between July 2015 and October 2015 after he convinced them the money was for his relative’s cancer treatment. Kiehm was also found guilty of stealing $800 from a neighbor and $13,000 from a man who employed him as a dog walker.
Kiehm was sentenced to serve between two to six years in prison, while the Associated Press reported he was released after one year and eight months.
