The FBI is looking for more possible victims of Aurora Phelps, a woman indicted in Nevada for allegedly luring several men on dating apps to Mexico, drugging them and stealing their financial information.
U.S. District Court for the District of Nevada.
According to court documents filed in October 2023, 43-year-old Phelps, who is also known as Aurora Flores, Aurora Velasco and Aurora Alvarez, is linked to at least two deaths and one disappearance. She is accused of befriending older men she met in person or online and gaining access to their bank, social security or retirement accounts by sometimes drugging them.
FBI asks victims of alleged romance scam to come forward
The FBI on Friday issued a news release asking other possible victims to come forward after prosecutors filed a motion to unseal the indictment earlier this month. The bureau is legally mandated to identify victims of federal crimes it investigates, but all identities of victims will be kept confidential, it said.
Investigators posted several photos of Phelps, including a screenshot of the dating app Tinder showing the long-, brown-haired woman with a short blurb that said, in part, “I am looking for friends. No fake people.”
FBI
The unsealed indictment by a grand jury in Nevada charged Phelps with wire fraud, mail fraud, bank fraud, identity theft and kidnapping. Phelps was taken into custody in September 2023 in Mexico, according to the motion to unseal, where she remained pending extradition to the U.S.
FBI Special Agent In Charge Spencer Evans described the allegations as “romance scam on steroids,” CBS affiliate KLAS reported.
Aurora Phelps’ alleged victims
According to a 21-count superseding indictment, Phelps allegedly met one victim in July 2021 on an online dating service, going on dates with him over the next two months as she “attempted to persuade him to travel with her to Mexico.”
In November 2021, Phelps met him at his house, where they ordered lunch for delivery, and she allegedly “caused him to consume a prescription drug without his knowledge and consent,” the indictment read. She then allegedly left the elderly man mostly unconscious for the next five or so days, stealing his iPhone, iPad, driver’s license and bank cards and using the information to sell his Apple stock — worth approximately $3.3 million — on E-Trade. However, she was unable to remove the money from his account, the indictment said.
FBI
In 2022, Phelps met another elderly man online. This man then met Phelps in person at a Las Vegas restaurant where she allegedly gave him medication and other substances that “caused him to become lethargic and confused,” the indictment said.
She is again accused of gaining access to the man’s financial accounts, using his American Express credit card, influencing him to fly with her to Mexico City and using his Wells Fargo card to rent a hotel room. Several days later, Phelps returned to the U.S. without the second victim, who had died in the hotel, prosecutors alleged.
In addition to the credit card usage, Phelps also allegedly transferred $7,000 from the victim’s Capital One account to buy a motorcycle and made two other wire transfers of approximately $1,530 and $2,319 into her own account and her husband’s. The victim’s Social Security account password had also been changed allegedly by Phelps.
In December 2021, the alleged scammer met a third victim at the Hard Rock Hotel in Guadalajara, Mexico, where she also resided, the court document detailed.
“She left the hotel with him, and caused him to disappear,” the indictment read, void of additional details.
Throughout the following year, Phelps would transfer the third victim’s monthly social security payments to herself and steadily took money from the victim’s bank account by making purchases and withdrawals from ATMs, prosecutors alleged. She is also accused of taking his BMW and allegedly tried to make herself a beneficiary on the victim’s union retirement account.
The last victim listed in the federal indictment was found dead on his bathroom floor in Guadalajara, Mexico, a day after prosecutors claim he went on a date with Phelps on or about May 30, 2022.
Following the same pattern as with other victims, Phelps is accused of stealing from the final victim’s accounts or attempting to access them, including using one of his accounts to buy an APMEX gold coin that she allegedly mailed to her house.
CBS News has reached out the FBI for more information. It’s unclear whether Phelps has representation yet, and her extradition to the Nevada is ongoing.
If convicted on all counts, Phelps faces a maximum statutory penalty of life in prison, according to prosecutors.
