Vicky Pattison: Romance fraud victims turn pain into purpose

TV presenter and Strictly Come Dancing celebrity Vicky Pattison, who hosts a BBC podcast exposing romance fraud, has praised the victims for their bravery in speaking out.

The latest episode of Love Bombed: Wifehunter tells the story of Ray McDonald from Peterlee, in County Durham, who has spent the last 20 years defrauding women on an industrial scale.

He used dating apps to form multiple relationships, often within days of being released from prison.

Pattison hopes the podcast is helping to "change the narrative" for victims of romance fraud.

"Women who experience something like this, there is a huge stigma, a feeling of shame that seems to surround it," she says.

"We need to reframe it. They aren't to blame. Not at all.

"It's the men that are doing this that are."

Pattison has also discovered women are fighting back by turning to social media groups to expose men like McDonald and protect themselves.

It was on one of these - a site called Are We Dating The Same Guy? - a post appeared about him that would later lead to his imprisonment.

"I love that site," Pattison says.

"It has saved so many of my friends."

The post was written in 2024 by a woman worried her aunt had begun to see a man who was "almost too perfect".

The woman, who the BBC has agreed to call Anna to protect her aunt's identity, says she asked herself: "What's the worst that could happen?"

"So I posted a status in the group asking if anyone knew a man called Ray in his 50s who claimed to be a police probation officer and said he owned a villa in Cyprus," she says.

The comments started pouring in, with many women saying they were seeing the same man.

One messaged to say a friend had just married him in Dubai.

Northumbria Police would later acknowledge how important that single post was in leading to McDonald's arrest and imprisonment for four years and six months later that year.

Not that prison appears to deter him.

Since being discharged from the army in 2000, McDonald has spent 20 years defrauding what the force believes may be hundreds of women, leading to seven spells behind bars.

"There is such misunderstanding about this sort of crime," Pattison says.

"I have heard people say it would never happen to me, how can you not see the red flags?

"But as someone who has had their heart broken and desperately wanted to be in love, I can feel real empathy for these women."

Two of McDonald's victims lost their homes because of the debt they accrued in order to give him money.

In the podcast, Newcastle-born Pattison asks 58-year-old Caroline, from County Durham, how she thinks her life would have turned out if she had never met him.

"I'd not feel ashamed that I'd let my kids down, that I've got nothing to leave them," Caroline says.

But Pattison feels this narrative - that it is the woman at fault - "is what the people who commit these crimes prey on".

"They rely on that," she says. "But, if we can break down that stigma, if we can celebrate these women's bravery, their ability to rebuild their lives, to speak out in the hopes that less women will fall prey to this, I think we're doing a really good thing."

Susan, who is 51 and lives in nearby Wearside, feels the results of the judicial system do not reflect the damage McDonald does.

"He destroyed my life and went to prison for 18 months and then came out again," she says. "I'm still picking up the pieces now."

Consultant clinical psychologist Annabel Poate-Joyner says McDonald displays clear "narcissistic traits".

"I don't see any reason why he's going to stop, because he's been to prison many times for this and that hasn't stopped him," she says.

McDonald was most recently released from prison at the end of 2025 but, within days, the BBC found him on a dating app and went undercover with a fake profile to catch him.

Despite having boasted to "Kaye" that he had a large car, a holiday lodge and a job as a deep sea diver, he maintained when he was eventually confronted he was just "looking for friendship".

Fraud now makes up almost half of all crimes, with more than four million cases a year, according to the Crime Survey of England and Wales.

Romance fraud, which can affect both women and men, is still a small, although growing, part of that total but Steve Kettle from the fraud reporting service Report Fraud says it has "a huge emotional cost".

"The fraudsters tend to follow the same pattern," he says.

"It starts with a plea for sympathy, a crisis of some kind they need help with, which is followed up, over a period of time, with a request for money."

McDonald's favourite ploy was to say his daughter had cancer and ask to borrow money to buy her gifts or because he was missing work to look after her.

Susan wonders why dating websites "aren't doing more to protect people" from fraudsters like McDonald.

"I saw his profile on one, and reported it to the site with links to news reports about him, but I don't think I heard anything back," she says.

Michael Lawrie, who worked for 25 years in online dating sites' safety and customer experience departments, says they need "to get users on quickly" - and plenty of them.

"You can't be verifying emails or phone numbers, you're putting them straight out there," he says.

McDonald used a number of sites including Badoo, Hinge, Tinder and Plenty of Fish.

A spokesperson for Badoo said the company worked "closely with law enforcement" and had dedicated channels for them to share information about anyone banned from using dating apps due to court orders or parole restrictions.

Plenty of Fish, Hinge and Tinder are all owned by Match Group, which said safety was "a primary area of focus".

A spokesperson said the company invested "heavily in proactive tools, advanced detection systems and user education" and worked closely with law enforcement, "enabling authorities to share information and request data to support their investigations".

"Clearly whenever there's any new technology, it doesn't take people long before they find a way to use it to their own advantage, to hurt others," Pattison says.

Susan would also like to see longer sentences for fraudsters.

"It's not about the money, it's the abuse.

"He needs to not get away with it and not just go and sit pretty in prison for a couple of years and plan his next move."

Judges and magistrates are constrained by the sentencing guidelines for fraud which has a maximum prison sentence of 10 years. Since September 2024, many offenders have been released after serving only 40% of their sentence.

Susan says she would also like "some form of register so people can do checks on him like they do on child offenders or domestic violence perpetrators".

But public access to criminal records is largely limited to prospective employers via the Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS).

At least one of McDonald's victims said she had used Clare's Law - which gives people the right to know if a partner has any history of violence or abuse - but the romance fraudster often uses a false name.

Former police officers Emma Coles and Sam Hutchinson, now private investigators, say the most effective weapon women have against people like McDonald is other women and the Facebook groups where they can share information.

"These groups are very, very good," Hutchinson says. "People are paying attention to them, posting about somebody if they feel worried or feel that there are some red flags there."

McDonald's most recent spell in prison came about because somebody did just that, out of concern for someone she loved.

"A simple question ended up unravelling everything he had been hiding," Anna says.

"Realising how many people had been hurt, and how close my auntie came to being one of them, was overwhelming.

"It was terrifying to think that all of this came to light because of one post, and heartbreaking to see how easily trust had been exploited."

Vicky Pattison believes "getting the word out" is an important way to stop romance fraud.

"That's why I'm using my platform to talk about this.

"To celebrate those incredibly brave, brave women who have come forward and are turning their pain into purpose."

• If you have been affected by any of the issues raised in this story, information and support can be found at the BBC Action Line

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