The Case For Anna Sorokin

Anna Sorokin was recently released to home confinement from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody.

So many people are fascinated by Anna Sorokin, usually known as Anna Delvey. She is the fake heiress of New York City. Anna wanted to mix with the wealthy elite in New York, and wasn't about to let the fact that she didn't have any money stop her.

Anna was from a Russian family that lived in Germany, and she had German citizenship. The story that she told in New York was that she had inherited a fortune from her family's business in Germany. She was well-informed and well-traveled and could easily talk as if she was rich.

Anna always had to have the best of everything, luxury hotels, high-class restaurants and, first class while traveling. If the people who were charmed by her would just pay her way, they would certainly be repaid when she got her arts foundation set up, which was why she was in New York.

Anna sometimes did have a lot of money, when she would treat friends to expensive restaurants and give out $100 tips. Unfortunately her money didn't come from any inheritance. It came from her knowing how the banking system works, forging money transfer receipts, and her skill at depositing fake checks and then withdrawing money before the checks bounced.

Despite how she managed to charm most of the people that she met, Anna must have known that she would eventually be caught. But given her ways of reasoning I cannot help wondering if that was actually part of her plan.

This kind of case always gets a lot of media attention. Someone playing the system and winning, at least for a while. If what she wanted was fame and attention, she would actually get it by getting arrested.

Her crimes were mostly against major banks, which were still resented as having been responsible for the 2008 economic crash. Maybe, in her own way of thinking, she would come across as a kind of Robin Hood character, since he had generously tipped so many people. She just might be able to charm the court and be found not guilty, and would have gained all of the free publicity that her arrest and trial generated.

Even if Anna was sent to prison her sentence would be relatively short. She hadn't physically hurt anyone and her financial mishaps could be portrayed as more about carelessness and misunderstanding than of actual crime.

Then, when Anna was released from prison, she would really have achieved her goal of being a New York socialite. Even if she still didn't have any actual money, she would make up for it with fame. Her name would be all over the news and would be world-famous as the girl who, at least in her own mind, outsmarted the system.

After reading about her exploits I would say that eventually arrest and highly-publicized trial were part of the plan all along. What I find really interesting is how she almost always looked at the camera when her photo was being taken in the courtroom. This is very rare for people on trial but she knew that it was part of her publicity for the future.

She lived extravagantly in New York City, living at some of the best hotels and having her meals in expensive restaurants. She charmed people into paying her bills and got what money she did have from kiting checks and taking out loans based on forged receipts of money transfers.

Upon being caught and convicted, she was sentenced to 4-12 years in prison. But she was released after serving a fraction of her sentence, less than 2 years, before being detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) from which she has now been transferred to house arrest. But why was she was released from prison so early. It is really about our values and what our society is all about.

The case of Anna Sorokin involves how different something can look over the long-term, as opposed to the short-term. Both in our individual lives, as well as in history as a whole, events can look very different over the long-term.

How many people, down through history, have been scorned, ignored or, villified, but exonerated afterward? Many people who have changed the world for the better had been seen as criminals or radicals in their time. 

When revolutionary events take place their impact is often not realized until much later. The events were considered as either failures, or of less-than-important, at the time. An ideal example is the French Revolution, which opened the modern political era.

Could it be that the case of Anna Sorokin is one of those events that end up changing our view of things, even though it is not realized at the time?

First, Anna herself actually achieved her presumed goal of getting into New York high society by being caught and put on trial. Now everyone knows who she is, even if it is for the wrong reason, and media contracts seem likely to bring her wealth even if she is deported.

Second Rachel Williams, the former friend who lost a lot of money to Anna but was then instrumental in getting her arrested, received a book contract that more than made up the money she had lost. 

In the short term the fraud that Anna Sorokin committed was certainly wrong. But can you see how, both for her and those associated with her, it looks very different in the long-term? Her crimes turn out to be the kind of story that fascinates people and, if they wish to sell their story to the media, a financial blessing for anyone who came in contact with her.

Don't forget the Kardashian Family. The Kardashians have built a billion-dollar financial empire, selling all manner of fashion products and cosmetics, but they were launched to fame by their father's association with O.J. Simpson. If not for the 1994 O.J. murder case, it is highly unlikely that we would ever have heard of the Kardashians.

This idea of good coming from bad underpins our very existence. A mother's birth pangs result in the birth of a child. The Crucifixion of Jesus results in our salvation. Rainy days result in crops growing so that we can have food.

The United States is based on business, on economic activity. Anna Sorokin's crimes of fraud have already generated economic activity that far outweigh what she did wrong, a movie and the book mentioned above. 

As for the money that Anna allegedly defrauded, she spent that money in ways that generated economic activity and provided jobs, particularly at hotels and restaurants. She defrauded, or allegedly attempted to defraud, banks. But the economic activity that all of this generated meant that people, on the whole, have more money that they will deposit in banks.

Anna Sorokin never physically hurt anyone. Her alleged crimes fascinate people, and thus generate economic activity, but that is also true of serial killers. But Anna's alleged crimes cannot possibly be compared to a killer. 

Anna Sorokin's actions were crimes, according to the law. But what about our culture, what America stands for? Might Anna's actions look any different if we look through the prism of our culture?

One thing that really stands out is that Anna believed in America, and in New York City. It is a compliment to New York, and to the country, that she thought she could get rich there. We may not agree with her methods but we have to admit, at least to some degree, that her spirit was in the right place.

Anna certainly had moxie, or chutzpah, or whatever you want to call it. This is a characteristic that has always been valued in America, and especially in New York City. New York is where people came to make money, and Anna is the kind of person that made the city.

How many times have we heard the advice, "Fake it until you make it"? Well that was what Anna Sorokin did. She wasn't wealthy in reality, so she pretended she was. Maybe she committed what legally were crimes but she was just trying to fit into the culture around her.

What about all of the people who started the business enterprises that made New York City, and America as a whole? Were all of them meticulously honest about who they were and how much money they had? Borrowing one's money, and then borrowing some more to pay that back, and then keep borrowing to keep paying back, is more common than we might think.

Could the real problem be the gap between our cultural values and our law? Is Anna really a criminal, or did she just fall into the chasm between our law on one side and our cultural values on the other?

Anna was convicted of defrauding money. But she didn't actually break into anywhere and "steal" anything. There is a fundamental principle of American consumerism called "Let the buyer beware". This means that while someone selling something isn't allowed to blatantly lie about the product, at least not in writing, the burden is also on the buyer to be aware and be careful of what they are spending their money on.

There is another well-established consumer principle that "If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is". If someone walks up to you, asks to borrow money, and then can't pay you back, whose fault is it? Isn't it the responsibility of the lender to make sure that the borrower has the means to repay?

What Anna Sorokin did, in applying for bank loans, was dishonest. But dishonesty doesn't necessarily meet the definition of criminal. People are not always honest with their resumes and dating profiles, but we don't put them in jail for it. 

Where was Anna's heart during all of this? The only conclusion I can come to is that she really believed, once her arts foundation and associated businesses got off the ground, that she would then be able to pay everyone back. It isn't like she "took the money and ran". But I also believe that her "Plan B" was to let the resulting media publicity make her into a celebrity if she got caught, and that is exactly what happened.

This is at least as much about how we see things as about what Anna actually did. For all we know the way this might go down in history is that Anna might have finally led our values out of the Robber Baron era, in that our values need to be more nuanced, as opposed to the stark simplistic black and white of right and wrong.

This is because, while what Anna did was technically wrong, it also ultimately benefited many people, particularly those she had scammed. It has generated economic activity that far outweighed the original harm done. Even the money that she defrauded was spent in ways that benefited hotels and restaurants, and provided jobs, she also gave out generous tips. Nothing destructive like illegal drugs was ever involved.

Anna Sorokin was sentenced to 4-12 years in prison, but she was released after serving only a fraction of the minimum sentence, less than 2 years. I am sure that the reason her prison term was cut so short was that we instinctively know that what we have seen in this posting is true. America should actually take it as a compliment that someone like Anna chose to come here.

What if Anna Sorokin, or Anna Delvey, had been around a hundred years ago? She would have been the toast of the original Waldorf-Astoria:

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