[00:00:03] Justin West: She noticed these payments, these transfers to something called Coinbase.
And she saw that his bank account had been drawn down to next to nothing.
[00:00:22] Bob: Welcome back to The Perfect Scam.
I’m your host, Bob Sullivan.
I hope you’ll forgive me.
And I do too.
[00:01:32] Justin West: My name is Justin West.
I’m a plastic surgeon.
I was born in California.
I have one brother, Matthew West, who’s my younger brother.
My father, Jan and John… my father was a surgeon, my mother was a nurse.
My brother is about 212 years younger than me, so we were very close growing up.
[00:01:53] Bob: When I talked to Justin, he was surrounded by packing boxes.
That’s the kind of family we’re talking about here.
“I had two mothers,” because Justin was very, is very protective.
He’s very much like me.
He is a smother mother.
He always fit in.
Matthew fit in anywhere.
And he could keep up with anybody.
I played a lot of sports growing up; he did not.
I always wanted to be what my father, you know did.
So he told my mom, “I will play sports, but I will only play football.”
And she called his bluff and let him play.
And Matt ended up being really good at it.
[00:04:09] Bob: Matt did a lot of little things to get a rise out of Mom.
[00:04:13] Jan West: Matt did not refer to me as Mom, Mother, Mommy.
[00:04:36] Justin West: Yeah, so my dad used to call Matthew, Matty Moo.
Matt grew his hair out long.
He’s my, you know, little brother."
[00:06:15] Bob: “I’ll take care of Matt forever.”
A couple of years after school, Matt starts working in finance.
Becomes an analyst for a real estate investment trust, a REIT, and did very well.
He worked for Sam Zell, one of the world’s most famous real estate investors.
Just had a really good uh career trajectory uh with that group.
Loved everything about REITs.
Was very successful in this industry.
He was very successful.
[00:07:36] Bob: Matt was charming and charmed.
Everything Matt touches seems to turn to gold.
He dabbles in film and well, even that works out for him.
[00:07:46] Justin West: He actually went and started working on the set of a movie.
He worked on “The Replacements” with Gene Hackman and Keanu Reeves.
[00:07:59] Justin West: He’s had a really fascinating life.
I mean he’s had a really, he’s taken some really fascinating journeys in life.
[00:08:26] Bob: There was another journey coming, however.
A journey Matthew and the West family never expected to take.
Sometimes the ER doesn’t want to do it."
There’s something there."
So we kind of prepared him.
Don’t worry about it."
And then he called back later that afternoon with his diagnosis, and it was just soul crushing.
[00:09:24] Bob: Matt has brain cancer.
A very deadly form of brain cancer.
The family is told that most people only live about 8 months after their diagnosis.
And that cancer always comes back.
That style of treatment made no sense to me.
So I asked them, “What’s the maintenance we’re going to do?
Which it inevitably does.
And they said, “That’s not how we do it.”
And ultimately, we found a program in China that was doing CAR T therapy.
So we put Matt on a plane.
[00:11:41] (clip of Matt) Dorian, happy birthday.
Welcome to the guitar family, so I thought I’d introduce you to a little birthday jam.
Better than Happy Birthday, even better.
Um, so, with plenty of errors and without further ado, here we go.
But we had to assign a doctor for that treatment.
So that was in California.
[00:13:20] Bob: The drugs are helping but they aren’t a cure.
Both the brain cancer and the treatments bring on painful symptoms.
And last fall, things take a turn for the worse.
I mean is he getting nauseous all the time?
He is on a huge medication regimen.
He takes, I mean, you know, probably two dozen medications a day.
So the cancer is, unfortunately I think, catching up.
He’s extremely vulnerable.
And like I said, it’s going to be four years.
But with the diagnosis in October, progression, I think he started searching for relief.
[00:17:20] Bob: Like everyone does day, Matt starts searching for relief online.
So I think he started searching for help.
How is he going to prepare for this, the finality of it all.
And I think he was looking, you know, for some, for end control for end-stage cancer.
[00:18:03] Bob: So at one point, he does what I think anyone would do.
He, he goes online himself looking for, for ways to be more comfortable, right?
[00:18:11] Justin West: Absolutely.
And he was clearly sick.
He looked really nervous.
Did you, did you drink something new?”
You know, “Let’s talk about this.”
And I said, “What?
How the heck does a chocolate bar make you sick?”
And uh, apparently psilocybin can make you, makes a lot of people quite nauseous.
So that was the first indication that we had that there was a problem.
[00:20:21] Bob: Matt had bought the chocolate bars from someone he met online.
Really afraid of something else.
[00:22:48] Bob: A lot of trouble?
Justin and Jan don’t believe it.
It must be some mistake.
But Matt, severely debilitated from cancer, from all the treatments and already predictably paranoid is inconsolable.
He believes he’s in terrible trouble.
And a few days later, trouble does arrive.
And that never happened.
And there was no reason for him to be overdrawn.
[00:23:21] Bob: Jan drops everything to investigate.
[00:23:24] Jan West: I took Matthew to the bank because I had no power of attorney.
And that’s when we started getting access to his accounts and finding more and more information.
And we were in shock.
Justin and Jan start trying to put the pieces together.
[00:24:33] Bob: Where is the money?
And why is Matt so convinced the police are coming to his house?
That’s next on The Perfect Scam.
Call the AARP Fraud Watch online grid Helpline at 877-908-3360.
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Be sure to find us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
For AARP’s The Perfect Scam, I’m Bob Sullivan.
