Netflix released a mini-series "Inventing Anna" about Anna Delvey, a Russian-born swindler who posed as a wealthy German heiress. talks about the history of the fraudster, her collaboration with Netflix, royalties and life after the show.

Who is Anna Delvi?

Anna Delvi (real name - Sorokina) was born on January 23, 1991 in Domodedovo near Moscow. At school, she studied English, French and German (the latter was the most difficult). Anna's father, Vadim, drove groceries to retail outlets in his car, and her mother owned a small store. When another child appeared in the family, the woman left the business and became a housewife.

The head of the family kept in touch with merchants from Germany and in 2007 managed to move the family to the small German town of Eschweiler. There Sorokin worked as a truck driver and repaired refrigerators.

After graduating from high school, Anna entered St Martin's Central School of Art in London. Without completing her studies, Sorokina returned to Germany and got a job in the PR service. Communication skills helped Anna quickly develop her career. Her next job was the French glossy magazine Purple. The Russian emigrant quickly made connections, began to go to secular parties and surrounded herself with the elite. In 2013, she moved to the USA.

Fictitious identity and fraud

In 2016, Anna came up with the pseudonym Delvi, the legend of her billionaire father from Germany, and a plan to open a private club, the Anna Delvi Foundation, which will allegedly display her family's art collection.

"Anna, posing as a wealthy German heiress, was trying to get a $22 million loan to open a private club," the U.S. Attorney's Office said in a statement. “She provided an employee of the City National Bank in Midtown with forged documents from other banks indicating her accounts abroad, totaling about $60 million.”

Anna applied with false documents to various banks, not only to Midtown. In total, she was given about $ 200 thousand. She always looked elegant, dressed expensively and tastefully, flew in a private jet. In the image of an intelligent heiress from Europe, Anna made acquaintances with top managers, artists and celebrities.

Positioning herself as a dollar millionaire, the swindler settled in expensive hotels and did not pay for accommodation. Delvi's bills were paid by wealthy friends whom she skillfully manipulated. One of her excuses was the delay in transferring money from abroad. For the same reason, Anna's bank card often "did not work". The total amount of fraudster thefts from banks, hotels and friends amounted to at least $ 275 thousand.

Influential friends helped the girl choose a building for the Anna Delvey Foundation - an old six-story house on Park Avenue in New York. According to an article by Jessica Pressler in New York Magazine, Anna had a creative director in London who helped her with the foundation's branding. However, in 2017, the plans of the fraudster collapsed - she was arrested on six charges of stealing services.

Prison and parole

In May 2019, Sorokina was found guilty on eight counts, including second-degree embezzlement, attempted embezzlement and theft of services. She was sentenced to a term of 4 to 12 years in prison and a fine of $24,000. Sorokina was also charged with paying about $200,000 to the victims.

After being released on parole on February 11, 2020, Anna returned to her previous lifestyle. She settled in the prestigious NoMad Hotel in New York, signed contracts with the media and was going to release clothes. Specifically, Delvey planned to create lingerie, a line of prison-style homemade suits called The Corrections Collection, and T-shirts with the phrases "Anna Delvey - more than El Chapo" and "Anna Delvey - she has more deals than Netflix." There were rumors about printing T-shirts with Anna's bank QR code so that people could send money to her.

Delvi's only income at that time was a deal with Netflix - she received £235,000 (about $320,000) for using her story in the series. According to the Daily Mail, she paid out £147,000 to banks and hotels, as well as £17,500 in fines. Mark Kremers, owner of London-based and Paris-based digital agency Future Corp, told the Daily Mail that the scammer still owes him £16,800 for branding work he did for the private club.

"She told me, 'Don't worry, it's just a little hiccup with the transfer of funds,'" Kremers complained. “But every single day, every week, for more than a year, there were different excuses.”

His clients included fashion brand Moncler, artist Damien Hirst and the New York Museum of Modern Art.In exchange for an interview, Delvey persuaded an American TV channel to buy her a new luxury wardrobe. She dined at expensive restaurants and returned to the hotel before the 9pm curfew. But the beautiful life did not last long - just six weeks after parole, Sorokina was arrested again. This time - for an expired tourist visa, on which she entered the United States. Since March 26, 2021, she has been in jail in Orange County (in upstate New York) awaiting deportation to Germany.

About Netflix

On February 11, Netflix released the mini-series "Inventing Anna" about the history of the creation of the article by New York Magazine journalist Jessica Pressler "How a girl cheated the New York crowd and the banks." Shonda Rhimes, best known for Grey's Anatomy, How to Get Away with Murder and The Bridgertons, is the showrunner for the project. Journalist Pressler became co-producer, and Julia Garner (Ozark, The Americans and Maniac) played the fraudster.

Each episode begins with the caption "This story is absolutely true, except for the part that is completely made up." According to the plot, a pregnant journalist from Manhattan Magazine, Vivian Kent (Anna Chlumsky), refuses to write an article proposed by the editor about harassment on Wall Street and proposes her own topic: an investigation into the history of the swindler Anna Delvey.

The editor criticizes the idea, and the journalist makes her own appointment with Delvey at the prison on Rikers Island. When talking with Kent, the swindler behaves impudently: for example, she reproaches her because of cheap clothes and weight gain during pregnancy. Nevertheless, something attracts the journalist in a cheeky interlocutor. She is completely immersed in the topic, hoping to prove her worth in the profession before giving birth.

Sorokina's life after the release of the series

After the release of the show, Anna Delvey resumed active Instagram. She uploads most of the content in stories - most often these are screenshots with news about her. The number of subscribers to the Delvi page is growing daily. In a Daily Mail comment, she revealed that she had not seen the series yet.

“I want to watch the series, but I have to wait until I get out of prison,” Sorokina said. "Obviously I can't get a Netflix account while I'm incarcerated."

Despite interacting with Shonda Rhimes, Anna stated that she does not know if the drama is true. In prison, she writes memoirs and negotiates with publishers.

“I am the only person who can tell my story,” she said. “The only good thing I've managed to achieve while I'm here is that I definitely have a lot of time to write.”

The girl also said that she was in talks with some galleries about showing her drawings, finishing writing a book, planning to launch her own clothing line and working on a podcast. Now Anna is worried about a possible deportation to Germany with a 10-year ban on entering the United States, because she wants to live in New York. Former cameraman and Delvey's assistant Douglas Higginbotham said he did not condone Anna's crimes, but believed that she had already been punished enough.

“If she really has to leave the States, I think she will feel completely defeated,” he said. New York is where she wants to be. She wants to live this life; she wants to live like Jeff Bezos."

At the same time, Sorokina does not fully admit her guilt and declares that she "never deceived people."

“My crimes were against financial institutions. The definition of fraud in America is that you permanently deprive people of funds or property, and I don’t feel that this was ever my intention, ”the scammer said.

The Daily Mail editors noted that Sorokin did not ask for a fee for the interview.

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