http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/10/magazi...ss&emc=rss
Paul Frampton, 68-year old theoretical physicist, traveled to South America with the intention of meeting Denise Milani, a bikini model to whom he believed he was chatting online. He flew first to La Paz where he was told she had just left, and was then asked to pick up a bag Milani had supposedly forgotten, with which he flew to Buenos Aires on his way to Belgium to meet up with her at last. The bag was full of cocaine, and he was arrested in Buenos Aires airport on his way back to the US, foregoing the Belgium trip.
The article is fascinating - Frampton appears to genuinely have believed he was chatting with Milani online, and when questioned about the incongruence of a schlubby, 68-year old physicist and a young bikini model falling in love,
"Interspersed with the calculations and hypotheses were his Oxford grades, which, he said, showed that he, like Newton, was in the top 1 percentile for intelligence"
and:
" she’s in the top 1 percentile of how women look.... As these days tick by, and I think about it a lot, the more I realize that we are the perfect couple in all respects."
At first glance, he seems like a deluded, wacky professor completely out of touch with reality, an easy target to be duped by drug-smugglers in an online scam. However, during the trial, text-messages and emails he had sent to Milani from Buenos Aires came out:
“This stuff is worth nothing in Bolivia, but $Ms in Europe. You meet me at the airport and we do not go near the hotel the ‘agent’ suggested. Stay at another hotel.”
Indicating that on a deeper level, not only was he fully aware of the drug-smuggling operation, he was attempting to alter its outcome to his gain. On a deeper level, he was aware that a 68-year old, middle class, non-famous physics professor has no realistic prospects for attracting a young model, but a *millionaire in charge of his destiny* does.
Paul Frampton, 68-year old theoretical physicist, traveled to South America with the intention of meeting Denise Milani, a bikini model to whom he believed he was chatting online. He flew first to La Paz where he was told she had just left, and was then asked to pick up a bag Milani had supposedly forgotten, with which he flew to Buenos Aires on his way to Belgium to meet up with her at last. The bag was full of cocaine, and he was arrested in Buenos Aires airport on his way back to the US, foregoing the Belgium trip.
The article is fascinating - Frampton appears to genuinely have believed he was chatting with Milani online, and when questioned about the incongruence of a schlubby, 68-year old physicist and a young bikini model falling in love,
"Interspersed with the calculations and hypotheses were his Oxford grades, which, he said, showed that he, like Newton, was in the top 1 percentile for intelligence"
and:
" she’s in the top 1 percentile of how women look.... As these days tick by, and I think about it a lot, the more I realize that we are the perfect couple in all respects."
At first glance, he seems like a deluded, wacky professor completely out of touch with reality, an easy target to be duped by drug-smugglers in an online scam. However, during the trial, text-messages and emails he had sent to Milani from Buenos Aires came out:
“This stuff is worth nothing in Bolivia, but $Ms in Europe. You meet me at the airport and we do not go near the hotel the ‘agent’ suggested. Stay at another hotel.”
Indicating that on a deeper level, not only was he fully aware of the drug-smuggling operation, he was attempting to alter its outcome to his gain. On a deeper level, he was aware that a 68-year old, middle class, non-famous physics professor has no realistic prospects for attracting a young model, but a *millionaire in charge of his destiny* does.
