Original subtitles

In this episode of American Greed, an heir to a timber fortune, a devious

psychic, and a quest for love.

I only paid her $10 for several hours.

It was a bargain.

Over a decade, fortune teller Rachel Lee's bargain cost Ralph Reigns Jr.

$15 million and much more.

The scam in this case was so deep.

He was essentially brainwashed.

With Lee dealing the cards, Brains believes his dreams are coming true.

I'm beginning to think that it's happened.

She gave him what he wanted most.

Smile. But the reality is, it was all false.

And it was all designed to steal his money.

Lee's scorched earth scam leaves behind a trail of devastation.

His whole family has been taken away from him.

His whole family.

It's a clairvoyant con where Rachel Lee and her family see themselves living the

good life. There's my car.

There's my car.

There's the car I'm going to get.

It's evil.

It's real evil.

In 2013, a fortune teller from Oregon named Rachel Lee is in Monte Carlo with

her husband, Blancy.

Bonjour.

In this mecca for the rich and famous, the Lees treat themselves to a hotel

costing $1 ,800 a night.

All I can say is forget about it.

They gamble in black tie at the Casino Royale and party at a club called

Billionaire.

Lee appears to be having the time of her life.

Something that's easy to do when all the money she's spending belongs to someone

else.

Ralph Rains Jr.

grows up here on the Rains tree farm, about an hour west of Portland, Oregon.

My dad purchased the place in the mid -50s.

We started out planting the trees, and I watched my dad, and I planted my first

trees when I was about 10.

Planted well over a million trees over the years.

It's hard, dirty work, but at the end of the day, you feel good.

Trees from the Raines farm can fetch up to $1 ,000 each, but the family is

careful not to cut down too many.

Theirs is a sustainable forest where the public is welcomed.

Though it's enjoyed by many, no one knows it or loves it as much as Ralph

Jr.

When I'm out here among the trees, I'm in my element.

You can see that.

Living alone among the trees he will one day inherit, Jr.

is described as being bright but gullible.

He is mostly awkward.

He's always been that way.

And really, other than working with some of the people that were working on the

property, I don't think he had a lot of social life.

He's intelligent, very intelligent, even from the first time I met him, but very

sweet, very naive almost.

Raines is an only child who stands in the shadow of his father, a

World War II pilot worth millions.

My dad made virtually all the business decisions and ran the place, and I

carried out the orders.

Junior is fine with the arrangement.

He's never really cared about money. It means nothing to him.

He doesn't particularly...

care about clothing or having a nice house or beautiful

furnishings. That kind of thing is just not of interest to him at all.

One thing that does interest him is the psychic realm.

I'm interested, deeply interested in the paranormal.

I have a strong interest in it. Some of the areas I believe in, some of the

areas I don't.

While visiting Bend, Oregon in 2004, fate leads him to this psychic shop run

Rachel Lee.

I stopped by, and I visited with her, and I got acquainted with her, and I

her personally. I only paid her $10 for several hours.

It was a bargain.

When Raines Jr.

meets Lee, he's 57 years old, and he shares with her his one great desire.

I said, I wish I had a family, was married and had a family.

And I said, well, it just hasn't happened in my life.

Lee says she can help, but she seems to take an interest in another aspect of

Junior's life story.

She said, well, I'd like to see your place. And I says, well, I'd love to

it to you.

I showed her the place, and she agreed it was a lot of property.

And she told me, she said, I understand a lot. She said, I've learned a lot from

you. And I said, well, I've enjoyed showing it to you.

It doesn't take a fortune teller to realize this land is worth a fortune.

You're sitting there looking out at all this property.

You know that there's money there.

But I think she realized that there was.

A lot.

This was kind of a big one for her.

Next on American Greed.

Slowly, Rachel Lee begins crafting a plot to get into Rain's life and into

wallet. She built a story with him over 10 years that allowed him to be

like the frog in the pot. The water is turned up hotter and hotter, but because

the person is involved in it, they don't see it.

If you're not sure where to turn, reach out to Rachel from The Can Be Psychic, a

world -renowned psychic using tarot cards, palm reading, and her natural

abilities to read into your life story.

In this TV ad, Rachel Lee touts herself as a guiding hand for those in need.

Rachel can help you find success in love, business, and life.

In reality, though, Lee is a master of the sweetheart swindle.

She uses the promise of love to isolate a lonely man and hijack his financial

life.

Ralph Raines Jr.

is hardly her first victim.

Rachel Lee was really skilled at executing this playbook of fraud. She

has developed a skill over time in figuring out what individuals need to

and then creating just the perfect...

to be able to extract money from them.

In Sacramento, California, in 1999, a public transit worker who we'll call

Francisco says he meets Rachel Lee at Psychic World.

One friend describes Francisco as being kind of slow, and he comes to Lee hoping

she can reunite him with a lost love interest.

She just said, this is your soulmate.

You may cross paths in two years, but it can also be something that can take as

long as ten years.

Lee tells Francisco she is having her own love problems and will soon be

a divorce.

Then she lets him in on a secret.

When she first saw me, she told me that she saw the most wonderful man.

She picked that up right away.

You don't need to be a psycho for that.

As their friendship grows, Francisco goes with Lee to a car dealership where

first refers to him as being more than a friend.

She came out of nowhere like my fiancé.

Amor, she called me that. She said amor, the word which means love in English,

almost making me go beyond a friend and making me like her.

possible future husband.

It's good timing because Lee needs her new Amore to co -sign on her new truck.

Soon, Francisco says Lee has him shelling out thousands to help her save

house, pay for a divorce lawyer, buy another new car, and take out numerous

credit cards in her name.

She'll always be wanting to do shopping.

It's like that was her passion.

This goes on for years, and eventually Francisco begins to hear from credit

companies seeking payment.

Later, Francisco files a lawsuit claiming he's out more than $100 ,000.

And in July 2003, he goes to police, though his case is never prosecuted.

Months later, Lee heads north to Bend, Oregon.

where she sets up a new shop and begins luring a much bigger fish.

Ralph Raines Jr.

has access to his own money, and in the first two years of their relationship,

he is happy to share it with Rachel Lee, the woman who's helping him find love.

Early in their decade -long relationship, Junior gives Lee cash,

watches.

And eventually, a Hummer.

Then on Valentine's Day, 2006,

Raines pays $915 ,000 for a 4 ,600 -square -foot, four -bedroom house

in the hills above Portland.

Mr. Raines Jr.

was in his late 50s. He had never purchased a piece of real estate before

life. It's clear that that piece of property was purchased because Rachel

convinced him.

that it would be a good investment for him in the long run. The investment

pays off for him.

Lee, on the other hand, furnishes the home using Rain's money and for years

lives there rent -free with a litany of her own family members, including her

husband, Lancey Lee.

When Junior buys Lee the house, the scam is actually just getting started.

And it takes a huge leap forward one day in October 2006.

when Ralph Raines Sr.

suffers a stroke.

For years, Sr.

has made all the business decisions for the farm. Now he's left debilitated, and

Jr. is left with a major dilemma.

All of a sudden, I was the boss.

Coming up on American Greed, Ralph Raines faces a moment of great peril.

Rachel Lee senses a major opportunity.

Ralph Raines Sr.'s stroke opened a door for Rachel Lee. It was a turning point

in this scan.

It was a moment she exploited.

Following his father's stroke, Ralph Raines Jr.

desperately needs someone to care for his dad.

and keep the family business running smoothly.

Rachel Lee tells him and his family a story that makes it seem like she can

help. She convinced me that she knew how to take care of people.

She did tell me that her husband had died of cancer and that she was the

caregiver of him until he died.

She later told Mr. Raines Jr.

that she had also helped her husband with her husband's business.

and had done some bookkeeping for his auto business.

But there's a slight problem with the story.

All of the things that Rachel Lee told Ralph Raines Jr.

about herself were lies.

Blind to the truth, Raines asked Lee to take care of his dad the way she once

took care of her dying husband.

I asked Rachel, I said, well, would you like a job?

And I was confident with her.

My dad got along with her, and I thought everything was fine.

In fact, Raines trusts Lee so much that he gives her another job as well.

Because Rachel Lee had told Ralph Raines Jr. that she had previously served as a

bookkeeper, this allowed her to justify her offer to assist with the books and

records for the tree farm.

To Jr., Lee seems like a godsend.

and he happily gives her control of accounts belonging to him, his father,

the farm.

I had other things to do. I was doing mostly the hard, dirty work around the

place.

Out working amongst the trees, Raines performed zero oversight of his new

bookkeeper.

Putting a check in front of him and saying, Ralph, you need to sign this?

He would not have questioned it. I'm not even sure he even would have looked at

it.

Raines agrees to pay Lee nearly $9 ,000 a month for her caregiving services.

And sometimes she pays herself two or three times in a single month.

Much of this is ostensibly for taking care of Junior's ailing father.

But what kind of care is he getting?

Ethel Kelly.

A neighbor who once worked for Senior says she gets a firsthand look.

Many times he would be dirty in dirty clothes, and he hadn't had a shower for,

gosh, I don't know how long.

It was disastrous.

You know, he was not being taken care of.

It's painful. It hurts to know that she treated my friend, you know, Ralph

Senior, the way she did. And then Junior?

The kindest man on earth?

You don't do that.

Later, Rachel Lee brings Senior to live with her at the home in Portland,

purchased with Rain's family money.

When he gets there, he lives in a bed in the hallway.

Lee is a master of separating Junior and Senior from friends and family, and few

people are able to ask, what's going on?

My wife.

call his cell number and leave a message, and he wasn't getting back to

And later I found out the messages were being erased.

With few people watching, Lee gets to business.

Rain Sr.

has more than $5 million in investment accounts he shares with his son.

For years, he's left the money largely untouched.

But with Lee calling the shots, that's about to change.

Our understanding is that Ralph Raines Jr.

was very frugal by his own account, preferred shopping at Walmart and at

Goodwill than to other stores.

There's no indication from his prior practice that he ever would have

those accounts on his own. In 2007, Lee has Raines sell $300 ,000 in stock,

and the proceeds land in Tree Farm bank accounts.

After Senior's stroke, the farm accounts were controlled fully by Rachel Lee.

By the time she took control of the accounts, which we believe was about

Ralph Raines Jr.

trusted her completely.

With Raines blindly signing checks, Lee parcels out most of the money she's

stealing to herself and her relatives.

Next on American Greed.

The fortune teller plays matchmaker. The child is conceived in green.

After

three

years of friendship, Rachel Lee is familiar with Ralph Reign's deepest

Down to the last detail.

Ralph Reigns Jr.

shared with Rachel Lee what his image was of the ideal woman that he was

attracted to.

He preferred women who were blonde and light -skinned, and he was interested in

people who were exotic and not from this area.

Reigns' fantasy gives his psychic friend an opportunity to set the hook even

deeper. In October 2007, Reigns is waiting for Lee at the Portland airport

seemingly from out of the blue, a mysterious young woman approaches.

She was tall, slender, blonde, British accent.

The woman introduces herself as Mary Marks.

and seems to have a paranormal gift.

From his perspective, it was a chance meeting.

They got to talking, and she said, well, is your name Ralph?

And he said, well, yeah. Well, he believes in psyches.

And so he thought it was kind of a sign.

Eventually, Mary tells Raines that she's British.

living illegally in California, where she works in accounting.

To Raines, it's like a dream come true.

I'm beginning to think that it's happened.

Yes, something has happened, but it's not what Raines thinks.

Rachel Lee was in the business of committing fraud.

Not only did she support her family with fraud, but she used all her family

members in committing this fraud.

The person he believes is Mary Marks is really, partially, one of Rachel Lee's

daughters, who at the time, we believe, was approximately 17 years old.

Raines, of course, has no idea that the woman he's falling for is wearing a wig,

or that she's related to his best friend, Rachel.

Neither Rachel nor her daughter tell him after the first meeting, in the years

that follow, or even when Portia Lee slash Mary Marks comes to Raines with an

idea.

She proposed to me.

She said, you know, I'd like to be your wife.

I'd like to help you manage the business and you do the work on the place. I

love it here.

Karen Finnamore learns about her cousin's new British wife from a name

high school reunion.

When they got there, Ralph introduced her to me.

And I said, I didn't know you were married. That's a heck of a way to find

And he said, oh, it was a secret. We had to keep it a secret.

Or she was going to be deported.

Like much in this scam, the name Mary Marks is not chosen at random.

Mary Marks is actually Rachel Lee's mother's name.

They needed a real person behind the fake persona so they could open bank

accounts and they could transfer properties.

When Junior writes checks to Mary Marks, his wife, the actual Mary Marks can

take them and deposit them into accounts she opens.

What's more, Rain's wife is just one part of the fake family the Lees create

him.

Around 2008,

Portia Lee, the young woman playing Mary Marks, becomes pregnant. But the father

is not her beloved Ralph Raines Jr.

Now the Lees need to convince Junior that he's the one who planted the seed.

Rain's friend Ethel Kelly says it's a lie that could be nearly impossible to

sell.

Well, I think he just didn't want to push himself on anybody.

So, you know, companionship was just fine.

Because he was not interested in the physical as much as he is.

Just having someone care about him.

He's not that. He's a real gentleman.

Desperate to fit this square peg into a round hole, Mary Marks comes to Raines

with a request.

Ralph Raines Jr.

tells us that...

Mary Marks asked him if he would father a child with her through in vitro

fertilization. That Mary Marks and Rachel Lee provided Ralph Reams Jr.

with a container for him to place his donation.

That he then took that donation to the airport where he was instructed to meet

Mary Marks. She told him that she was transporting that back to California

she was going to go through a...

process of in vitro fertilization.

Rains is told the process works and that he will soon be a father.

But when Portia Lee has her baby, the birth father takes it.

She and Rachel now have no heir to give Rains, but that won't stop them.

Another of Rachel Lee's children, Pebbles Lee, had a child at about the

time that Portia Lee gave birth to her son.

And so without Portia Lee's son to introduce to Ralph Reams Jr., Rachel Lee

Pebbles Lee's son and introduced that son to Ralph Reams Jr.

The child's name, Giorgio Armani.

Giorgio.

With Mary often gone, young Giorgio lives with his new nanny, Rachel Lee,

at her home in Portland.

Georgio, Georgio, tell your mom hello.

Yeah, he's a little upset.

Of course we have Rachel.

From the outside looking in, it's an unbelievable story.

But Lee has cast a spell over Junior with the fantasy life she's created.

She gave him what he wanted most.

He wanted to be loved. He wanted to be cared about. He wanted to have his own

family. They gave him everything he desired, everything he hadn't had up

this time. But the reality is it was all false, and it was all designed to steal

his money.

For years, pictures showed Junior with Mary Marks and young Giorgio going on

trips, celebrating holidays, and just acting like a regular family.

This is the happiest I ever was in my life.

I thought that I had it all.

Raines is blinded by happiness and doesn't notice that in 2009, his friend

Rachel Lee sells more than $2 .1 million of his family's investments and pockets

the proceeds.

She pays hundreds of thousands of dollars for luxury cars, plane tickets,

high roller trips to Las Vegas.

Next on American Greed, after stealing Ralph Reign's most beloved asset, Rachel

Lee splurges on an exquisite European vacation.

With her husband, Blancy.

We're here at the Mona Lisa Art Museum.

And yes, folks, we found the Da Vinci Code. It's right there, underneath that

big thing there.

Take a closer look at Raines and Mark's family album at americangreed .cnbcprime

.com. Feeling greedy?

Want more than your share of behind -the -scenes dirt?

Follow us at American Greed TV on Twitter.

We'll be right back.

On February 2, 2011, Ralph Raines Sr.

dies at 91 years of age.

A distinguished World War II pilot, his son is there to place an American flag

on his grave.

But Junior's wife, Mary Marks, is nowhere to be found.

Rachel was there with Giorgio, and I said, what the hell, you know, where's

wife? And he says, oh, Mary treats him like all the time.

If that's the case, Junior doesn't seem to notice or care.

Months after his father's burial, in an act of love, he has the names of his so

-called wife and son proudly added to his parents' gravestone.

For the Lees, it's time to celebrate.

Shortly after Senior's death, Rachel and family spend $336 ,000 in a

single month.

But their greed still isn't satisfied.

The Raines tree farm is worth millions.

And Lee and Mary Marks come to Raines with a bold lie.

After Ralph Raines Sr.

died, his estate went through probate.

Rachel Lee and Mary Marks convinced Ralph Raines Jr.

that there were outstanding taxes that were due as a result of that probate

process and that they needed to sell off the tree farm in order to pay those

taxes.

Jr. buys their story.

And in 2011, his wife begins selling off different parcels of the Raines tree

farm.

It's hard to imagine Junior would easily part with the land he's grown up on,

the land he cherishes.

So after a repeat of the in vitro fertilization lie, Mary comes to Ralph

a fake baby bump, saying there will soon be another mouth to feed.

Mr. Raines Jr., in addition to wanting to cover the taxes he was told existed,

was planning for his family's growth.

Mr. Reyes Jr.

would have done anything that was asked of him if it was done on behalf of

providing for his family.

As Ralph prepares for the arrival of a daughter he wants to call Gloria, a

realtor helps him and his wife sell most of the thousand acres he helped plant.

Rachel Lee gets her hands on $12 .3 million from the sales.

Before long...

The new owners have it clear -cut.

It had gone from a little over 1 ,000 contingent acres in standing timber on a

working farm that was intended to last for generations to

a barren desert.

There was nothing.

A few months later, after the sale is complete...

Mary, playing this heartless charade, tells Ralph she's lost their second

According to Raines' cousin, Mary then says she has to return to England.

While she's gone, Raines receives a call telling him his wife is dead.

While Junior is left to face the devastation, Rachel is busy spending his

This is the most outrageous case I have ever seen, both in terms of the

expenditure of money and the lavishness of the lifestyle and the length that

these defendants went to to manipulate this victim.

In a single day, Rachel and her husband, Blancy, spend a half million dollars on

a Bentley and a Ferrari, which will bear the license plates Mr. Big and Mr. Big

One.

They spend $3 .8 million on real estate.

That fall, Lee goes to the Bellagio Hotel in Las Vegas, where she buys

$63 ,000 Rolex, part of a growing collection.

Then in August 2013, they take that European vacation.

Outside Monte Carlo's Casino Royale, Blancy marvels at the luxury cars on

display.

So many Royals, Royals, and Bentley's all over.

Ferraris, more Ferraris, and Bentleys, and Bentleys.

Get a close -up. There's my car.

There's my car.

There's the car I'm going to get.

Oh, yeah. It's a Casino Royale, baby.

I've never seen something so beautiful in my life. How about it, Rachel?

Traveling from Paris... There she is.

...to Rome... A lot of history here.

...to Venice... Beautiful.

...and beyond, Rachel and Blancy are surrounded by many of the world's

treasures, but they seem more interested in something else.

Okay, everybody, we're here in Monte Carlo at a mall.

It's literally right underneath our hotel.

We came to the largest Louis Vuitton store.

There's five levels.

Can you believe they actually have Hermes store here at the airport?

Hey, Rachel.

Look at this. Rolex.

The Lees spare no expense on this ultimate greed vacation.

I had the best time of my life.

You pretty much did it all, huh?

She did it all.

And it's all thanks to the man they've been deceiving for nearly a decade.

Next on American Greed, a car meant to turn heads attracts the wrong kind of

attention.

I've lived in this area for over three decades, and I have never seen a Ferrari

in candy.

For years, Rachel Lee's massive scam has flown under the radar.

But that all changes in a sudden and unexpected way.

Driving through Canby on her way to work, Portland Police Detective Liz

begins to suspect something is up at Rachel Lee's shop.

I noticed a full -size white Ford pickup, and then eventually a white

showed up.

And I've lived in this area for...

over three decades, and I have never seen a Ferrari in Canby.

Her police instincts tell her to do some digging, and Crothers finds the name

Ralph Raines on records related to the shop.

It made us concerned that Ralph's money was being used to finance this psychic

job, and if that was the case, then what else was happening with Ralph's money?

In January 2014,

Crothers goes to a police training seminar on elder fraud, where she meets

Detective Steve Floyd of the Canby Police Department.

As the two discuss the case, they're overheard by Marlene Olson, an

with the Oregon Department of Justice.

Olson once worked as a logger and knows the Raines family and their farm well.

Hoping to talk to Raines, she pulls up to the gate.

I was astonished in the extreme.

In the past, when I had been up there, you could stand at the gate and you

couldn't see 100 feet because of the trees.

When I got to the gate, the gate was open, and I could see all the way to the

other side of the property.

And that's when I knew, unequivocally, we had a case.

Detective Floyd subpoenas financial records, and agents from the IRS

Investigation Division begin to follow the money.

On March 19, 2014, they visit the farm.

The Canby detectives came by my home, and they asked me some

soul -searching questions that I didn't know and I didn't have answers to.

And they told me, they said, do you realize that you didn't have to sell

this property?

And I said, well, no, I was told I would have to.

And they said, no, you didn't.

And I was shocked.

And then I didn't believe it.

Two days later, officers seized nearly $2 million from Rachel Lee's bank

accounts. and search the can -be -psychic shop.

Inside, they find five Rolexes, a blank check already bearing Ralph Raines Jr.'s

signature, and various parts of the Mary Marks disguise.

After the searches, they again talk to Raines, who is now protecting the woman

who scammed him out of millions.

In May, Raines writes a letter to prosecutor Donna Maddox saying he's not

victim, that he's behind Rachel 100 percent and that he wants all this

When we asked Mr. Raines Jr.

about this letter later, he did say that he wrote this letter at Rachel Lee's

direction and that, in fact, he had written many versions of it at Rachel

direction and he had ripped them up and thrown them away.

when she didn't like the product, and they continued to write the letter until

they came up with one that she approved of.

Days after putting pen to paper, Raines is with Rachel and Portia at the shop

where he first met his psychic nearly 10 years and $15 million ago.

Raines now has just $200 ,000 left, and they're planning on taking him on a trip

to the desert.

I was told, by the authorities, that they truly believed that if he would

gotten that car, if it would have been ten minutes later, that he probably

would have returned.

There's no doubt in my mind that woman probably would have dropped him off in

the desert someplace.

You know, she was stuck.

Before they depart, authorities show up and arrest Rachel and Portia, and Raines

is left devastated.

Imagine. You know, you have a family, you have a son, you have a wife, and you

wake up and you don't have a wife, you don't have a son, never did.

That's pretty hard.

That's pretty hard on him.

He just was a lost soul.

His whole family had been taken away from him.

His whole family.

That's the part that makes me so angry, is playing with his emotions and his

heart.

It's just unbelievable to me that anybody could do that for

money.

Rachel Lee's husband, Blancy Lee, took in more than $2 .5 million.

He helps the feds track down Rain's stolen assets, pleads guilty to money

laundering and tax charges, and in 2015, a judge sentences him to two years in

prison.

Rachel Lee pleads guilty to charges of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, money

laundering, and failure to pay income taxes.

A judge sentences her to eight years, four months in prison. Less time than it

took to steal the Raines family fortune.

Portia Lee also pleads guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud.

Raines is still having trouble understanding that his wife, Mary Marks,

figment of Rachel Lee's twisted imagination.

In what might be an effort to curry favor on the day of her sentencing,

agrees to a very special meeting with Raines.

Well, when she came in, she was dressed as Mary Marks. And she said, hello,

Ralph, you know, how are you, in the British accent.

Then she all of a sudden takes off the...

The hat and the wig, and it was pretty stunning.

I mean, he almost passed out just from that.

It was good for Ralph, but it really shocked him. It really shook him up.

They asked her several questions, and he had such fond memories of certain

things.

Smile.

Happy birthday.

And she didn't even remember them. She didn't have any idea, no memory of it at

all. And those were memories that were very precious to him.

Following this meeting, a judge sentences Portia Lee, now 25, to two

nine months in prison.

Ralph Raines Jr.

chooses not to discuss this and many other details of the Lee's crime.

I am not proud of this. I got deceived so bad.

I was deliriously happy.

I don't care to talk about it.

Rain says he still thinks of Giorgio as a son.

And when he first met with American Greed, he wore a gold band on his ring

finger.

There is a part of Ralph Raines Jr.

that will always see Rachel Lee as his best friend and will always see the

person he remembers as Mary Mark as his wife.

And that is because the scam in this case was so deep

and executed so well. He was essentially brainwashed.

Raines has recovered some of his money and assets which the government seized

from the Lees. He now lives in an aging A -frame on what's left of the family

farm.

Every time he looks outside, the clear -cut devastation wrought by Rachel Lee

there.

A potent reminder of her fraud and all that he has lost.

But even after all that has befallen him, he remains ever hopeful.

Ten years ago, this whole area in here had trees this size up here.

It's something I helped plant, I helped build, and now it's gone.

I realize we've had a disaster here, but it will grow back and heal.

Ten years from now, you won't recognize this spot.

Come back in 10 years.