A fortune teller in Malta by no means noticed it coming. However Maria Magdalena Sultana has prevented jail time after authorities arrested her for cash laundering along with her long-running playing behavior.
Sultana allegedly made an honest dwelling staring into her crystal ball and telling others what fates awaited them. Nonetheless, the magic apparently didn’t work to foretell her personal future.
Media outlet TVM reviews that from 2009 to 2020, she generated appreciable revenue as a psychic, though how a lot she earned stays a thriller. It was sufficient, nonetheless, that she may afford common journeys to casinos, which proved to be her undoing.
Crystal Ball Magic Fades
Within the 11-year span, Sultana reportedly spent round €200,000 (US$199,760) at space casinos. Nonetheless, her way of life caught up together with her when somebody tipped off the police about her questionable spending habits final 12 months.
That led to an investigation, which found that Sultana was masquerading as a fortune teller. She provided her providers by way of two completely different pages on Fb, incomes €20 to €35 (US$19.98 to $35.96) per session. She hadn’t held a job since 2008, submitting unemployment claims and repeatedly accumulating advantages from the state.
After working some calculations, investigators realized that she couldn’t be making sufficient revenue to cowl her playing exercise with out slicing corners. This included not paying taxes and utilizing the on line casino as a method to launder what she made studying individuals’s future.
Because the investigation progressed, police took a visit to Sultana’s dwelling. There, they discovered quite a few objects related to fortune telling, together with a Ouija board and extra. As well as, they confiscated over €4,000 (US$3,996) in money.
With the investigation concluded, police arrested and charged Sultana for her crimes. These included cash laundering, fraud, tax evasion, probation violation, and extra. On the time of her repeated fortune-telling offenses, she had a number of probation orders issued towards her.
At trial, quite a few her former shoppers appeared to verify her exercise. That they had given her cash to inform them about their future or to put a curse on others.
Nobody confirmed that her predictions or actions grew to become actuality. Because of this, a number of later thought of suicide due to the shortage of success of Sultana’s prophecies.
No Fortunes for the Foreseeable Future
In the long run, the choose presiding over the case, Donatella Frendo Dimech, determined to not throw the e book at her too laborious. Regardless of being a repeat offender, Sultana obtained a 24-month jail sentence, suspended for 4 years.
As well as, she should pay a high quality of €28,000 (US$27,991). As a result of she collected authorities subsidies whereas working, Sultana additionally had to surrender sure belongings that the federal government seized.
A part of the choose’s leniency was the results of Sultana’s dangerous luck on the casinos. The choose acknowledged that, though she claimed to have the ability to see the long run, she had misplaced more cash on the tables and machines than she had gained.