Hollywood Psychic Will Finally Be Seeing Bars
Notorious "Gypsy Swindler" sentenced to 18 months in prison
Broward Sheriff's Office
Fake psychic Gina Marks, in an earlier and more recent mug shot.
Notorious Hollywood Psychic Gina Marks had to have known her future didn't look bright. Well, at least the next 18 months.
Marks, 37, was sentenced to a year and a half behind bars Wednesday, after she pleaded guilty to two counts of organized fraud and one count of grand theft for swindling a victim out of nearly $300,000.
Marks, who spent years duping clients out of hundreds of thousands of dollars, also made a payment of $400,000 Wednesday to pay back her victims. She'll serve eight months of probation upon her release and pay another $100,000.
The so-called "Gypsy Swindler" was arrested back in March by the Broward Sheriff's Office after she hustled a female customer out of $298,000 in cash, gift cards, jewelry, purses and clothing.
Police said Marks swindled the Coconut Grove woman out of the goods by telling her she was surrounded by evil spirits and that Marks was the only one who vanquish them.
Marks convinced the woman she was cursed, had cancer, her family members were in danger and that her apartment was full of evil and negativity. Marks even told the woman that her father was going to die unless she gave Marks gift cards to high-end department stores, police said.
To remove the evil, Marks had the woman rub an egg all over her body, spit in a jar and cover it with a black pillowcase and put it under her bed, and eat only red fruit.
She also had the woman provide hair and urine samples.
The con took place over a period of 19 months, beginning in August of 2008 and ending in February 2010. Police described the victim as being in a fragile mental state.
The March arrest was just the latest for Marks. Last October, Marks was charged with grand theft for scamming a client out of $30,000 in a "cleansing ritual." She was already on probation after pleading guilty to fleecing five separate clients throughout Broward County out of $65,000, to rid the money of demons.
Marks, who has operated under the name Zara Margazio, wrote a book called Miami Psychic - Confessions of a Confidante, under the name Regina Milbourne, published by Regan Books in 2006.
Posted Wednesday, Sep 1, 2010 - 11:26 AM EST
