
A travel agent, named Maria Silvia has scammed Manchester United striker, Cristiano Ronaldo of £250,000 (about N140 million) after the football star entrusted her with his credit cards and pin.
The 53-year-old travel agent also scammed Ronaldo’s super-agent Jorge Mendes of £14,000 and Manchester United winger, Nani, of over £1,500.
Due to her wrongdoing, Silvia got a four-year suspended prison sentence on Sunday after being earlier convicted by a Porto criminal court in 2017 Reports have gathered.
It was also revealed that Ronaldo was targeted as a victim of Silvia’s scamming spree for three years between February 2007 and July 2010.
Quoting a renowned Portuguese newspaper Jornal de Noticias, Sun Sports reported that the 36-year-old Ronaldo submitted a statement to the police in 2011 over the matter.
According to the reports, The travel agent had to plug a hole in the firm’s accounts. She, therefore, began to bill those trips to Cristiano Ronaldo who had an account at Geostar and for practical reasons handed the agent a virtual credit card and pin code which became a green route to taking money out.
According to the newspaper, the £245,770 scammed from Ronaldo corresponded with around 200 trips that he never made between Portugal to the US, Africa, and other European countries.
The travel agent, who currently works as a cleaner, was first interrogated in 2013 before her eventual sentence on Sunday, September 19, 2021.
As part of her court deal, she had agreed to repay her firm a sum of £7,680 sparing her prison sentence.