Kathleen Legaspi - Artist Scammer

By now, many of you have heard -

Remember that lady I was supposed to be working with on  "collection" that would be coming out in April?

I thought to myself last night, "Hmm... I haven't heard from her in days..." She went back to San Diego because some shit went down at her apartment on 3036 N. Sheffield - she claims the Russian Mafia had her up all night - pinned her between 2 of them and demanded money. She says her mom paid them off and she grabbed 2 giant bags of clothes as well as 2 giant suitcases to bring back to San Diego with her...

She kept promising to call me, even e-mailed me once and said that yes, she still wants me to work on the collection and we would now divide patternmaking responsibilities between me and another patternmaker in LA.

I tried to remember her full name. What was it? I had heard her say so many different names.... RED FLAG. I also now recall that she couldn't remember where her office was and her home was and "mixed them up" a few times. At first, she said she lived off of Milwaukee near the blue line, had an office near the Belmont red line. Then, when Dave and I met up with her, her place was near the Belmont red line - 3036 N. Sheffield .  I never, ever saw her "office on Milwaukee". Presumably, it never existed.

I googled "Katheen Shei" and this is what I found -

www.cheflaszlo.com/KathleenKaf…


The pages literally just go on, and on, and on about all the scamming crimes she has committed - and she's really good.

Here's a short run down:

-Lures in artists, fashion designers, chefs, models with promises of helping them out, offering them connections as well as money. {What a dumbass - artists are some of the poorest people out there unless you're a huge star which honestly, is like 1% of the art/entertainment community}.

-Arrested and in jail March of 2007 - originally a $70,000 bail.

-Has run her scams WHILE IN JAIL.

-5 felonies

-On probation for that capture in 2007 - not allowed to leave the state of California. {Which means, she was on probation when I met her.}

-She lies INCESSANTLY. When I knew her, she gave me and Dave some sob story about having had pneumonia in December. Apparently, reading up she was "always sick" yet never actually went to the doctor. It was all made up.

-Lied for months to one of her {ex?} boyfriends that she was pregnant, carrying his twins, then had a miscarriage.




The sites I find just go on and on and on. Click links - this woman has a HUGE background - and the site only really documents 2 years worth of it. The only reason I never googled her in the first place was because I didn't know her full name. I looked up her company, but it's a real website - she just pretends she is a part of that company.

I honesty don't think I would have been scammed because 1 - I know from a modeling thing an ex of mine was doing long, long ago that you NEVER have to put up money for things if they are a legitimate company. Soon enough, they will be making money off of YOU to recoup expenses. That's how she has been scamming many people - mostly out in LA.

And the IDIOT she has to be.... as far as I know, in Chicago, artists are a very close-knit group. If something bad happens to one of them, the rest of them know almost instantly.

I almost got scammed. The most money I was missing was $20 - and that's money she borrowed for stupid things - a bus pass, food, etc. {She claims she lost her bank card and wouldn't have a new one for a week or so.}

She also steals people's identities. That's one of my main concerns. Not that I have much of anything, honestly. She was in my apartment with me and Dave and she saw that Lauren and I don't even have a futon - we have the mattress pad because the futon broke in half in October. If we can't even afford a futon, how the hell is she going to get money out of me? All I want is a $300 futon, and I can't get one! She scams people out of $80,000, I read, which was one of her bigger scams.

Absolutely insane.

I feel bad writing this because she was always so nice to me and Dave - and even gave him $20.

I have since emptied the contents of the bags of clothes that she left here - my sister and I have a few new items and the rest will be donated to Unique, a thrift store down the street from me. I'd rather people who cannot afford clothing {or poor artists} be able to buy and use them than some woman who rips people off to buy her clothes.

I feel like I should be a part of a Lifetime movie or something.

Mora of the story: Freelancers, beware. Do background checks. Do google searches and check references of legitimate companies they have worked for.

It coulld have been a lot worse for me.