A Thief Opened a $250,000 Credit Line in My Name. The Bank Said My Co-Signer Was a Woman I’d Never Met

We agreed to meet halfway, at a diner in Moultrie. Public place. Broad daylight.

She was already in a booth when I walked in. Navy dress, reading glasses, a folder of papers stacked so neatly the corners lined up. She looked me up and down like an X-ray.

“You don’t look like a thief,” she said.

“You don’t look like one either.”

“Thieves never do. That’s the point.” But she slid the folder across the table.

We went through everything, side by side, over two cups of coffee and a slice of pecan pie neither of us touched.

The application had been filed online in March. Both our Social Security numbers. Both our birthdays. A copy of my driver’s license, and one of hers. A joint income statement that made us look very rich and very married.

“Where would someone get all this?” she said.

“From someone who’d seen both of us sign something.”

We looked at each other.

“Have you ever bought a tractor?” I asked.

She almost laughed. “Mr. Fairley, I’m a dentist.”

“Have you ever financed anything? A car? Equipment for your office?”

She thought about it. Then her face changed.

“My dental chairs,” she said slowly. “Six years ago. Through a finance company in Tifton.”

The fraud investigator at the bank called us both the next morning, on a conference line. She had traced the account. The money had gone out in four transfers to a business account in Tifton, registered to an address on Magnolia Street.

Noreen went very quiet on the line.

“Ms. Gatlin? Do you know that address?”

“Yes,” said Noreen. “I lived there for eleven years. With my ex-husband.”