A single mother has disclosed that she ended her relationship and spent hundreds of pounds on a Stranger Things romance scam.
McKala, from Kentucky, left her husband after believing she was seeing Dacre Montgomery, who plays Billy Hargrove in the Netflix thriller.
The mother-of-one, who has a nearly seven-year-old daughter, also gave the individual acting as the 28-year-old Australian star $10,000 (£7,836) when they requested financial assistance.
McKala stated that she met ‘Dacre’ on an internet forum and was initially sceptical of his identity until he persuaded her to view a certain episode of the Netflix sci-fi before it aired.
During the episode, Dacre’s character Billy emerged, leading McKala to assume he was genuine, adding that she didn’t believe anyone other than insiders would be familiar with the series.
McKala stated she had to choose between her spouse and ‘Dacre’ after a year of online conversation and opted to break her marriage, with her former partner leaving in just two months.
Now in an online relationship with ‘Dacre’, McKala told the Catfished YouTube channel he began asking her for money as he was unable to access his bank account due to a controlling girlfriend.
She explained: ‘He said if I try to use my bank account she’s over it as it’s joint. He said so she keeps all the stuff so I would have to ask her all the time. And I understood that point too because my ex was very controlling with our money.’
McKala stated that she consented to help ‘now and then,’ which quickly escalated into hundred-dollar gift cards, totaling $10,000, despite ‘Dacre’ promising to pay her back.
However, given that the real Dacre is in a committed relationship with Liv Pollock and makes $150,000 (£117,000) every Stranger Things episode, McKala’s suspicions were confirmed.
The Catfished crew immediately realised McKala had been tricked, with details about the Stranger Things episode that had caused her to believe he was the real deal being made public before it was released.
After hearing the truth, McKala said: ‘Love makes you do crazy, stupid, irrational things,’ she said, admitting she was ripe for being scammed because of her past trauma.
‘If you’re someone like me, you’re afraid of abandonment and you’re a real big people pleaser and you’re very co-dependent. These scammers, they just kind of come in and they leech off that.’
Stranger Things will return for a fifth and final season, with Terminator actor Linda Hamilton joining the cast.
Throughout four seasons set in the 1980s, the citizens of the fictitious town of Hawkins, Indiana, have had to battle malevolent forces from another realm.
Winona Ryder from Beetlejuice, David Harbour from Hellboy, and Finn Wolfhard have all appeared in the programme.
Stranger Things is available to stream on Netflix.
