After man is tricked into thinking he’s dating Katy Perry online we reveal others being ‘catfished’ by con artists

MEET the victims who have had  their hearts broken by online con ­merchants – just like gullible ­Spencer Morrill, 36.

For six years,  Spencer thought he was  ­dating  pop star Katy Perry but he’d actually fallen  for a “catfish” scam –  where  an online date pretends to be someone they are not.

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Last week MTV show Catfish exposed “Katy” as Gloucs girl Harriet, 18.

Here, JOSIE GRIFFITHS  looks at  other  bizarre romantic cons . . .

The Writer

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AUSSIE author Susannah Birch, 29, was online friends with “Patrick” for 12 years and dated him for three of them.

Yet in 2014 Susannah discovered that Patrick – who asked for naked pictures of her – was not just two years older than her but 30.

He was actually a 64-year-old grandad from Scotland.

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The Lovesick Romeo

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DUTCHMAN Alexander Pieter Cirk, 41, waited TEN DAYS to meet his internet  girlfriend of two months at an airport in China, before realising he had been catfished.

Alex was taken to hospital with exhaustion.

The hoaxer, unmasked by a Chinese TV station,  did it for “a laugh”.

The Reality Star

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EVEN hunks such as Geordie Shore’s Scott Timlin, 28, can fall prey to catfishing.

His co-star Gary Beadle revealed Scotty T was messaging a girl from Milan on Twitter for seven months.

When in Italy, Scott drove for three hours to meet her. But “she” turned out to be a 47-year-old bloke called Peter.

The Singleton

CRAIG McGrath couldn’t believe his luck when a random hot girl on Twitter messaged him saying she wanted sex, with no strings attached.

After exchanging increasingly flirty messages, she agreed to meet the 19-year-old for a night of passion – but she insisted that he lay naked on his bed, holding a bottle of oil, as he waited for her to arrive.

Of course, she never turned up. The whole thing was just a prank plotted by his friends . . . who filmed Craig in the buff and posted the footage online.

The Wannabe Wag

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GLAMOUR model Josie Cunningham, 26, had a BABY with a man thinking he was a top footballer.

For 18 months she thought she was dating Hull City’s Curtis Davies – until the real Davies insisted he had never met her.

Josie realised she had been catfished by an unnamed lookalike.