Anna Delvey — The Fake German Heiress Who Conned Her Way to Global Infamy

Russian-born Anna Sorokin (aka Anna Delvey) came to NYC with an agenda, did she succeed? or fail?

I spend my 30 minutes on the treadmill watching YouTube videos. Topics ranging from organization hacks, interior design tips, how to get into grad school, and true crime fill my feed. YouTube does a surprising (scary) job choosing videos that catch my eye and make me hit play. They hit a homerun when Anna Delvey popped up in my recent feed.

The thumbnail caught my attention with a picture of a cute young blond and “I just don’t feel guilty.” in large letters next to her face. The video description drew me in further with “How con-artist Anna Sorokin ripped off NYC Elite”.

So intriguing! A modern-day con? I wanted to learn more. A quick search produced plenty of information about Anna and her long con in New York City.

Netflix received my first look because, well, it’s Netflix, and I thought it was a documentary. Instead, it was a preview for a limited series, Inventing Anna. The life of Anna Delvey inspires the Netflix limited series, created by Shonda Rhimes (Grays Anatomy, Scandal). The series features Julia Garner (Ozark) as Anna.

I continued my search to find more videos and articles to learn about this twisted, real-life drama.

The Anna Delvey story is described as having a Sex in the City meets Catch Me if You Can feel. I think it has more of a Gossip Girl vibe. So while the Netflix (semi-fictional) series is sure to be captivating, you will be both shocked and entertained with the truth as told by those who lived it. The details are so far-fetched. I had to remain mindful that these are real people, real businesses, and banks throughout my search for information. The Anna Delvey story is not a made-up story. It happened. There are facts and victims. There was a trial and sentencing.

Who is Anna Delvey?

Anna Delvey is an alias for Anna Sorokin, a Russian-born, regular girl raised in Germany by middle-class parents. Her parents worked hard to send her to school in London, where she landed an internship with Purple magazine. Her affiliation with Purple brought her to New York City.

After arriving in New York City, Anna connected with the social elite crowd and lived a lavish lifestyle, with no money of her own. A long game con artist. Anna portrayed herself as an heiress who would have access to 80 million US dollars on her 25th birthday. In the meantime, her acquaintances thought she was living on an allowance provided by her wealthy family.

Flashing one hundred dollar bills for tips, Anna lived on borrowed money and routinely skipped out on tabs at restaurants, bars, and hotels. She had multiple credit cards constantly maxed out and ran a bank scam using a system called check kiting.

She wove her way into the lives of the social elite while also befriending people who were well connected but not financially wealthy. People with average salaries and regular jobs necessary to live or their bills would go unpaid. While most of the elite social crowd kept her at arm’s length, Anna formed genuine relationships with people like Rachel Williams and Neffatari (Neff) Davis. Rachel was a photography assistant with Vanity Fair, well connected but not a wealthy elite. Neffatari was a concierge at 11 Howard, a hotel Anna frequented.

Anna turned out to be a selfish master manipulator. A calculated thief who ended up convicted of grand larceny, attempted grand larceny and theft of services.

Resources:

This story is complicated and deep. The greatly anticipated Netflix series premiers Friday, February 11th, will represent only a portion of this story. Inventing Anna is not an Anna Delvey (aka Anna Sorokin) documentary; actual events inspire the series but do not define it. Some are concerned it will glamorize Anna and her con instead of exposing the trail of deceit and damage Anna left in her wake.

If you are a true crime fan, I suggest digging into the story to learn about it before enjoying the Netflix telling of the tale. HBO is due to come out with a series about Anna Delvey from a victim’s perspective based on the book My Friend Anna by Rachel DeLoache Williams.

Honestly, I will devour both!

References:

60 Minutes Australia (video)

The Infamous Case of Anna Delvey Part 1, 2, and 3 (videos)

Vanity Fair Who is Anna Delvey? (video)

Anna Delvey is So Much More than a Fake German Heiress by Bazaar (article)

Jessica Pressler New York Magazine The Cut Article (the Netflix series Inventing Anna is based on this article)

The book — My friend Anna

The 60 Minutes Australia Video introduced me to Rachel Williams’s memoir, My Friend Anna. Unwittingly Anna promotes the book during the interview by saying, “who cares what she writes in her stupid little book no one is going to read anyway.” Anna’s utter disdain for Rachel’s book piqued my curiosity. So I went out that very day to pick up a copy. I’m happy I did!

Rachel was Anna’s friend and a photography assistant at Vanity Fair. She was not part of the rich and famous, financially elite crowd in NYC; however, she was part of the social scene Anna aspired to reach.

Rachel was an easy target. Kind and trusting with lots of connections, Anna befriended her and quickly isolated her from the rest of her good friends in NYC. Anna almost ruined Rachel’s life financially, mentally, and emotionally during their friendship. She ran up debts in Rachel’s name for over $60,000. At the time, that was more money than Rachel made in a year.

My Friend Anna is a memoir written to share Rachel’s side of the story. It is a must-read to have an intimate look into the details of this fascinating story. Rachel’s re-telling of her story is informative, heartfelt, and well-written. Utterly captivating amid all the buzz surrounding the Netflix premiere.

Inventing Anna — the Netflix Limited Series

The Netflix series premiers Friday, February 11th. I will binge it and compare notes from all the digging I’ve done. It will be interesting to see if the series reveals any truth about the sick nature of Anna’s mindset and the harm she caused along the way. Or if the series will glamorize her.

I use some of these made-for-TV (or streaming) docu-series as jumping points to learn about real-life events that capture my attention. It is essential to remember these entertaining renditions of real-life drama can portray the bad guys in a favorable light. But, as entertaining as Anna Delvey (Sorokin) is, she is a real-life villain. No, she didn’t murder anyone, but she psychologically abused and manipulated people. Instead, she financially and emotionally exploited people. She did steal.

In interviews, Anna states, “I just asked people for things, and they either gave it to me, or they didn’t.” However, she falsified bank documents impersonated people via emails and phone calls using voice-changing apps. She knew what she was doing and was in this for the long con.

Where is Anna Delvey (Sorokin) now?

She is, no doubt, infamous. Her story is intriguing. She did serve time for her crimes; however, she is now free, or she was for a while.

According to a Cosmopolitan article dated January 27th, 2022, this is what Anna is up to now:

Anna was released from prison on February 11th, 2021, after serving just three years of her four-to-twelve-year sentence — and she appeared to quickly go back to her old ways of luxury, checking into NoMad, a swanky NY hotel, using the money she obtained from Netflix in exchange for the rights to her story (the streaming service allegedly paid Anna £230,000 — a portion of which went to repaying her bank debts and victims).

It’s also believed that she used her newly-obtained income to hire a film crew to follow her around and document her early days of readapting into society, saying during an Insider interview, “I did what I did. And I was, I don’t know, 23, 24, 25. I’m just trying to fix things and move on […] I’m just kind of filming everything I’m doing right now and I’m going to see what to do with it later. I just got out of prison, like two days ago. So it’s me like getting all this stuff from Sephora, me opening a bank account as soon as I get permission from my parole officer.”

However, it’s currently unclear as to whether or not Anna is incarcerated — just a month after her release, in late March 2021, Anna was taken into ICE custody for overstaying her visa in the US. It was later claimed by The New York Post that she was being detained at a facility in New Jersey.

An article posted on February 7th, 2022 by Today.com states:

On Jan. 19, Sorokin tested positive for COVID-19 and has been in quarantine isolation in the Orange Country Correctional Facility.Infamous but detained.

Infamous but detained.

Although famous, Anna is not rich and is not free. If notoriety was her goal, she accomplished what she set out to do. If gaining wealth was her goal, she failed. If becoming a New York City socialite was her goal, she failed. No one knows what her ultimate goal was, only that there was no end in sight.

In The Confidence Game, Maria Konnikova explains:

While cheats and swindlers may be a dime a dozen, true conmen — the Bernie Madoffs, the Jim Bakkers, the Lance Armstrongs — are elegant, outsized personalities, artists of persuasion and exploiters of trust.

This statement explains Anna, an elegant persuader and an exploiter of trust.

Anna’s story is a true crime gold mine. Reading Rachel’s memoir and visiting her website makes me pause. While I may eagerly read and learn about this intriguing con artist’s story, other stories are left untold or, at the very least, pushed aside.

Rachel’s memoir is relatable because she represents everyday people who grow up in towns all over the country, work hard, go to school and pursue their dreams. She represents familiar people, trusting, and kind. Someone who ended up deeply hurt in many ways and areas of life. Someone who now is forever changed because she thought she found a true friend.