The DEA The DEA was used to calls about dealers and
suspected drug houses. So they were surprised when an NYPD officer called them about a strange
story about a team of adult entertainment waitresses who were targeting rich men.
He told them how one particular guy went to a bar, met a server, and flirted with her.
Then, he woke up in a hotel room with no recollection of what happened between meeting the server
and waking up in the hotel.
All he remembered was sipping his drink while talking to the cute girl, and bam, everything
went black after that. However, he did know a couple things: his credit card had been
charged thousands of dollars for drinks and dances he didn't remember paying for. There
were also service tips, lots of service tips.
He also noticed several pictures he didn't remember taking. The girl he flirted with
snapped some very problematic pictures, the kind he didn't want his wife and family seeing.
The NYPD wouldn't take the case at first. Many people complained about having their
credit cards stolen on a drunken night, especially in New York. But the man had evidence, and
the investigation moved forward. The DEA had no idea what they were getting themselves
into.
The Quartet It all started in 2013 when Samantha Bharbash
came up with a system for scamming guys at the clubs she and her friends worked at. The
individuals involved were Barbash, the leader, and three other women who followed her system:
Roselyn Keo, Karina Pascucci, and Marci Rosen. The women came from different backgrounds,
but they all shared a common goal. They loved money and were willing to scam the disgusting
rich men who wandered into their club night after night. In a Robinhood-like tale, these
women missed one crucial step—they stole from the rich and gave to themselves.
Though the women had worked in the so-called gentlemen club business for some time, they
had yet to discover what they were capable of. (CTA to subscribe)
The System The film Hustlers depicts the Cunning Quartet
as erotic dancers, one of the film's hallmark gimmicks. But in reality, they weren't all
dancers. Barbash made sure to note in her Jlo lawsuit that, at the time, she wasn't
a dancer but a hostess and server.
She saw dozens and dozens of men walk into her club every weekend. These particular men
were dressed in expensive suits, wore five-thousand-dollar watches, and usually had nice wedding bands
hidden deep inside their pockets.
She realized that these men had a lot to lose, more than just thousands of dollars in disposable
income. So, she devised a plan. This plan ensured that on paper, at least, they could
scam these men and not have to worry about getting caught. What were these guys going
to say? "I got robbed at an adult club?" Their wives would probably have a few questions
of their own.
The way Barbash saw it, there was a golden opportunity just lying on the table. Someone
needed to pounce, and it might as well be her. That's when she assembled the team.
The Marketing Keo was Barbash's right-hand woman, the Brad
Pitt to George Clooney's Danny Ocean. They taught other women how to pull off the scam,
small step by small step. Every weekend night, they'd go out to a bar near the financial
district, where most of these guys hung out. Barbash approached the men, flirted with them,
talked about their work and personal lives, all while drinking tons of alcohol.
Then, Barbash texted the other girls and told them to come over. She had one on the hook.
The other girls, Keo, Pascucci, and Rosen, would show up and butter the now intoxicated
dude even more.
Barbash started dancing in clubs at 19. In 2013, she was 30. So, she knew how to manipulate
men into doing what she wanted, which typically involved draining their credit cards.
Due to the bar's proximity to Wall Street, many were finance guys working on Wall Street:
bankers, traders, brokers, investors, hedge fund managers. Barbash watched them come into
her club for years.
Some of these guys spent $100k a night, usually pulled from their six or seven-figure limit
credit cards. The tricky part was having your bucket in the right spot when the Wall Street
money started raining. Barbash knew a way to find those sweet spots.
She realized there were two different types of men the Quartet went after. The disrespectful
guys and the guys who were white knights. The rude guys could be manipulated with alcohol
and attention. As mentioned earlier, Barbash would call the other hustlers over to the
bar. They would flirt like crazy, make him feel important. Then, they would invite him
to their gentleman's club.
Once they got to the club, the Quartet would run the crap out of his credit card over a
period of several weeks. They'd accumulate five-figure tabs on some nights. Other times,
they'd swipe for six-figure sums.
After they swiped their cards enough times, the Quartet took the men to a hotel, where
they had a whole trap set for their target to fall into. When the man entered his room,
he'd lay down on the bed, expecting something dirtier than dancing.
Unwilling to solicit promiscuous activity themselves, the Quartet outsourced. They recruited
street workers to come up to the hotels and pose for blackmailing photographs. So when
the men woke up the next morning, he would have a good reason not to report the scam
to the police.
As for the white knights, they required a completely different approach. Keo explained
that while some men visit clubs to drink and enjoy the show, other men, however, go to
fall in love.
They walk in and see beautiful women trapped in an exploitative relationship with greedy
club owners and disgusting patrons. In other words, they saw dancers as damsels in distress,
and they were the only ones who could save them. Keo says these types of men are the
easiest to bilk.
Once they say 'I love you,' the dancer knows they'll give her whatever she wants. There's
no need to flirt and intoxicate them, just go along with his fantasy and collect money.
Keo says that men bought her cars, paid her rent, and purchased expensive jewelry for
her. All in the hopes that they'll quit and let the man save her from the dancer's life.
While rude guys and white knights might seem different, they all fit into the overall strategic
process. This process is called fishing. Though, Barbash preferred a more subtle term: marketing.
The Client List Barbash and associates marketed a lot during
2013. They made more money than they ever could have imagined, especially Barbash, who
took home the largest cut. She and the other hustlers bought new cars, clothes, and other
luxury items.
But the work wasn't always easy. They often had to work all night, trying to seduce drunk
handsy men into a club, then a hotel room. Barbash recalls not getting off until 6 am,
with just enough time to take her young daughter to school on weekday mornings.
She admitted in subsequent interviews that the stress was heavy after a couple months
of constant scamming. Each target took weeks to scam without them noticing, especially
the rude types. Each time the target partied at the gentleman’s club, they had to swipe
the card. It would have been much easier to steal the entire payload in one swipe. Barbash
admits to succumbing to this temptation a time or two.
It was also tempting to break another rule of Barbash's system: only scam targets on
the client list. Normally, Barbash chose targets she knew. These individuals were on her list
of clients she'd entertained in the past. Other targets belonged to other hustlers'
client lists.
By only scamming people they knew, the girls could keep track of who they were scamming
and how much they were stealing. However, the girls got reckless after a while. They'd
see wealthy-looking men sitting at the bars—by that point, they knew the right type to look
for—and buy them rounds of shots to get a conversation started.
Without knowing these guys, the Quartet would save time by seducing them, drugging them,
and eventually luring them to the gentlemen's club to drain their cards in one swipe.
These sloppily scammed targets didn't remember how they ended up in a hotel. But they noticed
a massive credit card bill pop on their phone the next day.
The Recording The man who contacted the NYPD was THE wrong
guy to scam. He doesn't remember much about the night he was scammed. But he did happen
to have a recording of the girl who scammed him.
No one has officially identified who this dancer was. Keo conveniently says she doesn't
remember the girl, though she does remember the amount of money she stole from him: $17,000.
Keo also recalls how the man came to her and begged for his money back, saying he had a
mortgage to pay. Keo responded with cold no. She was running a business, after all.
What she didn't count on was how desperate the man truly was. He felt his only option
was to seek out the authorities.
The Sting The DEA eventually caught the dancer who drugged
and scammed her guy and interrogated her using the recording as evidence. She couldn't deny
her involvement, so the NYPD offered her a deal.
The DEA said she could get off easier if she helped them expose the other hustlers by going
undercover. She agreed. Before long, the dancer was mic-ed up and sitting in a bar with Keo
and Barbash.
Barbash recalls how the girl was acting weird the whole night. She tried to get her and
Keo to drug a random guy's drink. Barbash thought her associate was just eager to score
some scam money. But Keo had a hunch that something was up. Barbash told her that she
was paranoid and not to worry about it.
In hindsight, Barbash said she should have listened to Keo. Because not long after the
sting, investigators obtained enough data to arrest the cunning Quartet.
Aftermath After only four months of scamming, Barbash,
Keo, Rosen, Pascucci, and a few other dancers were all arrested on the same day. Despite
committing several felonies, none of the hustlers saw any prison time. Barbash, the ringleader,
received 5 years probation. Marsi Rosen and Karina Pascucci were sentenced to weekends
in jail for four months and five years’ probation as part of a plea deal.
The hustlers' probationary time is now up. These days they live relatively normal lives.
Though they may never live down those four months in 2013, when they scammed some of
New York's wealthiest men. And inspired a Hollywood blockbuster.
As for the lawsuit, a judge dismissed the case in May 2020. Samantha sued J-Lo for $40
million while claiming the actress misrepresented her in the film. The judge ruled that the
film was based on a 2015 article written by Jessica Pressler called The Hustlers at Scores
and never mentioned Samantha's name in the movie. While the article was written specifically
about the Quartet's scam, the film took its own creative liberties.
Click to watch one of these next videos!
And let us know in the comment section if you think the punishment the judge gave out
to them was appropriate for the crimes they committed!