Russian con artist Anna Sorokin, better known by her pseudonym Anna Delvey, was released from jail in February, and is officially out of ICE detention as of October 7th, 2022. Originally convicted in 2019 for attempted grand larceny and stealing a private jet, Anna’s case gained new traction with the drop of the popular Netflix documentary series, Inventing Anna.
Sentenced to serve 4 to 12 years in federal jail, Anna was released after serving nearly 4, but quickly put behind bars again in March, due to overstaying her visa. Now that she is officially free, and returning to a new apartment in Manhattan, additional questions about her story have resurfaced.
Although confined to prison these past couple of years, Anna has not stayed silent regarding her sentence, sharing her narrative by appearing on podcasts, most notably, Call Her Daddy. Here, she told host Alex Cooper that she does not consider herself a con artist, and that she “never intended to harm anyone.” Anna also claims to have never introduced herself as a German heiress, saying, “No one introduces themself as such, it sounds completely ridiculous.” Regardless, she did admit to scamming banks, her friends, and New York’s elite out of thousands of dollars… leaving everyone wondering: How did she do it?
The basis of Anna Delvey as we know her was crafted upon a great deal of illusion and assumption. Living in 5-star hotels and reportedly throwing $100 bills around as tips, Anna had New York not only believing in her fictitious royal background, but admiring it. In the years before her arrest she would frequently dine and dash, go on lavish trips with friends, “forgetting” to pay her share, and max out numerous credit cards. This continued until July of 2017 when she was first arrested, and people began to catch on to her fabricated persona. Reportedly, Anna had skipped paying bills for two NYC hotels- the W New York, and the Beekman, which amounted to over $3,000 in fees. She was scheduled to attend court in September, however, never showed. She was then arrested again in October of that year in a sting operation organized by the Manhattan District Attorney’s office, resulting in her future trial and arrest, and revealing her true identity.
This leads us into the present day, with Sorokin’s future still uncertain. If anything’s for sure though, the terms of her release include some strict rules, such as a complete social media ban. This will definitely be difficult for her, as she seems to have relished controlling her platform as a way to essentially control the narrative around herself.
In considering how she would like to be remembered, Anna desires a future where she is no longer associated with her crimes, if possible. She concludes that one day she will “hopefully be able to create something good out of all the attention.”