I recently listened to a podcast called Sympathy Pains, hosted by Laura Beil. The show consisted of six parts, detailing the various scandals and fraudulent acts leading up to Sarah Delashmit’s trial and subsequent imprisonment.
Over the course of 20 years, Delashmit claimed that she had cancer, muscular dystrophy, and other illnesses, all for the purpose of finding true friends, or so she claimed. She used a wheelchair and posted selfies from a hospital bed, told friends and coworkers she was trapped in abusive relationships, and even that she was the mother of children who had died.
Shockingly to her victims, it was all a con. Sympathy was both her great need and her powerful weapon. However, unlike most scams, Delashmit didn’t want people’s money, instead vying for the attention and emotions of trusting and vulnerable women.
Throughout the series, I was incredibly intrigued by the way this woman's mind worked. Delaschmidt was apathetic and almost sociopathic in her actions towards these other women, yet was able to play her act so sincerely.
The reporting itself was fairly well done considering the number of interviews the journalist, Laura Beil, was able to acquire. She had interviewed lines from police officers, victims of the case, and even some family of the mentally afflicted woman. The investigations seemed in-depth, and the story was easy to follow.
The format of the series was episodic in the way Beil broke down the story of Delashmit. Each episode started by recounting a story of a woman who became another victim and then slowly built toward the inevitable flood of information coming to light, as Delashmit’s lies were unveiled.
Something that could have been done better was the repetitiveness of the episodes. They all followed much the same storyline, starting with introducing the wronged and then recounting the story of how Delaschmit had fooled and hurt them. By the fourth woman to tell a similar story to her fellow victims, I was just eager for the reporter to get to the point.
I understand what Beil was trying to say about the various women, and how their stories led up to the inevitable Dr. Phil episode, but their portion honestly could have been summarized and condensed into two, maybe three episodes at most.
Overall, it was a very intriguing story and I would be interested in knowing what happened to Sarah Delashmit after this whole ordeal. From the minimal digging I have done already, it seems like she served her time in prison and then dropped off the map. I could hardly find an article mentioning her within the last two years, the most recent being from March 2022.
I am not one much for listening to podcasts like this, typically preferring to stick to fictional horror anthologies, but I find true crime intriguing as well. I have a couple of long flights ahead of me in the coming months, and I would not be opposed to potentially downloading a podcast or two like this to accompany me on those long trips.
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