A woman was charged with faking cancer as a ploy to steal money from sympathetic donators; her own family asked that she receive the most serious punishment possible.
A Burlington County, N.J., judge sentenced Lori E. Stilley to 500 hours of community service after she collected close to $12,000 in donations from over 300 people, Philly.com reported.
Stilley, 41, even made a Facebook page and sold an online e-book about her supposed struggle with stage-three bladder cancer.
The woman's family realized Stilley had been lying after she made a "miraculous recovery" a day before she was set to begin hospice care, her scam had been going on for nine months.
"I have never heard of such an outrageous thing. I'm almost speechless. It's despicable what you've done," Superior Court Judge James W. Palmer Jr. told Stilley in court.
Stilley asked for donations on her personal website and Facebook, claiming she did not have health insurance to pay for her treatments. Two fundraisers were organized by her friends and family to raise additional donations, a Burlington County Prosecutors Office press release reported.
After Stilley indicated she wished to marry her boyfriend before she died, loved ones paid for the wedding themselves and negotiated the cost of a banquet hall rental down to $500.
A friend created a meal calendar, where people had scheduled dates to prepare and drop off meals for the "dying" woman months in advance.
"I don't think it was profit-motivated [but rather a result of] prescription medicine abuse." Andrew McDonnell, the county prosecutor who recommended Stilley's maximum sentence, said, according to Philly.com.
Besides the financial consequences imposed on hundreds of people by Stilley's lie, the emotional trauma it caused her loved ones was also a concern.
"I couldn't sleep," Lisa DiGiovanni, Stilley's younger sister, told the judge. "My life became consumed with helping Lori."
DiGiovanni said her children had been devastated by their aunt's alleged illness, and her son was in counseling to help cope with depression.
"My sister faked an illness, but she has taken so many lives," DiGiovanni told the judge. She asked that the court impose the maximum sentence on Stilley.
Stilley's has no medical record of a stage three bladder cancer diagnosis.
In 2004 Stilley was arrested and charged with filing a fraudulent medical claim and collecting $8,892.
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