Clash of Clans addiction leads a Minnesota Man to fake Cancer!

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As they say, over-indulgence of anything, even something as simple as water can intoxicate. This is pretty much what happened to the Minnesotan, Jeremiah Jon Smith, who claimed to have a stage four terminal cancer and that he had only 18 to 24 months to live.

The 37 year old man was charged with theft by swindle last week, for he committed a fraudulent by falsely claiming to have cancer, collected thousands of dollars in donations and spent the money in buying gems in the game “Clash of Clans”. Here is some inside to what actually happened;

After declaring that he was diagnosed with cancer, Smith took a month off from the job and a month later claimed that he had only 6 months to live. In the meantime he claimed to have visited a couple of doctors, but refused to take his wife along.

A Go Fund Me campaign was launched to collect funds for his treatment, a total of $6800 was collected. On Feb. 6th, a dart tournament, beer bust and silent were held for Smith in Spring Lake Park, Minnesota. Another benefit was held in Northfield on Feb. 20th. The events raised a total of $15,600 with $4,000 which was allegedly used for outstanding bills.

Smith’s wife was the one who caught in suspicion revealed the true colors of the fraud Smith was committing. She tried to obtain his medical records, but to no avail, for Smith did not allow it. She reported that she never saw a medical bill or report, which made her curious as to what the agenda was.

After the reporting, the police confronted Smith to which he said that he would provide them with the medical reports and also told them that he went to Olmsted Medical Center and was on a trial medication. Police called the medical center and discovered Smith “does not participate in trial medications.” Later when the police did not receive the medical records, the police were granted a search warrant for Smith’s medical records, and found that the records were devoid of any cancer diagnosis.

Upon investigation, Smith told that he spent the money gathered from the benefits to buy gems for the mobile game “Clash of Clans”, drinking, dart tournaments and marijuana. All the listed items apart from the game seem quite something for which a person might commit trickery. However, just to buy gems for a game, this doesn’t really settle nice with me.


Although the game is free to download and play, additional in-game currency, gems, can be purchased for real money from Apple or Google store in from in-App purchases. These gems can then be used to upgrade the players and the defenses within no time at all, giving you an edge over the other players.

Apparently the virtual power enticed Smith to go for unfair means. In other words the man was so much into the game, that its addiction led him to do some nasty stuff. In a sense this all seems a bit frightening for who knew that a game would cause a crime of this nature. Either it be due to the power greed the game induced in him or the feel to dominate, the game had had a negative impact on the user.

Jeremiah Smith is charged with a felony, but because he has no criminal history, he will likely get probation, not prison time. He’s scheduled to make a court appearance in early November. Let’s see what fate awaits the con man!

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