Man Posing As Adele’s Manager Arrested After Trying To Scam Free Kendrick Lamar Tickets
A husband and wife were arrested in Miami over the weekend for allegedly posing as Adele’s manager in an attempt to obtain free tickets to see Kendrick Lamar at Rolling Loud festival.
This was the latest in what has been a series of attempted scams by Justin Jackson and his wife, Angel Lii, The Miami Herald reports. The two have allegedly posed as Adele’s manager Jonathan Dickins in the past to request free concert tickets and memorabilia from Rihanna, Usher, Drake, Katy Perry, Chris Brown, and Pharrell Williams.
As Jackson and Lii attempted to receive free goods using Dickins’ name, the real Dickins began receiving emails from other reps wondering what was going on. He reported the scam to Miami-Dade police more than a year ago, launching an investigation.
When the conning couple reached out to reps for Lamar’s label, Interscope, they suspected it was a fake and reached out to Dickins to confirm the suspicion. Dickins alerted Miami-Dade police, who used the opportunity to set up a sting posing as a production manager.
When Jackson, Lii, and one other woman arrived at Bayfront Park to pick up the tickets on Saturday — claiming Dickins was working with clients all day — the couple was immediately detained by police and now face grand theft and identity theft charges. The other woman with them was not arrested.
This is not the first time that Jackson has been accused of impersonating a celebrity rep. In 2007, he was sentenced to two years in prison for posing as a rep to Madonna and convinced a New York boutique to loan him $2.4 million jewelry that he later sold to a pawn shop.
In 2014, Jackson was sued for impersonating former basketball player and Obama aide Reggie Love, Oprah Winfrey’s nephew and OWN TV executive Scott Garner, according to The Miami Herald. Under these identities, Jackson attempted to get free stuff and land jobs with Perry Ellis and fancy Florida hotels. A federal judge ordered Jackson and Lii to stop the scam.
This article originally appeared on Billboard.