Saturday, August 16, 2008

Proof Paul isn't Gina F.

Here's our findings, and the proof we have that Gina F is real, and involved with this scheme. This post is solely about Gina. We have stated we haven't found a link to Paul knowing this person in person, and are still asking for viable proof he did know her. Until that time, we work with what we've got and can tangibly prove. We would also like to add that the original goal was to prove that Pepe did not exist, so yes, more time has been vested in Gina than Paul.

We were very careful to triple check everything we had, and even gave the evidence to other people for review before posting the first blog about "Friends of Pepe" to make sure that we had our ducks in a row:

Gina Fiorentino, identified in many pictures across horse riding sites, as well as competitions/shows and photos by professional photographers, owns two horses, registered to her, by the names of Gracie and Chipotle, and her email address for shows is listed as chipngrace@aol.com. This same person is identified across the horse riding forums as chipngrace. Her email address with those accounts is chipngrace@aol.com. This same email address is connected to her YouTube account, which displays videos of her riding as late as July 31.

This same email address and username are registered to Gina's fotki account, and her MySpace account, where she is friends with a woman whose images were used as "Pepe" on the "Friends of Pepe" site. We have found no connection to this person to Paul or anything else and believe this person is not involved. As of yesterday afternoon, she was still fiercely protecting her friend, and cursing us.

Within an hour of the "Friends of Pepe" site coming down, all sites registered to Gina's email address came down. Now, unless Paul has broken into her AOL account or is really the woman on the horses below, Gina exists and was quickly covering her tracks.

Gifts and money were sent to "Gina Johnson" at her parents' residence (whose last name is not Johnson, but Fiorentino) in Minnesota by CFers in the last few months. Her parents' residence and last name has been verified again today as the same address "Gina Johnson/Pepe" gave as her address to these people.

This same user, chipngrace, has made comments about her CF boyfriend (below), and referenced Paul on her MySpace account. One commenter noted that Gina made Pepe up because she had fallen in love with Paul, and she didn't believe he would love her back. It would be interesting to know if Paul knew she was parading around as her girlfriend.

We have more, but hopefully that clears up any doubts.

We have seen comments and received emails about CFers actually debating whether or not to go through with a transplant after reading Pepe's story, and it infuriates us to think that that could have been a consequence of that damn blog. Thank God no one has come forward to say they turned down a transplant because of Pepe.

A few commenters have mentioned that they know someone Gina F. confessed to in person, and we're glad to hear it. It's a step in the right direction for her. If you know of her getting help, we would like to hear about that as well.

Other commenters cannot believe the malice of the DWT blog itself and its commenters. We have some thoughts. First, we are playing the "Friends of Pepe" hoaxers at their own game. We have taken them on in their home court. They chose to expose themselves, and so we exposed the troll.

Second, we did draw a line. Gina is an adult, and we treated her as one, who was caught in this horrendous lie. We contacted the sites where her username was being used with a general comment to the effects of her being a troll, and a link to this site. We contacted the young woman we visually know as Pepe, because she had a right to know Gina was using her pictures, and we contacted a few bloggers who had asked what happened to the "Friends of Pepe" site. We did not contact her family or her workplace, or reveal her contact information. If they have been informed or that information has been used, it came from another source. But again, playing at her own game. Pepe's story spread, just as Gina's has.

We are glad the malice is here. Be angry, let it out. We are a blog that was started in anger, literally having to "walk it off" because hands were shaking, and used this blog to expose a very well-composed lie.

We would rather people take their anger out here than on the CF community, or on other CF bloggers. We have received a few emails from other people who have had trolls on their sites, stealing content, even pictures of their babies, and some are truly bitter. Their troll was never exposed. And just like Gina, who was quietly exposed years ago on another board as "Blake" for the same game, their trolls have moved on to someone else.

Knowing that those people are out there lessens our Internet communities and faith in people, and makes us sick. It's time we take these punks on at their own game.

31 comments:

Anonymous said...

Your post dedicated to Gina? Yeah, it does NOT do anything to tie her to FOP. Is that the best you've got to prove that horse riding Gina was involved? Well, it's not good enough.

Anonymous said...

To the owners of DWT: hopefully you are tracking IP addresses of people commenting here. Anon @4:28 one sounded a lot like Gina herself.

Anonymous said...

"Now, unless Paul has broken into her AOL account".....couldn't Paul have just set up this AOL account?

DownWiththeTrolls said...

Would Paul have set up the email address that Gina uses at riding shows and on her riding forums?

Also, her email address appears to have been in use since 2005, and posters commented that "Pepe" showed up in late 2006. "FOP" showed up in Dec. 2007.

Anonymous #326, we have plenty of other evidence, but are not willing to reveal everything. What would convince you of a tie? And what kind of tie? That she was typing the posts? That she called the information in as Blake/Pepe? Or that she was the person posing as the person that was lying in the bed that was blogged about and showed up on the message boards and forums?

Define "involved" for us.

Anonymous said...

Fraud is fraud. I would contact her family and workplace. Who knows what else she is or has done to rip people off financially, emotionally, etc. And I too believe that anon 4:28 is Gina.

Anonymous said...

To DWT-
You don't have to bend over backwards to convince us of ANYTHING including a "tie". You have done your part by contacting the authorities and proving the FOP a scam (THANK YOU!). You are not responsible for trying Paul/Blake/Gina/Pepe's case here. People actually get paid to do that. You are good people, and thank you for all you do.

Anonymous said...

Personally, it's enough to know the story is a lie. I hope that this site continues to expose trolls. This blog is genius in that regard alone.

Anonymous said...

Here's one last thing to show that Gina has been using "ChipnGrace" email since before FOP started:

Chipngrace
Working Hunter Join Date: Aug. 12, 2005
Posts: 617

Anonymous said...

Okay so supposedly Paul wasn't involved? Yeah right. He has a picture of the supposed "Mia" on his facebook account. How do you explain this? It is not the same photo used on the FOP site.

Anonymous said...

As much as I truly beleive Paul was a willing party to this sham, I find it hard to beleive he hijakcked or created the accounts (youtube, etc) in Gina's name. If so, why would he post those videos to youtube during a time when Gina would have been in the hospital, as per his own story? That would imply that he was trying to sabbotage his own game.


Doubt it. Paul didn't do this by himself. But he's not an innocent party.

DownWiththeTrolls said...

Hear, hear 5:05.

Anonymous said...

in reply to
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Okay so supposedly Paul wasn't involved? Yeah right. He has a picture of the supposed "Mia" on his facebook account. How do you explain this? It is not the same photo used on the FOP site.

August 16, 2008 5:00 PM

,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

I e mailed paul on facebook today
about the pictures on his facebook of the girls that look like the horse back rider and pepe and mia.

his reply was he took down the
fake ( his words ) photos and he had no clue who mia was.

if he reads this, he will know for sure who I am.

Anonymous said...

To DWT-
No Paul wouldn't have set up those e-mails that Gina used on riding forums, BUT that doesn't make him innocent in this either....why did he close down ALL his info also if he wasn't involved? He has what seems like a lot of people on his side, so why would he need to "hide" from us just like Gina is? If he told his story without playing this hiding game I think he would get a lot of sympathy....right now, by hiding, it makes him look guilty. And everyone who writes that he is sick and this stress isn't good for him....was the stress of writing for Gina "good" for him? If he had the energy to do that then he should have the energy to make this right. Also anonymous 5:41....why did he have "fake" photos on his facebook?

Anonymous said...

ok. i get that Gina could have sent M**'s pics, and said it was her. And then he downloaded them to his flickr, FoP, etc.

But...he had a pic of the real gina on facebook? who the heck did he think that was? Was it a group photo...and Gina/M** said..."oh, i'm the skinny one w/dark hair...and the other people are just friends?" or do you think Gina/M** told him the heavier set girl was Blake?

--CB

Anonymous said...

This will be my last post on here.... but.... in the end... you can turn information over to law enforcement.... but that is really it... on some level... the posts are becoming a study in group dynamics... the anger .... the desire for revenge.. the paranoia... I hope someone initiates some form of healing as vigorously as anger and revenge were introduced... we know the blog was a lie... we know people were hurt... perhaps it is time to take a second step forward.

signed,

super duper anon

Anonymous said...

This was just posted in the CF forums.



This is Gina.

Paul is completely 100% innocent and has not done a thing wrong here, but try to help a friend. He knew nothing about my lies until just this Friday morning, after this blog was started and my story came to question. I knew I was discovered and admitted everything. I made the entire thing up.

So, no, Paul did not mastermind anything. Everything he wrote on FOP is was based on information I gave him, either as myself or posing as "Blake". Please stop all accusations towards him, he has done nothing wrong. In fact, he went above and beyond to do the right things, all the time.

I am really sorry for the pain I've caused to everyone. I am paying back those I owe. I am seeking professional help. I got a referral from Dr. Marc Feldman to some psychiatrists here, I have contacted them and should hear back from them the next business day. Again, I am really sorry for lying and causing such emotional pain and mistrust, and for making people question others in the future, and the transplant process. I never set out to hurt anybody, and I ended up hurting those I cared about the most.

I'm asking for forgiveness, not that I deserve it. I really am seeking the professional help I need and am going to give it my all.

Gina

-------------------------
24yo female w/CF
At first you're going to find me to be sarcastic, insensitive, and heartless.....after a few minutes you will see those are my good qualities

Anonymous said...

She posted under Blakes name! Forgot to mention that.

Anonymous said...

which cf forum? can you provide a link?

Anonymous said...

Interesting. Can we get confirmation that the Gina who posted this on the CF Forums is horse riding Gina Fiorentino?

Anonymous said...

It's interesting that Paul's MySpace was changed to private sometime today.(http://www.myspace.com/lungsforlife) It was public this afternoon. On that site it said he was a teacher at Oakton Community College near Chicago until May 2006 when he became too sick to continue his job.


It's also interesting that his name remains on the Oakton Faculty listing:


http://www.oakton.edu/cgi-bin/web500.pl?op=searchresult&searchfor_fullname=Paul+Mooney&searchfor_title=&searchfor_ou=&searchfor_telephonenumber=&searchfor_mail=&Search=Search

Anonymous said...

It was deleted. The site admins was allowing 24 hours to vent and then it was deleted as soon as Blake/Gina posted. I guess they didn't want any dramma from her to start. I can't say that I blame them. They wanted people to use this site to talk about Blake/Gina/Pepr/Paul

Anonymous said...

It was deleted. The site admins was allowing 24 hours to vent and then it was deleted as soon as Blake/Gina posted. I guess they didn't want any dramma from her to start. I can't say that I blame them. They wanted people to use this site to talk about Blake/Gina/Pepr/Paul

Anonymous said...

It was posted on cysticfibrosis.com
I believe it was deleted though shortly after it was posted by the mods. I could be wrong though.

What more do you want? If she isn't Gina F. then who is she? It is the same Gina who has two horses named Chipotle and Gracie, who had the YouTube videos with those very same horses (who deleted them as soon as she was found out) etc...It is her!

Anonymous said...

Paul probably made his account private because maybe he was sick of getting bashed or emails about this. He must be feeling very bad and vulnerable right now and doesn't need to be bombarded. I would probably do the same thing if I were in his shoes.

Anonymous said...

Try looking up this Dr. Marc Feldman she said she is seeing. He is in Birmingham , Alabama. And isn't that quite the distance from Minnesota? And he writes books and stuff on the Maunchausen. So obviously she has been reading what everyone is writing.

Anonymous said...

She must have been researching to find this guy.

Anonymous said...

Taken from facebook.
I don't get this. To the people that support Q. Do you think that there is really a pepe? Do you think that a intelligent man(as he seems to be)honestly was so close to somebody that he started a site dedicated just to one person in his name w/o ever actually meeting this person? Which isn't true, because there were statements of them actually being in a relationship. Him and Gina that is. So anyways, he did all of this w/o ever contacting the hospital himself once thru all of these updates, never onced called himself to check on a dear friend, so close to death. Just waited for these updates from her-while on the vent or so recently off. Her first instinct off the vent after hallucinating and having a sierra mist while drawing crazy pictures, was to call him. Doesn't that seem questionable? I would question someone calling me to report all of these numbers,while being so sick. I have been really sick, and that would have been the last thing I would have done, update a person I only knew thru a computer, while clinging to life. U guys r crazy to support him.

It seems Paul has many enemies all over the net now.

Anonymous said...

Taken from facebook.
I don't get this. To the people that support Q. Do you think that there is really a pepe? Do you think that a intelligent man(as he seems to be)honestly was so close to somebody that he started a site dedicated just to one person in his name w/o ever actually meeting this person? Which isn't true, because there were statements of them actually being in a relationship. Him and Gina that is. So anyways, he did all of this w/o ever contacting the hospital himself once thru all of these updates, never onced called himself to check on a dear friend, so close to death. Just waited for these updates from her-while on the vent or so recently off. Her first instinct off the vent after hallucinating and having a sierra mist while drawing crazy pictures, was to call him. Doesn't that seem questionable? I would question someone calling me to report all of these numbers,while being so sick. I have been really sick, and that would have been the last thing I would have done, update a person I only knew thru a computer, while clinging to life. U guys r crazy to support him.

It seems Paul has many enemies all over the net now.

April said...

How does anyone know there really is a Gina? Because Paul says so? Does anyone actually know Paul IRL? Maybe he is posting as Gina/Pepe too?

Adie said...

Just adding to my own confusion..on Day 5 after the tx, Paul, or rather, FOP, spoke to her - here it is copied and pasted: - "Not only that, FOP has spoken to her whilst speeding down I-80 somewhere west of Toledo, nearly blind with tears. What words can describe this? We've found a wireless rest-stop and are at a complete loss. The heart pounds. Pepe sounds magnificent! Her voice is clear as ever. She follows the conversation with only slight lapses. She herself is still trying to process what has happened to her. "I can't believe I got lungs and didn't know," she says. She explains that over the past few days, she was aware of things, of being moved, of changes. She also says that as she succumbed to sedation just before the initiation of ECMO, she believed she would never awaken again. Without the pristine, pink new lungs now restoring her to full sentience, she is correct: she probably never would have opened her eyes again."

Who did FOP/Paul speak to?

Also, another horrible, horrible posting was on 9th May, entitled "Suffering". It contained a letter that "Pepe" sent FOP, containing a huge amount of medical details, about a late friend "Michelle", who had to have surgery done in her room, with no sedation, while Pepe and her family were outside listening to her scream. Again, copied and pasted:

"We stood outside the door as he cut her chest open and dug his hand into her chest. She said she could see it going in right up to his wrist...except his thumb... He had to maneuver around the adhesions, and guide the tube in, starting low between her boobs and ending over or around her shoulder because he said part of the pain is due to it pushing on the pleural lining all the way from the front to the back under the scapula."

I always took this letter to be way too far fetched to be true, it seemed like something out of ER...why make something like this up? Presumably Gina made up this entire episode, and sent it in a letter to Paul to be published on the blog?

Grullapaint said...

Gina is back as Eventing4fun@aol.com.She is also back up on YouTube as eventer723. And is now saying she's a high functioning Austistic person. Just thought you all should know.She can't feel that bad about what she's done huh??!!