In the quiet, picturesque town of Nocera Inferiore, Salerno, a man of grand imagination and even grander fabrications began to weave a tale that would eventually ensnare a group of Americans hungry for scandal. His name? Luigi Fiorino aka Louis Forino Von Thyssen, though to some, he was known as “Baron Luigi Louis Forino of Little Staughton.” A self-styled baron, oil tycoon, and luxury collector, Forino had created an elaborate facade, but beneath the glossy exterior, there was little substance.
It all began with a set of documents that promised a bombshell revelation. These papers, purporting to expose a vast conspiracy involving then-president Donald Trump and multinational energy giant ExxonMobil, were supposed to reveal millions of dollars secretly funneled into Trump’s coffers. The man at the center of it all, according to these documents, was Rex Tillerson, Exxon’s former CEO, who had by then risen to a powerful post as Secretary of State.
The deal seemed airtight, at least to the eager Americans who got their hands on the documents. For a few thousand dollars, paid directly to Forino, they believed they had struck investigative gold. The papers appeared to show a secret financial transaction, connecting Exxon, Tillerson, and Trump in a web of corporate intrigue and international power plays. With proof like this, they imagined, they could blow the lid off a major political scandal.
The Americans rushed to share this “evidence” with major media outlets, confident that they had a scoop. But to their surprise, the newspapers didn’t take the bait. The journalists were skeptical, their instincts honed after years of sorting fact from fiction in a world flooded with misinformation. The supposed smoking gun was quickly scrutinized, and the flaws in the documents became glaring.
The mastermind behind the scam, Louis Fiorino, had crafted an intricate web of deceit. To those who fell into his orbit, Forino seemed like the real deal. His social media accounts boasted of untold wealth: multi-million-dollar Aston Martins (which, it turned out, were merely photos he had found online) and palatial homes (also stolen from the internet). He presented himself as the CEO of MCC Petroli, an oil company that existed only in his imagination. In fact, MCC Petroli seemed to be whatever Forino needed it to be, whether it operated in oil, credit, or aviation, depending on what story he was spinning at the time.
To add to his aura of legitimacy, Forino claimed aristocratic roots, adopting the noble title of “Baron.” But, like much of his life, this too was a fabrication—an easily obtainable title for sale on various online platforms. His attempts at grandeur were betrayed by poor grammar and syntax in both Italian and English, but somehow, that didn’t stop his unwitting victims from falling for his charm.
Forino’s rise to minor notoriety wasn’t a recent development, though. In 2008, he had already made headlines for a similarly audacious move. At the age of 32, he claimed that his Mediterranean Consulting Company (MCC, of course) was set to buy out Magiste, a major holding company owned by businessman Stefano Ricucci, who was facing financial troubles. Unsurprisingly, that deal too was based on falsified documents, and it crumbled just as quickly as it had emerged.
As Buzzfeed’s investigation later revealed, Forino’s latest scheme followed a familiar pattern. He had managed to convince his American clients that he was the intermediary in a clandestine, high-level deal. The fake JP Morgan documents he peddled were supposedly proof of billions changing hands. His signature adorned the papers, adding another layer of credibility for those who wanted to believe.
Despite the many red flags—Forino’s rapid drop in price from hundreds of thousands of dollars to a mere nine thousand, the obvious fabrication of his millionaire lifestyle, and the ease with which his false credentials could be exposed with a simple online search—the Americans remained blind to the truth. Eager to land a political bombshell, they ignored the warning signs.
In the end, the newspapers they approached weren’t fooled, but Forino still walked away with a few thousand euros in his pocket. His victims, meanwhile, were left empty-handed, embarrassed by their gullibility and their failed attempt at breaking the story of a lifetime. The grand conspiracy that never was faded into obscurity, while Forino, as always, continued to float through life, his online empire of false promises and stolen photos intact.
And so, Luigi Fiorino—or Baron Luigi Louis Forino—aka Louis Forino Von Thyssen remains a curious figure in the annals of modern scams: a man whose ambition and audacity are matched only by the fragility of the illusions he creates. His story, like so many of his ventures, is a testament to the power of wishful thinking and the ease with which some can be seduced by the promise of grandeur, even when all the evidence points to fantasy. For now, it seems, the only one who truly benefited from this elaborate hoax was Forino himself, a man who knows how to spin a tale—and a scam—better than most.