Ray William Johnson: True Story Podcast
The Fake Saudi Prince - The Anthony Gignac story
Sun, 16 Mar 2025
Anthony Gignac, a Colombian-born con artist, spent over three decades impersonating Saudi royalty to defraud investors worldwide. Assuming the identity of "Prince Khalid bin Al Saud," he orchestrated schemes that amassed over $8 million, funding a lavish lifestyle of luxury cars, yachts, and private jets. His deception unraveled in 2017 when a suspicious investor noticed inconsistencies in his behavior, leading to his arrest. In 2019, Gignac was sentenced to more than 18 years in prison for impersonation and fraud.
Chapter 1: Who is Anthony Gignac and how did he start his con?
So this kid ends up conning millions of dollars out of people by pretending to be a Saudi royal prince. Now his name's Anthony and Anthony's around 18 years old and he's kind of a turd. He's always in trouble. And one day in 1988, he starts stealing credit cards. And of course he'll run up like thousands of dollars on them buying stuff.
But specifically, he likes to rent limousines and he'll ride around in them. And when people are like, damn, who's this rich teenager? He'll tell them that he's a royal Saudi Arabian prince. And just to be clear, he's not a prince at all. He's not royal. He's not even Saudi Arabian. He's actually Colombian-born, but raised in the US.
But anyway, he eventually leaves Michigan, where he lives, and he moves over to California. And there, he starts pulling this con all over again. And he'll steal credit cards and pretend he's a royal Saudi prince, and he pulls this scam for a few years.
However, you can only steal credit cards and commit fraud so many times before you finally get caught and they throw your ass in prison for a while, which is exactly what happens to him. But a few years later, he gets out and now it's 1993 and Anthony is living in Miami.
And there he commits identity theft and he steals someone's identity and he moves into a luxury hotel and he keeps this lie going. He tells everyone he's an important Saudi prince and everyone believes him and they want to be his friend. And so he throws these big ass parties in his hotel room for all his new friends. But unfortunately, one night in his hotel room, boom, two of his guests rob him.
And so he calls the police to report it. And then police show up and even to the police he lies and says, I'm a Saudi prince. And so I guess the police reach out to the Saudi embassy and the Saudi embassy's like, prince who? That guy's full of . And so eventually, bam, Anthony is arrested and he goes to jail.
And he's actually there for quite a while because it's not until about a year later that he gets out on bail. Then he goes right back to scamming. He goes to an American Express office and he tells them he's a Saudi prince and that not only was his credit card stolen, but that that card had a $200 million credit limit. And then he like screams at the agent to get his way.
And by some miracle, I guess this works. And they give him a new American Express card with a $200 million spending limit. But unfortunately for him, it's not long before bam, he's caught again. And he actually gets caught a bunch of times. Here's his mugshot. And also here's another mugshot from a different time he got caught.
But anyway, Bro goes to prison a couple of times because he just won't stop telling people that he's a Saudi prince and conning them. And around 15 years go by. And at this point, you would think that Anthony would give up, but no. Not only has he not given up, he keeps trying to perfect this scheme and make himself more and more believable as this fake prince.
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Chapter 2: How did Anthony Gignac impersonate a Saudi prince?
I mean, it gets really intense, and Everyone goes back to their hotel room mad. The next day at breakfast, the prince's team tells Jeffrey, hey, to keep the prince interested in purchasing your hotel, you need to buy him a nice gift, like something worth at least $50,000. And of course, this makes Jeffrey even more suspicious. But he plays along. He's like...
But eventually he gets the FBI involved and they investigate. And as soon as the FBI sees photos of Anthony and they see his messed up teeth, they're now certain that he's a fraud. Because apparently Saudi royals are known for taking care of their teeth and Anthony's teeth, they're not in the best shape. Anyway, so eventually, bam, they go and arrest him. Here's his mugshot.
And since this is actually the 11th time he's been arrested for this con, he gets sentenced to 18 years in prison.