My Internet love is a corpse-hoarding granny

The dangers of online dating were never so clear

By Lucy Sherriff • Get more from this author

Posted in Music and Media, 22nd February 2001 14:25 GMT

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Trevor Tasker's online romance went from steamy to chilly when he flew to the States to marry his love, only to discover that she was an old age pensioner with a corpse in her freezer.

Trevor, 27, met Wynema Shumate in a chat room, and exchanged electronic love notes with her for months. After she sent him photographs of herself in her smalls he decided to up-sticks to the States to be with her.

However, the photographs were taken over 35 years ago, and Trevor was met at the airport by a rather larger, and older woman than he expected. Shumate is now 65, and weighs in at an impressive 20 stone, according to a report in The Sun.

But fair play to Trevor, he was not to be deterred and resolved to stay for a holiday despite his shock.

But worse was to come, because Shumate had kept the dead body of her former flatmate, James O'Neill in her freezer, because she wanted to continue living in his house, and keep drawing money from his account.

O'Neill had died of natural causes, but Shumate had tried to cut off one of his legs in order to fit him in the freezer. She has since been sentenced to a year in jail for fraud and unlawfully removing a dead body.

Trevor has apparently vowed never to go online again. His mum said that he was very embarrassed about the whole affair. ®

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