A Kansas City woman’s TikTok series is sparking important conversations about online dating safety after she Googled her date and uncovered an arrest record. Then their conversation spiraled into bizarre claims about billionaire parents and a series of increasingly elaborate lies. Maddie, known as @maddswatts, shared her wild dating saga in a three-part story time, with the first part quickly getting nearly 300,000 views.
Maddie’s story began when she found a match on Facebook Dating. He was so handsome that she initially worried he might be a catfish. They quickly hit it off. After exchanging texts and him sending a selfie to confirm his identity, Maddie felt a genuine connection, admitting she “really liked this guy.”
So she was excited when he told her he was in Kansas City for work, staying in an Airbnb with several coworkers for a few weeks. He invited Maddie and a friend to come over for games and a bonfire on Friday night. It sounded fun, but Maddie decided to do some digging first. The very first search result for his name brought up an arrest record from two years prior.
Her self-chosen nickname, ‘FBI agent,’ is apt
He had been arrested for allegedly robbing a pawn shop. Maddie immediately confirmed it was him because his mugshot was prominently displayed on the website. Armed with this shocking information, Maddie decided she had to confront him and texted him: “So I Googled your name, and it said you went to jail. What did you go to jail for?”
He admitted it, claiming he got “caught up in the wrong crowd,” was with a friend on drugs who robbed the pawn shop. It matched what she found, so she decided to proceed with the date. As she spoke to him in the days following, she was increasingly enamoured, even calling him “the love of my life” in a real-time post.
On Friday, they ate dinner and played some pool before heading out to the back porch. This is where things took an incredibly bizarre turn. He launched into an almost 45-minute monologue, telling Maddie a series of increasingly unbelievable stories. He claimed his ex-fiancée had almost killed him and had actually killed his dog with a fire poker.
Then, he casually mentioned that his parents were billionaires, but he chose to grow up with his grandparents on a farm. He also described a strange hierarchy at his work that required everyone to “earn” bedrooms, while he, as a boss, was sleeping in the basement next to a 19-year-old. To top it off, he asserted that he actually owned his own business through the company he technically worked for, a concept Maddie found utterly nonsensical.
Maddie left the date with many questions, so she tried to look into it. Despite details, she couldn’t find any evidence of his ex’s crime or prison time. When she confronted him about this, his reaction was a flurry of anger and guilt-tripping.
He eventually admitted to “exaggerating a little.” Then came another crazy concession: “I do have a history of lying, and it’s something that I’ve been really working hard on for the past two years, but I’m not lying about this.” Slowly, Maddie questioned his crazy claims, and they all fell apart.
The final straw came when Maddie discovered he had lied to his colleagues, saying that they had slept together the previous night. When she told him she was done, he tried to turn the tables, claiming she had “intense trust issues.” Then he abruptly left Kansas City. Maddie believes he fled because she was “hounding him about his lies.”
Maddie’s experience illustrates the complexities of dealing with pathological lying. Per Palo Alto University, this involves frequent fabrication regardless of context, often weaving believable stories that contain elements of truth. They are usually internally motivated to portray the person in a more favorable light.
Pathological lying typically involves a clear motive, such as seeking attention, admiration, pity, assistance, or to maintain a distorted self-image, and often serves as a form of manipulation by mixing truth and falsehood. Like Maddie’s date attempting to impress her with tales of wealth and power.
It makes her advice to “always Google your date” feel very important. Of course, sometimes the small lies can be pretty damaging too. Like insisting a camera at a sleepover is for security, or making an AI video to fake a crime for attention.
Published: Apr 12, 2026 01:00 pm