George Santos Accused of Stealing Thousands from Dying Dog’s GoFundMe

Along with lying about being Jewish, using stolen checks in Brazil, and essentially inventing out of thin air much of his resumé before he was elected to Congress, you can now add one more allegation against George Santos: stealing money from a GoFundMe for a veteran’s dying service dog. 

The veteran, 47-year-old Richard Osthoff, accused the freshman New York congressman Tuesday of setting up a GoFundMe to pay for medical treatment for his service dog, raising $3,000 through it, and then disappearing with the money without handing over a cent. The dog then died months later without receiving treatment. 

Osthoff told Patch.com that after his dog Sapphire developed a stomach tumor in 2016, a veterinarian referred him to “a guy who runs a pet charity.” That man was Santos, who was then going by the name Anthony Devolder, and the charity was Friends of Pets United, according to Patch.com. Santos has claimed that the charity was a registered nonprofit, but the Internal Revenue Service has no record of the organization’s existence, the New York Times reported in December. 

After the GoFundMe’s goal was reached, Santos “stopped answering my texts and calls," Osthoff told Patch.com. Osthoff posted on Facebook in November 2016 that he was “scammed by Anthony Devolder,” and that due to “bad veterinary contacts, and subterfuge regarding payment, Sapphire has NOT received veterinary care, and her growth is 3 to 4 times bigger than it was when the campaign was fulfilled,” according to a screenshot published by Patch.com. 

Among the problems were that Santos told Osthoff he had to use a veterinarian in Queens rather than the one in New Jersey who had told him Sapphire needed the surgery—and then, the veterinarian in Queens told Osthoff that the tumor was inoperable. A second person who attempted to intervene on Osthoff’s behalf, another veteran who runs a nonprofit outreach group, also told Patch that Santos was “totally uncooperative” in a phone conversation. 

In text messages published by Patch.com, a person who is purportedly Santos told Osthoff that it was “our credibility”—meaning the charity’s—that brought in the donations, and that the funds raised for Sapphire would be “moved on to the next animal in need.” Osthoff also told Patch.com that Santos told him in a phone conversation that he would use the money donated for Sapphire for other animals because Osthoff “didn’t do things [Santos’s] way.” 

Sapphire died in Jan. 2017, according to Patch.com. A GoFundMe spokesperson told VICE News in an email following publication of this story that when the company “received a report of an issue with this fundraiser in late 2016, our trust and safety team sought proof of the delivery of funds from the organizer.”

“The organizer failed to respond, which led to the fundraiser being removed and the email associated with that account prohibited from further use on our platform,” the spokesperson said. “GoFundMe has a zero tolerance policy for misuse of our platform and cooperates with law enforcement investigations of those accused of wrongdoing.”

Santos won election in November, flipping a Democratic district and helping Republicans win control of the House for the first time since 2018. Since then, however, he has been accused of lying about where he went to high school, about an invented college volleyball career at a school he appears to have never attended, and about his work on Wall Street. He has reportedly admitted to committing fraud in Brazil and been accused of theft in the U.S., where former roommates say he stole items from them—including a Burberry scarf he wore to a “Stop the Steal” rally on Jan. 5, 2021, Patch reported last week. 

Santos has also lied about having Jewish ancestry and even having relatives who survived the Holocaust. A former roommate of Santos’ told CNN Tuesday that Santos went by Anthony Devolder when he knew him, but used another different last name while soliciting money through Friends of Pets United because, as Santos allegedly told him: “The Jews will give more money if you’re a Jew.” 

Though the Nassau County GOP and six other New York Republican members of Congress have called for his resignation, it currently appears as though Santos will face zero consequences for essentially lying his way into Congress. Republican leaders appointed him to two committees on Tuesday, even as Speaker Kevin McCarthy admitted to reporters earlier this week that he “always had a few questions” about his new member’s largely invented resumé. 

Santos has largely refused to comment on most of the allegations against him. Last week, he told reporters on Capitol Hill that he would “be addressing the media soon… on my time.” He also tweeted on Jan. 11: “I will NOT resign!” 

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