Hingham -- A psychic who police say was involved in a scheme to bilk a Pembroke woman surrendered Monday.
Teresa Nicholas is accused of scamming the woman out of $7,000 by telling her the money was needed to prevent her daughter's suicide.
After Hingham Detectives spoke with an attorney representing Nichols, she agreed to turn herself in Monday afternoon. She was booked and later transported to Hingham District Court where she was arraigned on charges of Larceny over $250 and Conspiracy. She was released after posting $500 bail and is due to return to court June 22. The 43-year-old now lists her address as 179 Pleasant St., Attleboro.
The arrest of Nicholas, a Hingham-based fortune-teller with addresses in Hadley, Mass., and Albany, N.Y., comes weeks after another self-proclaimed psychic, Tiffany Crystal Smith, was arrested in connection to the same scam.
At her April 17 arraignment, Smith pleaded innocent to charges of larceny over $250 by false pretenses, larceny from a person over 65, conspiracy and two counts of larceny of more than $250. She was released after posting $1,500 bail.
Police said a 69-year-old Pembroke woman who came to Smith for a psychic reading agreed to give her money and an antique opal ring after Smith told her that she was under a "curse and a black cloud," and that her daughter would hang herself within a week if she didn't pay Smith $16,000 to lift the curse. The woman gave Smith a check for $7,000 on April 6, but then had second thoughts and told her family, police said.
Nicholas was not at Smith's Whiting Street shop during several visits detectives made there earlier this month, but police said the $7,000 check was made out to Nicholas and that surveillance footage shows Nicholas depositing it at the Rockland Federal Credit Union branch in South Weymouth.
Town records show that Nicholas, in July 2007, applied for a building permit so she could put up a sign reading "Psychic Reader & Advisor" outside the small commercial building at 49 Whiting St.
Hingham's building commissioner, Mark Grylls, said he is looking into whether the building has been illegally used as a residence. The building is in a business zone, but police said they found evidence that Smith had been living there.
"If she's living there, she'll be getting a letter from me," Grylls said.
Hingham selectmen are also looking into whether Smith and Nicholas were operating the shop without a required license. State law requires fortune-tellers to obtain a $2 license in the town where they live, but Assistant Town Administrator Betty Foley said Hingham has not issued any fortune-telling licenses.
Under state law, the maximum fine for telling a fortune without a permit is $100.
