St. Helena woman thought she made a friend online. Then she lost more than $20,000.

A St. Helena Island woman reported on Monday she believed she had been the victim of a scam after giving between $20,000 and $30,000 to a man she met online, according to a Beaufort County Sheriff’s Office report.

She told deputies she had been chatting with a man on Yahoo Messenger and corresponding via email for the past year, according to the report. He told her he had a box of “certificates and IRA bonds that he wanted to send to her” but it was stopped by Israeli Customs and she needed to help him pay to get it out so he could send it to her. Then he told her it had been stopped by U.S. Customs and Border Protection and she needed to help him pay again.

After several months of helping pay the fees, she had spent tens of thousands of dollars, according to the report. When someone contacted her and threatened her, saying she needed to pay yet again, she called U.S. Customs for help. She had the routing and account number she used for the wire transers, but told deputies the name on the account changed every few weeks.

Deputies encouraged her to stop speaking with the man and to let her bank know she had likely been the victim of a scam, according to the report.

This story was originally published December 19, 2017 at 3:00 PM with the headline "St. Helena woman thought she made a friend online. Then she lost more than $20,000.."