A widow lost $39,000, her house, and six dogs after a scam. ‘If the story wasn’t so horrible, people wouldn’t pay attention’

It started after a teenage girl sent a panicked email about getting her period while at school. 

That desperate SOS—one every woman knows well—went from England to Pennsylvania, where Kate Kleinert, a widow who lived alone outside Philadelphia with her six hospice dogs, read it. Kleinert’s heart went out to the girl, who referred to her as “Mom” and was the daughter of a single-dad friend named Tony who Kleinert had been chatting with. Kleinert ran out and picked up a gift card and texted images of the front and back.