Could this famous con man be lying about his story? A new book suggests he is

This story is from The Pulse, a weekly health and science podcast.

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Frank W. Abagnale Jr. may have pulled off one of the greatest hoaxes on earth.

Abagnale’s famous tale of forging checks and assuming different professional identities has captured national audiences through pop-culture adaptations, most famously the 2002 Steven Spielberg film, “Catch Me if You Can,” starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Tom Hanks. It was developed from Abagnale’s memoir of the same name.

The story goes that between the mid-1960s and the early 1970s, Abagnale lived out many lives as an impostor. He pretended to be a pilot for Pan American airlines, a doctor in Georgia, a lawyer for the attorney general’s office in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and a professor at Brigham Young University. He also cashed more than $2 million worth of bad checks in over 26 countries. All this, he claimed, while still a teenager and while being chased by the FBI.

The movie was a hit, winning tons of awards and garnering many more nominations.

But though the movie claims to be based on a true story, creating the myth of Frank W. Abagnale Jr. might be the best con that Abagnale actually pulled. A new book contends that the story of the charming teen running from the FBI and pulling off all those impersonations without getting caught is mostly made up.

Science journalist Alan C. Logan remembers watching the film on videocassette after it came out and thinking that there was just something off about it.

“I remember just having this nagging feeling and that something just wasn’t quite right about it,” Logan said. “And that was that. That thought, you know, went into the back of my mind for a couple of decades almost.”

Logan eventually revisited that nagging feeling. In early 2020, he wrote a book about Robert Vernon Spears, a medical con man who was the suspect in a mysterious commercial airline disaster in 1959.

“And everyone who read the book started comparing Spears, who was verifiable … to Abagnale, to ‘Catch Me if You Can.’ And I just thought, well, let me look into [it] a little bit. And nothing was adding up, nothing was verifiable.”

Logan said what he found blew his mind. His book about it is called “The Greatest Hoax on Earth: Catching Truth, While We Can.”

The real Frank

Logan used public records and newspaper clippings to find out the real story. He even spoke to people who knew Abagnale before the myth about his life took off, including a flight attendant Abagnale met in 1969 in an encounter that eventually led to his incarceration.

“What really happened was that, dressed as a TWA (Trans World Airlines) pilot, which he only did for a few weeks, [Abagnale] befriended a flight attendant called Paula Parks,” Logan said. “He followed her all over the Eastern Seaboard, identified her work schedule through deceptive means, and essentially stalked the woman.”

Parks didn’t know what to do with him. She tried to tell him that she wasn’t interested, but he was persistent. He even showed up at her apartment in New Orleans. She told him then that she was going to go visit her parents in Baton Rouge, and he tagged along.

“So Frank Abagnale meets her parents in Baton Rouge. Frank and Paula … part ways, and a few days later, Frank Abagnale shows back up at [her parents’] house in Baton Rouge and said, ‘Hey, I’m Paula’s friend. Remember me? I’m on furlough as a pilot.’ And they invited him in out of kindness.”

Abagnale stayed with the family for a while, in Parks’ room, and she was mortified. She didn’t trust him, but her family did. They cooked meals for him, and introduced him to people in Baton Rouge. He would take the family out to dinner and buy them flowers, earning their trust. All the while he was doing that with checks he stole from them, which he had rifled through. He stole about $1,200 from the family, and more from local businesses in Baton Rouge. In his book, Abagnale claimed that he never ripped off individuals, only hotels, airlines and banks.

Eventually, he was caught and arrested.

“So Abagnale’s narrative that between the ages of 16 and 20, he was on the run, chased all over the United States and even internationally by the FBI. This is completely fictitious,” Logan said. “Public records obtained by me show that he was confined for the most part in prison during those years.”

To tell the lie

Abagnale was paroled in 1974, and moved to Friendswood, Texas, where he was arrested once again for theft. After Abagnale got out of prison, a parole officer encouraged him to tell his story of being a transformed man.

It was an idea Abagnale ran with. At first, he started by giving small lectures, telling this story of redemption, but his tale grew larger and larger. He teamed up with a producer and eventually landed an appearance in 1977 on a national television show called “To Tell The Truth.”

The premise of the show was that celebrity panelists had to identify the one person who was not lying, out of three people claiming to be the same person. Logan said there was no fact-checking on “To Tell The Truth.”

“And perhaps for the first time in this show’s history, you had three liars on the stage. Two of them were instructed to lie. And then Abagnale told multiple lies about his biography on that show.”

Once Abagnale was on “To Tell The Truth,” he was a hit. The game show led to further  opportunities on national TV.  Later that same year, he was featured on the “Today” show with Tom Brokaw. Soon after, he was on “The Tonight Show” with Johnny Carson.

While most people were mesmerized by the story of the con man who impersonated a pilot, a doctor, a lawyer, and a college professor, some were not as convinced.