Manti Te'o was never going to be the last. In fact, he appears to have been the follower in the somehwat unbelievable trend of Catfishing athletes.
Chris Andersen found himself in the middle of a crazy Internet scheme and it seriously threatened his career. And so the dangers of the Internet rear their ugly head again.
Police in both Colorado and Canada have cleared Andersen of threatening a woman in California that had police searching his house just before he signed with the Heat. Andersen should be relieved to know that a woman attempting to extort him was the "mastermind" of this scheme and she is no longer in the picture.
Let me see if I can paint this picture for you:
According to Brian Windhorst of ESPN.com, 15 months ago police began investigating Andersen for making threats to a woman in California. Instead what actually was occurring was a woman in Manitoba was posing as Andersen and sending threatening messages to this woman. Then, she turned around and sent messages to Andersen as this very same woman looking to extort money from Andersen.
Making matters even more confusing and bizarre, the woman from California flew to Denver to meet Andersen. And she may have been under age (that was proven to be unfounded, but the media ran with it). This got police officers attention. And Andersen is in a sticky situation with the NBA having already lost an entire season to a suspension for violating the league's substance abuse policy.
This cloud hanging over Andersen could have very easily derailed his signing with Miami and, eventually, the team's championship. The police began investigating Andersen during the Nuggets' 2012 Playoff run and the team opted not to re-sign him. Andersen did not sign with the Heat until the middle of the season.
Authorities uncovered the scam and the fact Andersen was not involved when they searched Andersen's Denver home last year looking for the IP address from which the messages were sent. Their search did not turn up the IP address and Andersen was cleared from all charges.
It was only last month that authorities — including the Royal Canadian Mounted Police — met with Andersen in Colorado and unveiled the whole plot and what their investigation had uncovered.
