ENCORE | Brittany Dawn: Fitness Faker
46:00 Share

Wondery Plus subscribers can listen to Scamfluencers early and ad-free right now. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or Apple Podcasts. And a heads up to our listeners, today's episode discusses eating disorders. Please listen with care. Sarah, what's your stance on New Year's resolutions? Do you make them? Do you keep them? Is there any point in even coming up with them? I don't know.

I do make them more as a guideline of what I'd like to do. I'm not really super strict with them. So I keep it easy. Well, a lot of people, for whatever reason, decide that their New Year's resolution is to go on a diet. And Sarah, I think you know how I feel about diets, generally speaking.

Oh, yeah. Well, the episode we're going to air today originally aired around last year, but I think it's the perfect time to revisit it because it's a cautionary tale of sorts about what happens when diet culture meets capitalism meets total incompetence. It's terrifying, it's dangerous, and at some points, unfortunately, it's really funny. This is one of our favorite episodes we've ever recorded. Here's Brittany Dawn, the fitness faker, with a new updated ending.

Sachi, I am about to ask you a very loaded question. I need to know if you're ready. I'm never ready, but go ahead. What are your opinions on taking fitness or health advice from Instagram influencers? I mean, I don't and I wouldn't, but I understand why it is so enticing and...

And it makes people feel hopeful or it makes people feel really bad. They think that they missed something. But it's usually just like some random person on the Internet with a Wi-Fi connection. Yeah, I am of the same belief. And as you know, there's an entire industry of people whose fitness and health expertise is a bit questionable. And the story I'm about to tell you today is about how one woman tried to exploit a market to disastrous results.

It's January 2019 and the annual Fit Expo has arrived in sunny Los Angeles. Hundreds of fitness enthusiasts in skin-tight leggings and muscle tees mill around the LA Convention Center hoping to meet their favorite fitness celebrities. One of the celebrities at this convention is a Dallas-based Fitspo influencer, Brittany Dawn. She's 27 years old, tall and thin, with short blonde hair, a fake orange tan and bright blue eyes.

She runs an online coaching business and claims she has more than 5,000 clients. Brittany is very much a hashtag girl boss living her dream.

And even though Britney is internet famous, she's at the expo working the booth for some friends. She hands out samples and takes selfies with adoring fans, all part of the influencer gig, until a strange man walks behind the booth. He's got a horseshoe mustache and wears a bald eagle t-shirt with acid-washed jeans. The man taps Britney on the shoulder. Excuse me, I have a question. Yeah. You look familiar. Yeah.

Brittany doesn't know this guy, but she turns on the Texan charm and bats her false eyelashes. She is totally unprepared for what happens next. You look like you stole my daughter's money. I ain't kidding you.

Brittany panics. But things are about to get a whole lot worse because there's a hidden camera filming their exchange. The whole thing's an ambush that's signaling the beginning of the end for Brittany's fitness career. This man's here to call her out on behalf of all the women she's allegedly defrauded all over the country. And when the video gets posted, Brittany will face a catastrophe that changes her life forever. ♪

From Wondery, I'm Sarah Hagee. And I'm Sachi Cole. And this is Scamfluencers. Sachi, this is a story about a woman who built a virtual viral empire around fitness and nutrition. But what she promoted ultimately led her from leg day to lawsuits. Sachi, there is just so much to unpack in this story, and I truly cannot wait for you to hear it. I'm calling this episode The Fitness Faker. Legend.

Britney's origin story, according to her own telling of it on YouTube, starts about seven years earlier. It's 2012 and Britney Dawn Davis is in her early 20s. She's getting ready to walk on stage at her first bodybuilding competition. And when her number's called, Britney adjusts her skimpy bikini, tosses back her long brown hair and struts across the stage. She performs a 10-second posing routine, flexing every muscle of her spray-tanned body as the audience claps and cheers.

She says she places sixth out of roughly 40 girls. Brittany appears happy and healthy, but behind her pristine smile, she reportedly hides an ongoing struggle with an eating disorder. It likely began a few years earlier when Brittany had just started college at Texas A&M Commerce. She gains weight, like a lot of freshmen, and she feels really insecure about it. So she's hitting the gym and making small changes to her diet. She starts to feel better and she sees results.

But next semester, Brittany leaves the dorms and moves back home, which is where she says things take a turn for the worse. According to a video she posts to YouTube, Brittany buys a scale and becomes obsessed with seeing the numbers plummet. I remember I would stand in front of a mirror and I would still see my heaviest self. I was 110 pounds soaking wet. I was skin and bone. Oh, that's sad.

Also, there's nothing wrong with being your heaviest self. Sometimes that's your healthiest self. It doesn't sound like being 110 pounds is working for her. No, I mean, it really doesn't. And she starves herself and works out every spare minute of the day. But not long afterwards, she starts trying to mend her relationship with food. And that's when she discovers bikini competitions. She instantly becomes obsessed with

I'm preemptively stressed out about how her eating disorder and these bikini competitions are going to commingle here. Yeah, I mean, here's the thing. I could see why she'd be pleased. Yes, but not great. Well, when her family takes her to a celebratory dinner, Brittany's so parched she can't stop chugging water. She went on such a restrictive diet that she limited even her water intake.

And the next morning, she notices she gained a bunch of weight back. In the bodybuilding world, this is normal. It's called rebounding. But Brittany doesn't know that. Distraught and confused, she stops working out and starts binge eating, gaining 25 pounds in just a week...

This kicks off a two-year-long cycle of binge eating and restricting, with Brittany gaining and losing those 25 pounds over and over again. It's brutal on her body and mind. But everything changes when she implements a new diet that allows her to reinvent herself. ♪

Roughly two years after her first competition, Brittany thumbs through a menu. She's in training, so she has to watch what she eats. But today, she orders the sushi, guilt-free. This carb-filled meal would usually be forbidden during the on-season, but Brittany's been working with a new coach. And this coach teaches her all about flexible dieting.

With flexible dieting, Brittany says in a YouTube video that she no longer starves herself. Instead, she focuses on properly fueling her body. I went from this super strict, rigid, cookie-cutter meal plan to being able to eat certain things in certain quantities that I truly enjoyed and loved.

Okay, I guess I'm happy for her, but also this is just eating, you know, balanced meals, letting yourself enjoy your food, eating enough for how much you're burning. Well, flexible dieting changes Brittany's life.

At around 23 years old, Brittany finally achieves a body and confidence she always desired. And she knows she's not alone in her struggles. So in 2013, Brittany joins a relatively new app called Instagram, where she posts about flexible dieting and bikini competitions. She also launches a small business as a personal trainer. And Brittany replaces her last name, Davis, with her middle name, Dawn. And Brittany Dawn Fitness is born.

Right away, she says she snags a couple of local clients and claims a few of them are aspiring bikini models. But Brittany wants more than a life as a small town trainer.

So she works her glutes off to grow her audience on Instagram. And by early 2014, she fully adopts a persona of a fitness influencer. Brittany goes from brunette to blonde and dials her spray tan back a few notches. She also starts posting less about bodybuilding and her content starts to look more like this. Sachi, you got to check it out. Oh, brother. So... Yeah. Oh, brother is right. It's an image...

With two of her in it, she looks like she's in like the desert somewhere in like Palm Springs. And she is wearing a like fluffy white nightclub dress and one in like a very...

Please read the caption. You can't!

Well, remember, it's 2014 and the whole body positive movement is really starting to take off.

And Britney seems acutely aware of this cultural trend because she starts posting tons of pics looking, as you said, conventionally attractive while writing captions like, screw skinny, let's get strong. And food is not the enemy. She also flaunts her love of Oreos. You have to check out this other photo that is extremely 2014. Oh, yeah. Wow. That's a deep side part. Um...

She's in a grocery store holding two kinds of Oreos. But again, it's like, yeah, you know what? Enjoy your Oreos. No one's going to like leave you hate comments about being fat. It's just you're not going to have the same backlash that, you know, if a fat woman posted that she would not receive that same input. No one's going to look at a conventionally attractive thin woman and be like,

Oh, my God. She's eating Oreos. Can you believe it? That's so controversial. Like, it's not. It's actually there's a long history of otherwise very thin, beautiful women eating fast food and being like, check, check this out. Well, Britney really connects with her growing audience when she's open about her struggles with eating disorders. Her accounts seem to gain traction after she begins posting inspiring testimonies like this one.

Could you read it, Sachi? It says, almost two full years recovered from my anorexia. And if that's not a reason to get a kick-ass workout in the morning, then I don't know what is. Recovery is worth it. Keep pushing. Keep fighting. So in addition to Brittany's growing Instagram, she's dating her childhood best friend, Zach, and they're in love. Things seem to be going great for Brittany. But maintaining an online presence is a lot of work, and Brittany's ready to cash in.

In the fall of 2014, Brittany's personal training business continues to thrive. And now, in addition to training in-person clients, she's also coaching online. Online coaching is something she offered when she first launched her business, except she didn't have a wide enough reach. But now that she's built up her following, women from all over the country are interested in working with Brittany online.

She actually decides to leave bikini competitions and focus on modeling and coaching with a growing emphasis on her virtual clients. Starting at $80 for a four-week plan, Brittany offers her clients emailed recommendations for meals and workouts, which she says are tailored to fit their food preferences. The most expensive four-week plan is reserved for clients who are preparing to compete in a bikini contest.

For $245, she offers them a training and diet program tailored to their goals and, quote, unlimited access to Brittany Dawn. This sounds fine. You know, I'm sure it's fine. But the thing is, Brittany's probably going to work with a lot of people who are coming to her with eating disorders of their own.

And it doesn't sound like she's equipped to necessarily deal with that because her own way of dealing with her disordered eating was to hyper fixate on exercise. But I think anything where the goal is like a bikini contest is a little fishy because it's not like the bikini contest isn't like show up and wear a bikini and have a great time. It's like, what do you look like in it? How thin are you? You know? Yeah.

But for some of the membership plans, she seems to give clients access to herself. She offers check-ins via text, email, or phone calls, and business keeps growing. By the end of 2014, Brittany seems to be reaching a global audience of women who want to join #TeamBrittanyDawn. But almost immediately, Brittany realizes that she overpromised.

The online coaching is more work than she expected, but her follower count is growing. And with time, she's starting to get the attention of fitness brands like the supplement company First Form. She's got to push through. So Brittany tells herself she can handle the workload, or at least that's what she's convinced herself and her followers to believe.

Okay, Sachi, it's late 2014 and a young woman named Corey Reale is looking through Instagram. She's got brown eyes and a cascade of dirty blonde curls and she's looking to improve her diet and get in shape. But she hasn't been able to find a personal trainer where she lives in Eau Claire, Wisconsin.

Luckily, through the magic of the algorithm, Corey discovers Brittany Dawn. And there's a particular Instagram post that I like to imagine catches Corey's eye. It's from Thanksgiving. And in the picture, Brittany poses for a mirror selfie. She looks really happy. And the caption reads, here's to eating some turkey and a piece of pie without tracking it. Stress-free, a thankful heart and memories with family.

Corey likes the pic. She's inspired by Brittany's journey since Corey has also struggled with an eating disorder. Plus, she loves how easy Brittany makes her program look. In the comments, Corey notices that Brittany urges her followers to just reach out. So, feeling a connection with Brittany, Corey signs up for a package. She pays $115.

But immediately she notices some red flags. The welcome email that contains her personalized macro plan doesn't include her name. And in two weeks, she gains nine pounds. OK, I mean, that's a lot in two weeks. It could be water. It could be anything like there's any reason for it. But it sounds like it's not really what was advertised. Yeah, I mean, it just isn't what she's looking for.

So, Corey asks Brittany for help, but even though Brittany is supposed to be giving her personalized guidance, the communication Corey gets back is generic and doesn't address her concerns.

Corey's confused. She was sold on the idea that she'd be a part of a team or at least find a connection with her Fitspo inspiration. But instead, she feels alone. And with a sudden weight gain and zero professional guidance, Corey really struggles with her eating disorder. And she's not the only one. Unfortunately, it'll be years before she and other clients discover that their favorite fitness influencer is totally phoning it in.

Summer should be fun, not financially stressful. So if you're looking to build your credit with everyday purchases this summer, do it with the Chime Secured Credit Builder Visa credit card. Yep. With no annual fees or interest, Chime is a great tool to help build credit using your own money. And they have features like fee-free overdraft up to $200 with SpotMe.

When you set up a qualifying direct deposit and sign up for SpotMe, Chime will spot you up to your limit when you make a credit card purchase or a cash withdrawal that exceeds your balance. That is a game changer, especially since there's no fee to use SpotMe. With Chime's secure credit card, you can improve your credit scores all summer long. Get started today at Chime.com slash Scampod. That's Chime.com slash Scampod.

Chime feels like progress. The Chime Credit Builder Visa credit card is issued by the Bancorp Bank, N.A. or Stride Bank. N.A. spot me eligibility requirements and overdraft limits apply. Out-of-network ATM withdrawal and OTC advance fees may apply. Terms and conditions apply. Go to Chime.com slash disclosures for details.

Hormones can be a real roller coaster. One minute you're feeling energized and balanced, and the next you're dealing with pesky PMS symptoms. It doesn't feel good. And it doesn't help that there are over a thousand common environmental factors that can disrupt your delicate hormone balance, from the food you eat to the skincare products you use. But the good news is there's a way to get your hormones back on track.

Happy Mammoth's Hormone Harmony is a science-backed supplement that's specifically formulated to support women through all the hormone changes you face, from menstrual cycles to menopause. It uses powerful adaptogenic herbs that can help your body adapt to these chaotic hormonal shifts. Yeah, the results speak for themselves. Their supplements have over 17,000 glowing reviews, with customers raving about feeling like themselves again. And for a limited time, you can get 15% off your entire first order at HappyMammoth.com.

Just use the code SCAMPOD. That's happymammoth.com, M-A-M-M-O-T-H, with the code SCAMPOD to get 15% off your entire first order.

For the next few years, our girl Brittany is booked, blessed, and busy. Around this time, she says she's got roughly 1,500 clients, and that number seems to keep climbing. She also starts a YouTube channel. Morning, YouTube, and welcome back to my channel.

Today is going to be a healthier Starbucks alternative to their pumpkin spice latte. And she marries Zach. Their newlywed life is awesome. Together, they honeymoon in Hawaii and buy a house. Brittany is working hard to support her lifestyle. According to a video she posted to her YouTube channel in 2016, here's what an average day looks like for Brittany Dawn.

At around 1 p.m., she starts filming a vlog. She's sporting a full face of caked-on makeup as she records herself preparing her first meal of the day. Oatmeal with berries, egg whites, cauliflower, and peanut butter. It sounds like a joyless meal, but I suppose it is well-balanced. It's not the slice of pizza I had this morning. No. Well, fast forward a couple of hours, and it's time for her pre-workout snack. Eggs with spinach and three pieces of toast. ♪

But before Brittany heads to the gym, she goes to her home office. It's got a beige carpet and matching beige walls, and Brittany sets up her camera to record herself typing on her laptop. A text on screen tells us she's answering emails from clients, but I can only assume her responses are probably lackluster.

It's easy to imagine she's not reading the emails at all. Instead, she's likely copying and pasting canned messages and attaching supposedly personalized meal plans. She might not even include the client's names, just Dear XXX. And yes, this is allegedly a mistake she's actually made. And I should add, we reached out to Brittany Don for comment on the allegations in this episode, and we did not hear back.

Next, I picture Brittany scrolling through her texts and without reading those, hurriedly typing something like, you're killing it and hitting send. Brittany is overwhelmed, but she seems more interested in growing her following than actually helping people. So she plows ahead.

And in a year, Brittany's accounts seem to reach new heights. By March 2017, she says she has 400,000 Instagram followers and 50,000 YouTube subscribers. She celebrates by posting this photo of herself on Instagram, which also includes a giveaway for one of her 30-day programs. Sachi, can you please describe it? Oh, yeah. It's our friend Brittany in this cute little two-piece, and she's holding these big balloons and

And she says, as a way to say thank you for helping me reach 400,000 on here and 50,000 on YouTube, it's time for a huge giveaway. Yeah, she's thriving, even if her clients don't seem to be. But when her clients, like Corey, start talking to each other, they'll finally realize that their number one fitspiration isn't everything she claims to be.

Melina Brunson is a young mom pursuing her bachelor's degree at the University of Texas at Dallas, and she wants to start prioritizing her health. So in 2017, she says she joins Brittany Dawn's program for $250 and follows her personalized macro plan to a T. Melina hopes to lose weight and improve her mood, but instead, she doesn't see any results.

When Melina texts Brittany asking for advice, Melina says she sometimes waits days or even weeks to hear back. Melina follows up and again, nothing. When she finally does get a reply, it reads, Oh girl, you're doing so great.

Melina is confused. How could she be doing great if she's not getting the results she wanted? It's like Alexa's girl boss program. I know. And it's not really even as good as Alexa would be because Alexa would give you an answer immediately. Right. Well, it seems like a lot of other clients have had even worse experiences than Melina and reportedly suffered really harmful results.

There's a woman who says she joins a program as a fitness beginner, but she almost passes out after not getting enough nutrients. She reaches out to Brittany for help and never gets a response. Another woman signs up for a plan and in her survey writes...

I currently have an eating disorder, horrible body image views, and I'm underweight for my height. But her onboarding email disregards all that. It reads, great, welcome to the hashtag team Brittany Dawn family. And then the plan makes her lose weight even though she said she needs to gain weight. Yeah, see, this is the problem with a lot of these like health influencers is that they're so underweight.

around weight loss and weight loss being directly correlated with health. They clearly are not equipped to deal with anybody who actually has

vastly different dietary needs, has to do different kinds of exercise, is having a very different relationship with their body. Yeah, and not only are Brittany's clients not getting what they paid for, but their health is in danger too. So, Sachi, get this. There's a Facebook group that Brittany herself created for clients like Melina to cheer each other on and talk about their love of Brittany Dawn. But instead of using this group like it was intended, Brittany

Brittany's clients take to the group to complain. I love that so much. Yeah, two friends who joined the program together make a post asking why they have the exact same plan. But some clients say that when they complain, they don't receive an answer. They get blocked. Another client wonders why she's being charged a shipping fee on digital products.

She also gets blocked. This allegedly becomes a pattern. A woman complains, her post is removed. Someone asks a question, the post vanishes. I mean, I guess at least they're responsive to something. Yeah, they are seeing it. So Brittany's clients realize they've been scammed. They all have the same plan. And even though they're calling Brittany out, she just keeps on scamming.

So around 2018, her clients take matters into their own hands. They gather evidence in their own Facebook group called Brittany Dawn Fitness Complaints. The group quickly grows from a couple hundred members to over 4,000. At the same time, clients flood Brittany Dawn's Yelp page with negative reviews. And they contact the Better Business Bureau to leave formal complaints.

They even start a Change.org petition called Stop Britney Dawn Fitness Scams. It gets over 15,000 signatures. Yikes. It is very bad. And there are some heartbreaking comments like this one. Can you read it? This one says,

This is so incredibly sad. I hope you realize what you have done and all the women you have hurt. Yeah, it's not good. And even though the cries for accountability grow by the day, Britney continues to live her best hashtag fit girl life. But her perfectly filtered online presence is merely a facade for the emotional turmoil she faces at home. Just as Britney's scam begins to unravel, so does her personal life.

It's late 2017, and she's moving into a new apartment alone. Only months earlier, she and Zach got a divorce, and it sounded messy. A lot of the drama went down and now deleted into stories and tweets. She briefly acknowledges the heartbreak in a YouTube video where she reads a letter to herself. Dear self, I promise to believe in my own beauty, even when I don't see it for myself.

I promise to let my passion drive me, even on the days that I'm struggling to stand. And I promise that when the going gets tough, you will keep going.

Sarah, as you know, by law, I must side with any woman in any divorce. You know what? Fair. Yeah. Well, in the comments, she's met with an outpouring of love because despite the consumer complaints, Britney's work life doesn't seem to be affected. Britney even uses her haters to fuel content. Her posts about fighting negativity gain her sympathy from loyal supporters, saying,

Here's an example. Sachi, please tell us what you're seeing. Okay. It's a photo of her sitting in a car holding five dozen white roses and looking...

I guess chipper. And the caption to the photo says, Nightly reminder, a woman who's hustling, grinding, and working hard in life will never, never understand a woman who's hating. We don't speak the same language. Hashtag kindness goes a long way. Hashtag smile. This is when it starts to fall apart for me. Yeah. Well, though most of the comments are positive, there's one or two calling her out. There's even one that reads,

Please send me the password for the cookbook I purchased from you. Brittany responds, email me, girl. It seems like she's pretending to care about her client's issues, but often she sends them blanket replies and posts girl boss quotes online. And honestly, it seems like the strategy works.

During this time, she achieves yet another milestone. Her video, Eating for Fat Loss, gets over a million views. Sachi, I watched the video and it's just 10 straight minutes of Brittany working out and eating the blandest looking food. I truly have no idea how this one got a million views. I mean...

Everybody thinks there's like some miraculous secret to it. And the secret is to torture yourself. Well, Britney's follower and subscriber count continues to rise. It seems like everything's going to be OK until a different kind of influencer enters a scene. He's something of a vigilante. So when he learns about Britney, he decides he wants to put a stop to her scam once and for all.

It's February 2019, and the anti-Britney Dawn Facebook group is stronger than ever. It's so big that it gets on the radar of a comedian named Cassidy Campbell. Cassidy's a white dude with a dirty blonde crew cut and peach fuzz, and he's gained a following by pulling man-on-the-street-style stunts while disguised as stock characters like Wanksta or Spoiled Rich Kid. One of Cassidy's most popular characters is Chester the Trumper.

Chester's a hardworking, Trump-loving American dad. Cassidy decides to dress up as Chester and head to the LA Fit Expo. That's the event where Britney is shilling coffee for her friend. Okay, so we're full circle here. So we're back at where we were at the beginning of the episode. Exactly. So in the video, Chester, a.k.a. Cassidy, makes his way across the convention floor, trolling the crowd by uttering offensive comments, shouting, "'America!" and walking away."

Finally, he finds Brittany Dawn and he makes his move. Sachi, you have to watch the video and see what happens next. Excuse me, I have a question. Yeah. You look familiar. Yeah. You look like you stole my daughter's money. I ain't kidding you. Yep, you took $200. Hey, this woman took $200 from my daughter.

I find this really strange because I don't feel sympathetic to Brittany in this entire story. But the way he's talking to her is so...

and inappropriate. And I really want to put a fine point on this. Profoundly unfunny. It would also be one thing if he was actually affected by the scam, but he's just capitalizing on other people's issues with her. Well, eventually Cassidy does get kicked out, but he got what he needs. He puts together a 10-minute video that shows complaints from Brittany's jilted customers with on-screen text explaining her scam. And

And it builds to the grand finale, his confrontation with Britney herself. With the click of a button, Chester, of all people, exposes Britney and her scam. The fraudulent macro plans, the dangerous nutrition advice, the way she ghosts clients when they need her the most. And it goes viral. And Britney's downfall begins. ♪

Shifting your wardrobe from summer to fall can be challenging, but luckily, Quince offers timeless and high-quality items for any season. Yep, with Quince, your wardrobe stays fresh and in budget. They have items like cashmere sweaters from $50, pants for every occasion, washable silk tops, and so much more. Quince items are priced 50-80% less than regular brands because they partner directly with the factories to cut out the cost of the middleman.

I just ordered the super soft fleece cropped wide leg pants and the fleece crew. I got it for my mom. She loves them. She's been living in them. They're so comfortable and they're so affordable for how soft the material is. Make switching seasons a breeze with Quince's high quality closet essentials.

Go to quince.com slash scampod for free shipping on your order and 365-day returns. That's q-u-i-n-c-e dot com slash scampod for free shipping and 365-day returns. quince.com slash scampod.

After Cassidy's video drops, a new upload appears on Brittany's YouTube page. The video is titled, My Public Statement About the Past 24 Hours. The video has since been deleted, by the way, but here's a clip. I am just here with my heart on my sleeve and I'm here to put everything, like I said, to rest once and for all.

I apologize to anyone who feels like they got scammed from me. Okay, not a great apology. Not a good start. Not a great apology. Anyone who feels like they've been scammed. Yeah.

Well, Sachi, Brittany goes on to say that she's human with an incredibly big heart who did everything to the best of her ability. She ends a video with a plea for the death threats to stop and a promise to make things right with her followers. She also includes a link to buy her fitness plan in the description of the YouTube video. Influencers gonna influence, I guess. All right.

Around this time, lots of clients start demanding their money back. But Brittany allegedly only gives them partial refunds after they sign an NDA. One of the former clients who's had enough is Melina, the young mom in college. She's been in the business for a long time.

She unsubscribes from Britney's YouTube channel along with 10,000 others, and she takes to her own YouTube page to voice her opinion. You're giving us what seems to be raw truths of like your whole life. And I think it brings people in and they're super into it, which is all great. But it's like you're you're frauding us. You have taken our money and not actually provided us with you with what you said you were selling us.

Afterwards, something unexpected happens. Melina's video gets the attention of Good Morning America and some producers book her on the show. Here's what she tells the cameras. We never got anything back other than just, oh, girl, you're doing so great. But I'm like, how am I doing great? So not losing weight and inches aren't going anywhere. And Brittany agrees to an interview, too, now that she's in crisis PR mode.

When the segment airs, Melina watches her former fitness idol try to defend herself. I jumped into an industry that had no instruction manual. I'm basically going through uncharted territory and I'm doing the best that I can to the best of my ability. Melina probably doesn't buy this excuse. Brittany's had years to scale back or ask for help.

Melina believes that scamming was a conscious choice. Over the next month, followers like Melina watch in disbelief as Brittany Instagrams about resilience and facing adversity. In one post, she writes, some of the kindest souls have lived in a world that was not so kind to them. No, that sucks. You can almost tell when someone's done something wrong where they just start rambling on about like, people are mean. And kindness. Oh, well, Brittany,

Brittany is making herself look like the victim and her real victims are pissed. They continue to demand their money back along with a proper apology. Finally, a post appears. On March 27th, 2019, six weeks after Cassidy's videos uploaded, Brittany announces a social media break. She writes, "'To those of you who have lost trust in me, I look forward to having the opportunity to regain that in the future.'"

Maybe, just maybe, Brittany's finally seeing the error of her ways.

Brittany disappears for almost a month. And when she returns, she does start to change, but not in the way her followers expect. Sachi, would you please do the honors of describing and reading this post? I believe she's at a puppy yoga class and she's holding this very tiny dog who has the same hair color as her, which is interesting. And she writes, there are a thousand thoughts going through my mind. All I know is this.

The old Brittany is no longer present. If you knew me last year or even last month, allow me to reintroduce myself. Hi, everyone. My name is Brittany Dawn. I am a daughter, a sister, a best friend, an aunt, and everything in between. Things don't really change that much in anyone's life in a month. Like, there's stuff in my fridge that's older than me.

Brittany Dawn's realization of I'm a new person. Yeah. I mean, listen, the Internet moves fast, so there's a way to do it. But to be like, I'm a new person because I have faced real adversity because everybody held me accountable for what I did. It's like, no. Well, you know, Brittany is playing the sympathy card and her strategy backfires. Her posts are flooded with tons of mean comments.

Over the next year, Brittany tries sharing her usual content, but her reputation as a fitness influencer is tarnished. Eventually, she realizes that if she wants to stay in the influencing game, she's going to need a rebrand. So little by little, she posts less and less about diet and exercise and more about fitness.

Jesus. Oh boy. By mid-2020, Brittany fully reinvents herself as a Christian influencer. She grew up going to church, and on occasion she'd post about her faith, but now it's her whole vibe. Her short, bleached blonde hair is back down to her waist, and her booty shorts and crop tops have been replaced by modest dresses and full-coverage sweaters. Although, she still rocks the false eyelashes. She's a

And on YouTube, Brittany gives testimony about how Christ saved her from a life of sin. God saved me from such toxic thoughts and toxic just approaches to life. God is good. And he just breathed new life into me. Wash me, Lord, as snow.

God, there's a real like fitness influencer to Christ influencer pipeline. It's a good way to avoid acknowledging that you made decisions that weren't bad decisions. Yeah. And she brings her followers along for the ride as she falls in love and marries a new man, Jordan Nelson. He has a scruffy beard and two full sleeve tattoos. Brittany says Jordan's a godly man and gives thanks to the Lord every day for putting him in her path.

Oh, and he's a former Kansas City police officer. His law enforcement career came to an end shortly after the ACLU filed a lawsuit against him in 2018 alleging excessive use of force. A videotape shows him slamming a black man to the ground face first.

It's unclear where Jordan works now. He's no longer a police officer. And Brittany's job is in trouble, too. She receives a PPP loan for her dying company in 2020, but it's still not able to be resurrected.

The following year, Britney Dawn Fitness shudders for good. But shortly after, Britney starts a new endeavor, a nonprofit called She Lives Freed, which claims to be a space where all are welcome and every past has redemption. Did you say she lives freed? Yes. It's very intuitive to say out loud. Yeah, it's definitely normal. Well,

Well, her nonprofit offers products like a $30 devotional e-book with journaling prompts and also T-shirts with words like unapologetic written across the chest in a barely legible font. Great. That sounds like something that I need. I mean, you can't find stuff like that anywhere else. No, there's no other way to get it.

But their biggest draw is the in-person women's worship retreat. For $125, devoted followers can pray with Brittany, listen to panel discussions on modern Christianity, and even get baptized in a horse trough by Brittany herself.

And even though Brittany never fully owns up to her past mistakes, she claims she's been forgiven by the Lord. But there's another higher power watching over her, and this one's not so quick to forgive.

In February of 2022, a couple years after the Christian rebrand, Brittany gets sued by the state of Texas. They're suing her for violating the Deceptive Trade Practices Consumer Protection Act. Basically, Texas wants to nab her for false and misleading advertising. The lawsuit alleges that Brittany failed to provide the personalized coaching, check-ins, and modifications she advertised in her fitness plans.

and that she portrayed herself as having special knowledge or training to treat eating disorders when she didn't. The case is set to go to trial in 2023. If a jury decides Britney committed consumer fraud, she could have to pay up to a million dollars in damages. And recently, the state of Texas filed a motion to force Britney to answer questions and provide documents that she's been slow to send over. Britney's lawyer tells the Attorney General's office, quote,

Our client struggled to even save the delivered documents as PDF documents. We are discussing hiring a company to gather these documents for our client. They need to hire someone to save PDFs? Is she my 70-something-year-old father? Brittany has yet to comment publicly on the lawsuit, but she seems to be doing some damage control. Several months after getting sued, Brittany announced that she and Jordan will foster kids in need.

And she's as active as ever on social media. Britney has over a million followers on TikTok, where she makes videos about battling spiritual warfare and being the victim of cancel culture. But her victims feel differently. To them, Britney is a con woman, and they are eagerly awaiting her day in court. ♪

Sachi, there have been some updates to the story since we first aired this episode last winter. Brittany's trial was scheduled to start in March 2023, but then it got delayed. A few months later, court records show that the trial wasn't going to happen after all. Brittany had quietly reached a settlement with the state of Texas. In it, she admitted to wrongdoing and agreed to pay $300,000 in penalties and $100,000 in restitution within three years.

As part of the agreement, the court barred her from selling personalized nutrition plans unless she could actually provide personalized nutrition plans. What a concept. Similarly, it prevents her from selling one-on-one coaching unless she actually plans to do one-on-one coaching. She also can't represent herself as having any special knowledge or training to address eating disorders.

Oh, and she can't charge a shipping fee for products that are literally delivered over email, which, yes, is something she had actually been doing. I remain impressed at her audacity. You got to respect the hustle. And in June, less than two weeks after her agreement with the state of Texas was finalized, Brittany sat down with her husband Jordan and did what she does best. She filmed a YouTube video.

I'm here today to give full context, first to take full responsibility for where I went wrong, for the mistakes that were made, where I messed up, but also to give full context to this lawsuit, how my business started, where things went wrong, and how everything came about and ended in being sued by the state of Texas at 28 years old.

Brittany defends herself by saying she started the business when she was young and that she ended up harming people because of her, quote, arrogance and also, quote, just being dumb. About 20 minutes of rehashing later, she ends a video by saying...

But from this moment forward, I'm moving on. This is in my past. I have every right to move on. I didn't scam anyone. I didn't fraud anyone. I'm not a scammer. I'm not a fraud. I'm not a grifter. And I'm done tolerating being called that. I mean.

I don't know that she gets to make that decision for other people, but she can certainly walk away from public work because it doesn't seem like the audience wants it anymore, right? She can move on by not being a public person anymore. Right. Because she screwed up so badly, in my opinion. Okay, so is she still on YouTube or has she walked away from public life?

Well, since then, Brittany has been making YouTube videos like It's Her Day Job, which I guess it is. They're titled things like All the Times I Was Cancelled, The Truth to How My Dog Died, and Marriage Isn't What We Thought. All right, that's all the updates I've got for you. Let's go back to the original episode.

So, Sachi, there are a few things I want to get through here. You know, Brittany built this platform on helping women overcome their insecurities. And I feel like she posted a lot of content that we kind of discussed that perpetuated them, like having this very traditionally attractive small body and making it seem attainable and being like, look at me, I'm eating Oreos. Sorry, haters.

Yeah, the thing is, I'm generally always cautious when somebody is coming to the public and saying, I have a solution for your disordered eating, your body anxiety. But the person saying it is still engaging with the rituals of a lot of that disordered eating and kind of fucked up body image stuff. She's still sort of engaging in these like bikini body things.

You know, exercises. She's clearly thinking way too much about her own diet. Any diet you go on is designed to fail. You will gain the weight back as soon as you stop the plan. I guess the difference is that her plan didn't even really work when you were on it. Yeah.

Asashi, I need to know what you think of that rebrand to Christianity. The reason why it's frustrating in Brittany Dawn's case is because she's pivoted into religious influencing and being sort of a public Christian because it helps her avoid having any responsibility.

Because now she can say, like, I'm letting Jesus take over. You know, he's the guy in control. I am merely a passenger. When in fact, like a lot of the mistakes she made are her mistakes. It would be in her best interest, frankly, to own them. It would probably make a lot of people who are upset with her feel a little bit better.

But instead, she's hiding behind religion, which I find objectionable. But it's especially kind of craven when you perform it like this on the Internet. Yeah, it's like it would have gone away in some capacity if she just been like, I was in over my head. I made a huge mistake. I got caught up in this whole thing. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I'm so sorry. Like even taking half a bit, like not even full accountability, just like half.

like half. Yeah. Well, especially because she came in, again, I do think with good intentions. She came from her own trauma and she wanted to help people, but she just did not have the expertise for it. You can just say that. It's okay. You can admit it. Yeah. This is Fitness Faker. I'm Sarah Hagee. And I'm Sachi Cole.

We use many sources in our research. A few that were particularly helpful were Dom DeFurio's series of articles for the Dallas Morning News and William Joy's reporting for the Dallas TV station WFAA. Liz Galalis wrote this episode. Additional writing by us, Satya Cole and Sarah Hagee. Our senior producer is Jen Swan.

Our producer is John Reed. Our associate producer is Charlotte Miller. Our story editors are Sarah Enney and Allison Weintraub. Our senior story editor is Rachel B. Doyle. Sound design is by Andre Pluez. Fact-checking by Gabrielle Jollet. Additional audio assistance provided by Adrienne Tapia. Our music supervisor is Scott Velasquez for Freesound Sync.

Our executive producers are Janine Cornelow, Stephanie Jens, and Marshall Louie for Wondery. If you like Scamfluencers, you can listen to every episode early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Prime members can listen ad-free on Amazon Music. Before you go, tell us about yourself by filling out a short survey at wondery.com slash survey.