The Youth of George Santos: Odd Jobs, Bad Debts and Lawsuits

The hourly pay for agents, Mr. Rijo said, was a maximum, he said, of $15 an hour, with a dollar or two more for foreign language expertise.

At the same time, friends recall, Mr. Santos was living modestly in Queens, occasionally hiring extra roommates to pay the rent. Gregory Morey-Parker was one of those roommates, briefly. From the start, he said, there were incongruities between the way Mr. Santos talked about himself and the life he led. Mr. Santos boasted of family wealth and business success – even a home in Nantucket – which Mr. Morey-Parker said had seemed at odds with ordinary family life.

“You sit here bragging about all that money you make,” Mr Morey-Parker said. “Then why is your mother a cleaning lady?”

Peter Hamilton met Mr Santos around early 2014, he said. He recalled how Mr Santos, who claimed to be an NYU graduate, did not recognize the name of the business school he attended. Nevertheless, Mr. Hamilton found him charismatic and intelligent. “He seems to know what to say and how to say it to people,” Mr Hamilton recalled in an interview.

He didn’t hesitate when Mr Santos said he needed to borrow several thousand dollars to move in with his boyfriend, and loaned him the money in September 2014, according to court documents. Soon after, Mr. Hamilton said, Mr. Santos stopped responding to his texts and calls.

Mr Hamilton filed a lawsuit in Queens Small Claims Court seeking a refund in 2015. In October that year Mr Santos responded, saying the money had been refunded and he was not s It was not a loan but a favor. A judge, however, agreed with Mr. Hamilton and issued a judgment for $5,000 plus interest.