The Truth About Anna Delvey's Friendship With Rachel Williams
If you've watched Netflix's "Inventing Anna" or have followed Anna Delvey's story on the news, you would know that she's burned a lot of bridges with a lot of people. She has managed to con her way to the top of New York's social chain and art scene after convincing the people around her that she's a trust fund baby with money to spare.
Between 2013 to 2017, she defrauded hotels, financial institutions, and individuals over $200,000, and was convicted in a New York state court of attempted grand larceny, larceny in the second degree, and theft of services, per CNN. Delvey's elaborate scam intrigued a lot of people, so much so that her story was published in New York Magazine, and said story was bought by Netflix for a limited series. One of the friends she scammed, Rachel DeLoache Williams, also published a book called "My Friend Anna," which detailed how Delvey adversely impacted her life.
Amid the media storm concerning Delvey, Williams also remained vocal about their former friendship that turned out to be part of Delvey's scam. With what they have said about each other in public, it's hard to believe that they were good friends once upon a time.
Rachel Williams thought her friendship with Anna Delvey was real
Rachel Williams and Anna Delvey used to be good friends. She shared how they would often go on expensive dinners and night outs, but it all crumbled down when they traveled to Marrakech in 2017. Delvey apparently promised to pay for everything, including flights and lodging, but when her cards got declined during the trip, Williams was forced to cover the bill, forcing her to use one of her company credit cards. She paid a whopping $62,000 after being promised by Delvey that she would be paid back, per The Cut. Of course, she did not get compensated for it, so she took it up to the authorities and got involved in an investigation that would expose Delvey's crimes.
"Anna is a fascinating character for better for worse, especially as a young woman," Williams told Harper's Bazaar of what she thought of her former friend and why Delvey's story seemed compelling. "She took on traditionally male dominated power structures when it came to financial scamming. People are interested in that."
Ultimately, though, she realized that Delvey only kept her around because she deemed she was useful. "Even when I was friends with Anna, it was about the friendship," she shared. "I really liked her and I thought our friendship was real. It wasn't so much that I was swept up in her lifestyle, but mostly I just got swept up in a friendship that turned out to be toxic."
Anna Delvey blasted Rachel Williams on social media
After "Inventing Anna" was released, Rachel Williams told Vanity Fair that Anna Delvey's depiction in the series was wrong and was too glamorized. "I think promoting this whole narrative and celebrating a sociopathic, narcissistic, proven criminal is wrong," she said, claiming that the show was "running a con woman's PR," and offered a "dangerous distortion" of what happened in real life.
Delvey caught wind of Williams' strong words and took to Instagram to call her out. "I've been silent about this for years. However, watching Rachel stubbornly refuse to move on from her contrived trauma, ever brazen and unchecked, while going on every show that will have her, I thought—now I have to. And if I have to I will," she wrote, per Buzzfeed, and then went on to reveal that Williams reached out to her in 2018, asking her to collaborate on a book. "I guess 'giving me [a] platform' and 'glorifying crime' didn't seem to be such concerns of Rachel's back then."
Williams responded to Delvey's claims saying they were false and that she would never work with her ever. "I have no interest in feuding, but, with regard to Anna's allegations on Instagram, I'll leave the fiction-making to Anna and stick with the facts," she told The Independent. "Anna has proven herself to be a con artist and pathological liar. I, personally, would never have worked with her on a project of any kind."