Anna Sorokin, the notorious scammer who talked her way into high society as the “heiress” Anna Delvey, has been released from jail — on the condition she forgo social media, Bloomberg reported Wednesday.
Sorokin, who assumed the invented identity of a German heiress, has been detained by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement for 17 months for overstaying her visa.
An immigration judge ruled on Wednesday that she could be released from a facility in Orange County, New York, while she continues to battle deportation to Germany, where she has citizenship, according to Bloomberg. The $10,000 bail, however, came with an unusual stipulation: Sorokin is barred from accessing any social media platform, including TikTok, Instagram, and Twitter.
The Russian-born Sorokin, who was the subject of the Netflix bio-drama television series “Inventing Anna,” was a prolific social media user leading up to her arrest and would post frequently about the extravagant lifestyle she achieved through swindling hundreds of thousands of dollars from companies, colleagues, and acquaintances. In 2019, Sorokin was convicted of fraud in New York state court and sentenced to 4 to 12 years in prison, but was released early for good behavior last year. She was subsequently arrested by ICE agents.
While in the ICE detention, the scam artist reinvented herself—again—as a visual artist. In May, she unveiled simple pencil on paper drawings that were exhibited at Bar Chrystie in the Public Hotel. Sorokin called into the packed show, titled “Allegedly,” from prison.
“I would consider her style kind of a crossover between fashion sketches and satirical comics,” Chris Martine, Delvey’s representative, told ARTnews in March. Martine is the cofounder of Founders Art Club, which he described to ARTnews as “an advisory body and group of influential collectors.”
“She has an intriguing style, but the more important thing is really the intangibles that she brings to the table, which is that people are just fascinated by her,” he said.