NEW YORK -- New York City woman Anna Vargas thought she was happily married -- she just did not know she was "married" to four guys, The New York Post reports.
The 37-year-old Queens mom was the victim of an identity-theft nightmare, in which a parade of mysterious creeps arranged fake marriages by using her birth certificate, which she lost some 16 years ago.
Vargas had no idea what was going on -- until she tried to get married in 2004 and was heartbroken to find her application for a license rejected by the City Clerk's Office. She was turned down after records showed she was "married" twice in 1996, once to a man from Mexico and once to a man from Ecuador.
"I was very shocked and distraught [being rejected] because it was three weeks before I was supposed to get married," Vargas said.
It was not clear why the men got married to women using her identity, but often such ID theft involves immigration scams.
After the discovery, Vargas' relatives suggested she call off her wedding. On the advice of the family priest and a lawyer, Vargas got a license from another jurisdiction.
The ceremony was moved to Long Island, where she and fiance Angel Poggi said their "I dos" and prepared to live happily ever after.
Then out of the blue in 2009, one of her other "husbands," a man from Ecuador, turned up and slapped her with divorce papers.
When she refused to sign those documents and hired a lawyer, the Ecuadorean man showed up at her mother-in-law's house.
"Luckily, my mother-in-law had a picture of our wedding day," Vargas explained. "She said, 'Is this the person you were married to?' He said, 'No.'"
Vargas decided to go back and clear her name with the City Clerk's Office. On Jan. 25, Administrative Law Judge Joan Salzman ruled that Vargas was indeed the victim of fraud and nullified the two 1996 marriages.
Unfortunately, her troubles are not over, as Vargas also discovered another fake marriage in her name, on Long Island, and is fighting to erase it.
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