Inventing Anna, Netflix’s show based on a true story and real person Anna Sorokin, has been trending since the day the show was released. Her story isn’t the most known, but it’s one that captured my attention. 

Anna Sorokin, more well known through the alias Anna Delvey, is currently under the custody of the United States and is soon to be shipped back to Germany. 

Born January 23, 1991, in Russia, Sorokin is best known for her con-work where she played the role of an actress, pretending to be a wealthy German heiress worth 60 million euros under the name Anna Delvey. 

While deceiving the wealthy, elite art community of New York City, Sorokin managed to secure a $25 million loan to create an exclusive art club all while stealing a private jet and scamming banks, hotels, and associates out of around $200,000. 

In reality, Sorokin had no real wealth, college degree, business experience, or overall credibility. She wasn’t even German as she claimed to be. 

Found guilty of second-degree grand larceny, theft of services, and one count of first-degree attempted grand larceny by a Manhattan jury, Sorokin was given a penalty of 4 to 12 years imprisonment, a $24,000 fine, $199,000 restitution, and deportation to Germany. 

The day after being sentenced to her years of jail, she told the New York Times, “The thing is, I’m not sorry. I regret the way I went about certain things.”

After serving four years in prison, Sorokin was placed in an Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention at a New York facility last year. Sorokin was supposed to be sent back to her home country of Germany, though is said to temporarily remain in the country at the Orange County Correctional Facility in Goshen, NY. 

This isn’t the first time that Sorokin has been able to stall her deportation and has successfully gained two emergency stay requests since she was first arrested in 2017.

A spokesperson from ICE (U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement) confirmed on March 28 in a statement, “In November 2021, the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) granted Sorokin’s emergency stay request. Sorokin was granted an additional stay of removal by the 2nd Circuit court on March 21. She remains in ICE custody pending removal [to Germany]”

During her extended time in the country, Sorokin has found herself a new hobby. Initially only pretending to be experienced in the art world, Sorokin has begun to genuinely find a new interest in the art world. 

During her incarceration, Sorokin posted a number of her drawings to her Instagram account, @theannadelvey. Her artwork gained fame after being presented in a New York City group art exhibit known as “Free Anna Delvey.” The exhibit featured reproductions of her work by Alfredo Martinez each priced at $10,000 apiece and closed on March 27th. 

Chris Martine, an art dealer revealed to the New York Times his plans for Sorokin’s first solo art show which could open as early as April in large cities such as Los Angeles, Miami, London, and Paris. 

Sorokin’s variety of original artwork will be priced around $10,000 ranging from fashion sketches to satirical cartoons. The pieces are said to portray moments from Sorokin’s life over the past few years and allow her to tell her side of the story. 

According to The Cut, Sorokin says that in the future she would like to make her work more accessible to her “fans and admirers.”

The Netflix show which the fake heiress gained $320,000 and popularity from, was said to be “not that accurate” by the inspiration herself. 

To NBC News, Sorokin said, “I think I’m more self-aware of the way I come across, not all of the time, but I just don’t think that I’m so brazen and shameless”

According to The Cut, Sorokin said “I never was doing anything so super-crazy. There’s people spending way more money than I did. People assumed I was trying to impress anybody, but 40, 50, 60 million … that’s borderline poor in New York. There’s so many rich people there, you can’t even impress anybody. I do see what I did wrong. But so many people are doing worse things.”