Lovering, who is heavyset with graying blond hair and a deep voice, pleaded not guilty yesterday in Superior Court in Woburn, and did not immediately post his $10,000 bail.
He is accused of using false professions of his love and affection, phony health crises, and other made-up emergencies as part of a web of lies to persuade women he met through online dating sites to lend him money he did not repay, according to the indictment.
His lies allegedly grew bold enough to create an imaginary best friend, Doug Spencer, to explain how Lovering could cash checks sent to his post office box in Massachusetts, while he said he was ailing in a hospital in New Hampshire, authorities said.
Appearing calm and relaxed at arraignment, Lovering sat in the front row of the courtroom with a woman who identified herself as his wife, talking composedly and chuckling at a court officer’s joke. He listened quietly as the clerk read off the larceny charges against him.
None of the women Lovering is accused of scamming is named in the court paperwork.
The indictment, which reads like the plot line of a primetime legal drama, alleges the series of events.
In 2006, Lovering met his first alleged victim through a personal ad on Yahoo.com.
After drinks in North Andover, they began dating once or twice a week. Soon after, he said his eBay account was not working and persuaded her to bid on a pistol holster he wanted, promising to pay her back. She won the bid, for $231.02, but was not reimbursed.
Next she bought a Nazi SS ring on his behalf from a memorabilia dealer, for $4,500, and then an antique lock, for $1,040.
About this time he asked her to cosign a $4,500 loan from a Watertown bank, promising to give her the proceeds to pay down what he owed her.
She cosigned the documents, but Lovering spent the proceeds on a presentation box for the ring.
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