LAS VEGAS — A woman used online dating apps to lure at least four older men to meet her, then drugged them with sedatives and stole hundreds of thousands of dollars in a “sinister” romance scheme, FBI officials in Las Vegas said Friday.

Three of the men died, authorities said, and she has been charged in one of their deaths.

Aurora Phelps, 43, who is in custody in Mexico, faces 21 counts including wire fraud, identity theft and kidnapping resulting in death, Sue Fahami, the acting United States attorney for the District of Nevada, said at a news conference Friday.

“This is a romance scam on steroids,” said Spencer Evans, the special agent in charge of the FBI’s Las Vegas division. The fourth victim awoke from a coma after Phelps gave him prescription sedatives, Evans added.

In one instance Phelps is alleged to have kidnapped a victim by heavily sedating him and taking him across the U.S.-Mexico border in a wheelchair and then to a Mexico City hotel room, where he was found dead hours later.

— The Associated Press

LAS VEGAS — A woman used online dating apps to lure at least four older men to meet her, then drugged them with sedatives and stole hundreds of thousands of dollars in a “sinister” romance scheme, FBI officials in Las Vegas said Friday.

Three of the men died, authorities said, and she has been charged in one of their deaths.

Aurora Phelps, 43, who is in custody in Mexico, faces 21 counts including wire fraud, identity theft and kidnapping resulting in death, Sue Fahami, the acting United States attorney for the District of Nevada, said at a news conference Friday.

“This is a romance scam on steroids,” said Spencer Evans, the special agent in charge of the FBI’s Las Vegas division. The fourth victim awoke from a coma after Phelps gave him prescription sedatives, Evans added.

In one instance Phelps is alleged to have kidnapped a victim by heavily sedating him and taking him across the U.S.-Mexico border in a wheelchair and then to a Mexico City hotel room, where he was found dead hours later.

— The Associated Press