A couple years ago, I was scammed out of a lot of money by someone who acted like my friend and set me up. I took him to civil court, showed them the evidence that he did it deliberately and won a judgement against him. BUT, I have gotten very little of it and the lawyer fees and interest on the money I borrowed is adding up. The guy turns out to drug addict and all round criminal type and I will probably never recover what he scammed. Can I write this kind of loss off of my taxable income? How do I go about doing that? Is it something that I need a tax professional's help to do?