He was crowned winner of the first season of Australia’s The Biggest Loser, but Adriano “Adro” Sarnelli is most definitely the biggest loser now.
Just years after Woman’s Day reported he’d shockingly run off with his brother’s wife, we can now reveal the fitness fanatic has been charged with fraud and sentenced to imprisonment.
In April this year, Adro, who has shut down his Instagram account, was prosecuted in the Richlands Magistrates Court in Queensland after pleading guilty to failing to disclose earnings and property after filing for bankruptcy in 2015.
The disgraced Gold Coast star – who took home the $200,000 prize after losing a staggering 51.3kg on the hit reality show in 2006 – failed to tell his trustee that he had inherited $32,984.48 from his late mother’s estate in November 2017 and attempted to conceal his inheritance by directing the funds to be paid into a friend’s bank account.
When the trustee asked him about it, he failed to identify his friend. During his court appearance the unsympathetic judge refused to accept Adro’s naive excuse, knowing all too well this wasn’t the first time the TV reality star had attempted to thwart authorities.
Adro won the first season of The Biggest Loser in 2006.
(Image: Network Ten)Trouble with the law
In June 2017 Adro was convicted of a bankruptcy offence after he allegedly racked up an $8000 debt with Citigroup, which it claimed he never intended on paying. He only just narrowly escaped jail then and was placed on a 12-month good behaviour bond.
This time the judge was more lenient and decided to sentence him to four months’ imprisonment for each offence, to be served at the same time. Yet he managed to escape jail again and was released immediately and put onto a good behaviour bond for a further three years.
While Adro’s financial hardship has landed him in hot water, his personal struggles have also made headline news in the years since he won the show.
In 2012 he was caught in a public stoush with former The Biggest Loser host Ajay Rochester who ripped into him on her personal blog after he used the word “massive” to describe her body size.
WATCH: Ajay Rochester explains why she left The Biggest Loser. Post continues after video…
Ajay didn’t mince her words after she accused him of taking diet pills to win the show.
“Adro I have found your comments disgusting, pathetic and sad... it shows that you truly do not understand the true and everlasting depths and struggles of obesity,” she wrote.
“I remember how you came to the show, a lost, broken, desperate, powerless father unable to save your own life… contestants begged me to ask the producers to have you drug tested. I took that request to the producers and was told they didn’t want to know the truth, they just wanted a good winner and told me to shut up and go away.”
And that’s not all. In the same year he landed a fraud conviction, Woman’s Day broke the story that he started a relationship with his brother Mikele’s wife Amanda, who he is now believed to be engaged to.
After Biggest Loser, Adro started his own weight loss retreat.
(Image: Instagram @adrosarnelli)His brother’s wife
At the time a source revealed Mikele had discovered flirtatious messages between his wife and Adro on her phone. After confronting her about it, Amanda packed her bags and moved to the Gold Coast to be with his brother, taking her daughter Gemma with her. Her and Mikele’s daughter Sophia is thought to live with him.
An insider told Woman’s Day Mikele was a broken man, especially after he had opened up his home to Adro during Christmas in an attempt to mend their family feud after being estranged for years.
The source added that despite Adro reconnecting with Amanda – who he had previously dated before she married his brother – Mikele chose to believe their friendship was innocent, before later learning the truth.
Adro (left) with his brother Mikele and his wife Amanda, who is now said to be engaged to the Biggest Loser star.
(Image: Supplied)In the same year, Woman’s Day also spoke to several of Adro’s exes, who all came out against him – with many of them revealing they had been two or even three-timed by the star.
Ex Carla Price said she suffered two years of “heartache and turmoil” while dating Adro.
“I was accused of being unsupportive, self-righteous, not understanding and made to question my own reasoning,” she told Woman’s Day. “I came out of the relationship not in a great way.”
“I came out of the relationship not in a great way,” says a former girlfriend.
(Image: Instagram @adrosarnelli)She was then rattled to learn that Adro, who she said had a penchant for blonde, blue-eyed women, had also been cheating on her with several other women, including his sister-in-law Amanda, and Gold Coast Titans cheerleaders Amber and Tahnee, both who were in their early 20s.
“I felt for Mac [Adro’s brother Mikele]. He must have been devastated,” says Carla. “[Adro’s] very deserving of the Biggest Loser title, in more ways than one.”
Since then however, Adro seems to have changed his ways and settled down with Amanda, with the pair rumoured to now be engaged.
“Pity she’s still married to his brother,” adds the source.
