Belle Gibson, the woman who lied about healing her terminal cancer with wholefoods, is now facing more than $1 million in penalties for making for money off her fake claims.
The 24-year-old blogger was hugely successful with her global health scam before her web of lies finally came undone.
She gave hope to seriously ill people that wholefoods would ultimately cure them and tricked multinational companies like Apple and Penguin into believing it too.
After The Weekly spoke to her last year to hear her entire con story, she has since gone into hiding.
But now, the disgraced ‘wellness’ blogger has had legal proceedings launched against her in Federal Court by Consumer Affairs Victoria, according to The Age.
This could lead to prosecution against her company for her false claims of beating terminally ill cancer by not using conventional medicine, and also the unlawful fundraising of her company in 2013 and 2014.
Penguin Publishing is also being fined $30,000 for not fact-checking her story before printing her book The Whole Pantry, and will also have to include “prominent warning notice” on future books about natural therapies.
Belle’s company Belle Gibson Pty Ltd is currently in liquidation. It owes almost $140,000 which included $83,500 in tax to go to the federal government.
After deleting much of her online presence in the wake of the scandal, Belle Gibson appeared to quietly return to social media late last year, using a pseudonym “Harry Gibson” on Facebook.
Posts seen by The Weekly Online suggest she was still in a relationship with her partner Clive Rothwell, an IT worker. A profile photo appeared to show the two of them in a playful embrace.
Facebook posts also indicated Belle had moved home and was travelling to Adelaide, South Australia, with Clive and her young son Ollie over Christmas. Her son was “excited to be going to see nanny”, it said.
It’s possible they were reunited with her estranged mother Natalie Del-Ballo, who was based in South Australia. Last year, Ms Del-Ballo publicly condemned her daughter’s actions and said she “was deeply upset and incredibly hurt” by her behaviour in an interview with The Weekly.
However, following Belle’s later interview with 60 Minutes, her stance appeared to have softened and defended her daughter, portraying her as having told “a white lie”.
Under the latest Herry Gibson Facebook profile, there were also photographs of the family, as well as a photo of “healthy” brownies or biscuits that had apparently been made without sugar for her son and his friends.
The Whole Pantry included many recipes for wholefood-based recipes, including sugar-free biscuits and baked goods. Her book, published by Penguin, included a section at the beginning on her cancer claims.
Elsewhere there were posts in support of refugees and new technology.
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