As audiences around the world binge Netflix’s true-ish series Apple Cider Vinegar, Belle Gibson still considers herself to be a victim, and blames the media for creating her ‘into a monster’.
“She’s still hoping everyone will forget the havoc she created for so many people that bought into her business model,” a casting director for the series told the Daily Mail.
Belle Gibson first gained attention in 2013 for her blog The Whole Pantry where she shared how she was treating a terminal malignant brain tumour with holistic therapies and nutrition.
Within a year, she had created a social media empire, developed an app to accompany her blog and published a cookbook all to help cancer patients.
In early 2015, Belle admitted she lied about her diagnosis after it was discovered she failed to donate earnings from the app and book to charity.
“None of it’s true,” she told the Australian Women’s Weekly.
While she never faced criminal charges, Consumer Affairs Victoria fined her $410,000 which she has still not paid.
LUCY WEILAND
In 2018, Lucy Weiland announced she was suffering from terminal ovarian cancer on social media.
In response, the community in Townsville QLD quickly banded together to raise almost $55,000 to help fund Lucy’s treatment costs.
Her partner at the time, Bradley Congerton also accessed $17,000 to support her.
It was soon discovered she forged a doctor’s note, shaved her head, and wore fake medical patches to trick the community.
“Considering the person I loved, protected and did everything in my power to nurse back to health, managed to destroy me and use me,” Bradley said in a victim impact statement.
In August 2020, Lucy pleaded guilty to six charges of fraud, was ordered to pay over $29,000 to victims, and was sentenced to two years in prison.
AMANDA RILEY
Now known as ‘Scamanda’, Amanda Riley managed to convince her friends and community in Sane Jose, California that she was suffering from Hodgkin’s lymphoma for eight years from 2012 to 2019.
Over that period, Amanda convinced more than 300 people that she was sick through photos posted to Facebook showing her receiving chemotherapy, posing in hospital gowns and carting around an oxygen tank.
Amanda even shaved her head to fake the side effects of chemotherapy.
On the blog she created to receive donations totalling over $100,000, Amanda claimed that she entered remission and relapsed four times.
Along with the money to help fund her “treatments”, Amanda also received free tickets, and even scored a signed guitar from singer LeAnn Rimes at a concert.
When investigative journalist Nancy Moiscatiello received an anonymous tip off about Amanda, she began looking into her case and reported her to the IRS.
In 2021, Amanda pleaded guilty to wire fraud and was sentenced to five years in prison, and was ordered to repay her victims.
“This is the worst thing I have ever done and the worst mistake I could have made,” she said at her sentence hearing in May 2022.
Amanda is currently in prison and is expected to be released in October this year.
MEGAN BHARI
When Megan Bhari and her mum Jean set up their charity Believe in Magic in 2012, they wanted to help terminally ill kids in the UK, like Megan who had a brain tumour, meet celebrities, go on holidays or throw lavish parties.
Shortly after the charity launched, it caught the attention of One Direction, who regularly tweeted their support, wore wristbands on stage and attended the charity’s events.
Band members Louis Tomlinson donated $2 million pounds and put together a fundraising ball for the charity, while other celebs including Jessie J, Little Mix and Michael Bublé also donated to Megan and Jean’s cause.
Things turned around for the pair in 2016 when Jean posted a fundraiser link seeking $120,000 to pay for emergency surgery in Florida, which made Joanna Ashcroft, who’s son has stage four neuroblastoma, become suspicious and hired a private investigator to look into their claims.
“When Jean answered the phone to us from her hotel room in a luxury Disney holiday villa, we knew we weren’t wrong,” she told the BBC.
“If Megan and Jean couldn’t afford her soaring hospital bills what was Jean doing at a luxury five-star holiday complex?”
In 2017, the UK Charity Commission launched an investigation into Believe in Magic which revealed Jean and Megan withdrew large amounts of cash, transferred funds to personal accounts, and left over $100,000 pounds unaccounted for on reports. The charity closed in 2020.
Megan died in March 2018 at 23 years old, and an inquest into her death found that she was unwell through her life, and revealed she died from an abnormal heart rhythm caused by her fatty liver disease.
“I loved and cared for my daughter. Suggesting I might have harmed her is absolutely sickening,” Jean told the BBC.
