Social Media “Health” Guru Fakes Cancer for Profit: The Belle Gibson Story 01:08:32

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Boy, do I have a story for y'all. This week's case, as I'm sure you can tell from the title, is another cancer fraud story. Yes, there are more people that do this. Honestly, that's one thing that is most shocking to me when covering these types of cases is how many people actually do this and pull it off.

for so long. If you've missed my other episodes on people who fake cancer and sometimes scam people out of thousands of dollars or just scam them out of their sympathy or use it to get ahead, whatever it may be, I don't think I have told one that is quite on this scale. Maybe Elizabeth Finch comes close. Maybe. I don't know. I mean, they're all all of these stories are just horrific. But this one in particular got

so massive and tons of people were scammed and when I first started looking into it I really had no idea how massive this story was and I was shocked that I hadn't heard about it before but once I started looking more into it and I was down that rabbit hole man there was no digging out now some of my Australian subscribers may recognize this name I'm going to be talking about Belle Gibson

My God. And if you haven't heard of this woman, be prepared to pick your jaw up off the floor because it is truly remarkable and disgusting how this woman was able to lie to so many people and pull it off for quite a bit of time. She was a Australian social media health guru who was actually in the midst of a huge collaboration with Apple when she finally got exposed and

And thankfully, that happened before her audience could grow even bigger than it already was.

I mean, her reach was pretty massive. And honestly, I just can't believe how long it took for this woman to be exposed, how she was able to keep this going for such a long period of time and to grow her audience so big. As I've mentioned before, I think these types of stories are just so fascinating. The fact that people are able to lie and lie and lie. I mean, Belle is one of those people who just...

When it comes to her lying, the limit does not exist. She will just come up with a new lie every day, it feels like. And honestly, I could just ramble about her and my feelings on her and anger towards her for quite a while. But I have a lot to go over here, so we're going to go ahead and jump in. But before I do, first, I, of course, want to issue a trigger warning that this could be very upsetting and angering to those of you out there who...

have suffered from cancer or any other type of debilitating disease or illness, or have known someone who has battled with something like that or has lost their battle. Every time I post an episode like this, I just get so many comments from you out there who speak about how deeply hurtful people like this

And so many of you have shared your own personal journeys and experiences with me. And my heart truly goes out to you because this pisses me off. And I am someone who has not struggled with anything like that in my life. So I can't imagine how it makes...

those of you who have feel. But let's go ahead and dive right into this one. Let me tell you a little bit about Belle Gibson's background. Belle was born October 8th, 1991, and her full name is Annabelle Natalie Gibson. Now, Belle's background is pretty interesting. However, we don't know how much of it is true. And given the amount of lies that this woman has told in her life, I wouldn't be surprised if quite a bit of it is false.

So I'm going to do my best at telling you what we actually do know to be true. So Belle was born in Launceston, Tasmania, but moved to Manly, Queensland, which is where she attended school before dropping out in year 10, which would have been 2008. Before dropping out, though, around the time that she was 12 or 13, Belle was born in

Belle moved out of the house that she lived in with her mom and her brother and moved into a house with a random man, which sounds pretty concerning. And honestly, I don't know the details of this. And when I say random man, that is because...

That is how this person has been reported, a random man. I don't know how that happened or why it was allowed to happen, but according to Belle, her home life wasn't great. She has talked a lot about how she really had to raise herself.

how she didn't have any toys, how she had to schedule her own medical appointments, and that she did all the grocery shopping for her family on her own. Now, whether or not that is entirely true, like I said, I am not sure. But I think it's fair to assume that some of it, honestly, if not all of it, is possibly an exaggeration because all Belle does is make stuff up and exaggerate, truly. And I'm truly not trying to be mean when I say that. I'm just speaking...

facts here. Most of what Belle has said in her life has turned out to be wildly untrue. Unfortunately, Belle's word is just not something that you can trust. And honestly, I don't know if she even knows what the truth is. And of course, there have been things over the years that she's said that turned out to be true. For example,

She said that her mother has multiple sclerosis, and that is true. But she also said that her brother is autistic, and that is not true. Her brother Nick has actually since spoken out and said that Belle is someone who has always lied a lot. And her lies have caused him, as you can imagine, a lot of hardship.

Talk about the family is what irritates Nick the most. And he's especially angry at an invention used by Belle to garner sympathy on multiple occasions that he is autistic. You have a very offended brother who claims he has no idea why you would describe him as autistic. It is heartbreaking. Excuse me. Sorry.

It is heartbreaking for me that he still carries stigma. I don't think he, well, I don't think that that comment means he carries stigma. I mean, he's upset with you for describing him as having autism. Because he does. I don't have autism at all, no. Even when I was a kid, she

She's a cool me retard. She enjoys whatever sympathy, notoriety, money, whatever it is, she enjoys what the lies bring her. And so she will find any opportunity to lie, even if there's really no reason for it, like some of the stupidest lies ever. Take, for example, her melodramatic behavior in school. Before dropping out, Belle was known by her peers as someone who you just could not take seriously because she was cocky.

telling stories that were impossible to believe. Some of the things that she said were harmless lies, like saying she was a test tube baby, and others were much more outrageous, like when she said that she was part of the...

Witness Protection Program. That's a fun one. But for the most part, Belle's lies have to do with her health. I think that's really her bread and butter, if you will. And we know that she has been lying about her health as early as 2005. And it wouldn't shock me if she started even before that. And over time, these lies got worse and worse and just truly spiraled out of control.

out of control but the reason i say that the health lies started in 2005 is because that's when there's actual documentation of them starting because bell was posting about having brain cancer back in 2005 and then later said that she wasn't diagnosed until 2009

Riddle me that. And I'll get to her diagnosis here in a second, but before that, Belle dropped out of high school and moved to Perth, which coincidentally, or maybe not coincidentally, is on the complete opposite side of Australia from where she grew up. A fresh start, if you will. While in Perth, she worked for a private health insurance company. However, the majority of her time was...

Spent on the internet. Specifically, and you will never guess this, but she liked to spend a lot of time on a skateboarding forum, of all places. Now, I don't actually know if Belle was really a skateboarder or if she just found this online community and so she felt like she could manipulate them. But whatever her reasons were, this was really the beginning of the end. Because it was on this platform in early 2009 that Belle really dove headfirst into

into posting about her illness. And homegirl really didn't waste a second with the minor leagues and petty illness. She dove straight headfirst, or should I say heartfirst,

into very serious claims. In a series of posts, Bell claimed that she was writing everyone from her hospital bed after having just undergone multiple operations to remove fluid from around her heart. But according to Bell, the surgery did not go well. In fact, it went horribly wrong and...

She claimed that she died. The post reads, I just woke up out of a coma type thing and had no idea what was going on. The doctor comes in and tells me the draining failed and I went into cardiac arrest and died for just under three minutes. And as you can imagine, when someone posts something like this, your first gut reaction

reaction is to believe them, right? I mean, I follow so many different people online who have shared their health journeys and never has it crossed my mind that they could be lying. And obviously, I think the majority of them are telling the truth. And I find them to be really motivational to watch, really inspiring and educational as well. So her post was met with tons of sympathy and support, you know, from people with just basic

human empathy. So if her motive was sympathy, I would say she was successful with that because it came pouring in pretty quickly. But it clearly wasn't enough or she wanted more or maybe it just became kind of addicting at that point. And so the lies were far from over. I'm Victoria Cash and I want to invite you to a place called Lucky Land.

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And by mid-2009, so not long after she first started posting, Bell starts to claim that she is experiencing memory loss and difficulty walking and also problems with her vision. And according to her, she did go to a doctor, but all they ended up doing was prescribing her antidepressants and telling her that her symptoms were due to stress. And it wasn't long after this that she then says she suffered a stroke at work.

Although you'd be hard pressed to find any proof of this. But wait, there's more. And after this so-called stroke, Bell says that she decided to get a second opinion from a different doctor. And that's when she got her diagnosis. Now, she was diagnosed with an inoperable malignant brain tumor. And she was told she only has four months left.

left to live, which is a terrible diagnosis. But let's actually talk about her diagnosis for a moment, because how she claimed she was diagnosed is incredibly bizarre. According to Bell, her doctor was a man named Mark Johns, who was both an immunologist and a neurologist that worked for the Peter McCallum Cancer Center in Melbourne. And to be very clear here, there is no record

of this man existing. But she claims to have met him in Perth at a film screening and that he was her doctor throughout 2009, 2010, and 2011. And using a machine that Bell described as being an old-fashioned hard drive with lights and metal sheets that you could sit on, this Mark Johns guy apparently diagnosed her with terminal cancer.

He had come to my home and went through a series of tests and this was dubbed integrative medicine. It was a box, a machine with lights on the front and that machine was apparently German technology. There's two pads, two metal pads, one that goes below the chair and one that goes behind your back and then that measures...

what I believe or remember to be frequencies. He said to me that I had a stage four brain tumour

And that I had approximately four months to live. And after receiving this terrible, life-threatening diagnosis, Belle said that she did seek out traditional cancer treatments. She claims to have tried radiotherapy as well as oral chemotherapy. However, there is no record of her actually doing this. By this point, it was July of 2009 and Belle decided to pack up and leave Perth

to move to Melbourne, which she said she did because she wanted to be closer to her doctor. But after two months of allegedly going through this treatment with him, she said that she decided to stop it altogether after she fainted in a city park. And from that point on, she decided to ditch all the other treatments and wanted to try and heal herself using food, natural medicine, and alternative therapies, which she said was a decision that she not only made for herself, but

before her baby. Yes, you heard that right. Belle got pregnant right around the time that she was diagnosed with cancer, which obviously adds a whole new layer of emotion to all of this. And to fake cancer to your own child is a level of whack that I truly will never understand, but I'm getting ahead of myself. But while Belle was pregnant, she began posting on a new online forum for expecting mothers, and it was just one more platform where

She could, you know, exploit people for their sympathy. Now, I know that all of the cases I've covered of people faking cancer have had some sort of public element to them. And I mean, it's bad no matter how many people you are reaching, of course. But I'm telling you, nothing even comes close.

to how many people Belle started to reach. In the Scamanda case, Amanda Riley conned her entire community using her blog and through her local church. And in the Maddie Russo case, Maddie spread her lies on TikTok to a few thousand people. There was Elizabeth Finch who tricked tons of people that she worked with, but also did articles talking about her story and, you know, drew a community of support on social media as well. But in this case, Belle managed to reach not just a few thousand people, but a

few hundred thousand people and not just in her local community but around the world. Belle made her big social media debut in 2013 and

And her growth was almost instantaneous. Her account, which she called Healing underscore Bell, was used as a platform to talk about her cancer and how she's been able to outlive her four-month prognosis through healthy diet and alternative therapy. And even though I probably don't have to, I want to make a disclaimer that I'm not saying that, you know, living a healthy lifestyle obviously is bad for you in any way. It is very hard to navigate socials

social media these days because everyone has a different opinion about what is healthy for you. And it's really easy to get not only incorrect information, but dangerous information. And Bell's message specifically was not only wrong, but also highly dangerous. And her message was that superfoods and healthy eating and alternative therapies that were not backed

by science can cure terminal brain cancer. So when we look at Bell and her posting through social media, reaching all these people through her platform, it's not just about her deceiving people and exploiting them for sympathy and money. It's also that she put lives at risk. And that's not just my opinion, by the way. When real oncologists heard about her posts and, you know,

You know, her alternative methods and superfoods, being able to heal you. They were obviously very concerned, and they were really the ones who started calling out the bullshit. Through her page, you could find inspirational quotes, pictures of her meals, posts about the benefits of superfoods, and of course, a play-by-play of her health journey.

It was ultimately through this page that Bell told the story of being a sick mom who found healing and hope in food and alternative therapy after traditional medicine failed her. And to be clear here, I'm not saying that

you know, using superfoods and alternative therapies don't work at all. For some cases, you know, depending on what you're dealing with personally, those things can be very helpful and very healing. And some people want to take an alternative route and there's nothing wrong with that. But we're talking about terminal brain cancer. Okay. There is no proof at all that things like that can actually cure cancer.

And it is so dangerous and irresponsible to claim to people that it can and that it cured you when you don't even have it to begin with. Again, I'm getting ahead of myself, but those are just my thoughts. So her following quickly grew from a few hundred to a few thousand. And it was during that time that she came up with the business idea that would eventually lead to her downfall. By April of 2013, Bella had registered her new business, which was called Dixie.

the whole pantry now the whole pantry was both a community and recipe guide for living a holistic lifestyle and it launched on august 5th of that year in the form of an app and i'm sure many of you have heard of this app it became quite popular the app contained more than 50 gluten-free vegan and paleo recipes it had a shopping list feature as well as health and lifestyle wellness guides and by the end of the month the whole pantry

made its way to the number one spot in the App Store. And by the end of that year, it was named Apple's best food and drink app and the second best overall iPhone app in the world. So I think to say that this was an immediate success would truly be an understatement. And tons of people were motivated by it. I mean, apps like this aren't all bad, obviously. There is so many great resources out there if you're looking to improve your nutrition and get

Get different ideas for recipes and, you know, learn more about superfoods. All that is great when it's done by the right person, right? And backed by science. But so many people were stoked about the Whole Pantry app, feeling like it was the start of a wellness revolution. But problem was, it was all baseless.

based on a lie. Because the thing is, most people weren't just buying the app and then not engaging with Belle's story. Most people were downloading it because they had followed her journey and were inspired by her and had sympathy for her. And Belle was just eating that shit up. I mean, here's someone with terminal...

who is taking matters into her own hands, educating herself, and not only doing it for herself, but educating others, sharing the knowledge, and people were really motivated and inspired by her. Belle's success at this point was...

undeniable, but it was entirely ironic that she was attributing it to her authenticity and to her integrity. And her Instagram handle may have been Healing Bell, but I really think it should have been Stealing Bell because this app was not free. The Whole Pantry app cost $3.79. And keep in mind, this is a little while back. I feel like an app

Like that these days would probably go for a bit more, but multiply that by a few thousand dollars and Bell is looking at a lot of cash. Of course, there are some great apps out there, some great resources, great tools. I mean, I have several favorite fitness and health apps myself that I've paid for that, you know, are based on Bell.

Real science. They're not plagiarized, which we haven't even got to yet. But I'm just trying to say there is good stuff out there. But Bell's was absolutely not plagiarized.

And so, yeah, to me, it's theft. Because even if the app did provide useful information for the customers in terms of healthy recipes and such, people were also buying her story. And her story was a load of shit. Because all her followers and customers saw was this young mother who had done the impossible, beat the odds, had egos.

you know, hope and belief in herself and determination and who had the generosity at the end of the day to share her healing formula with the world because she's just so kind. ♪

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And Bell was convincing. I mean, I'll give her that. Because she not only tricked a bunch of innocent people, but she also tricked two major corporations. Because it turns out that less than two weeks after Bell's app, The Whole Pantry, had launched, she got an email from executives at Apple with an offer that you guys will not believe.

I'm sure we're all familiar with the Apple Watch, right? Well, in 2013, it had yet to be released, but it was in the works and was going to be announced in 2014 and launched

by April of 2015. And out of the thousands of apps from all across the world, the whole pantry was hand-selected to be one of the few that would appear on the Apple Watch as a pre-downloaded feature. And as you can imagine, an offer like this was monumental and came with a lot of perks for Miss Bell Gibson. Obviously, Bell was...

And I make this point because I think it's important that you all understand that Bell was not a stranger to Apple.

working from a distance. They were very involved. They worked closely alongside her, heard her story, felt for her, and for over a year, they were amping up to promote her business to the world. And honestly, it seemed like there was diligence in every aspect of their work, except for where it really mattered.

fact-checking at no point did anyone from Apple's team try and check to see if Belle was actually sick or if anything that she was promoting through her app had any medical backing or validity and this is absolutely hilarious to me but you guys she was plagiarizing recipes from Martha Stewart on this app

Oh, it's so good. And it wasn't just Martha Stewart. She was plagiarizing other people as well, but passing off their work as her own. And apparently not a single person thought to make sure that her work was her own, which is pretty surprising to me considering this is Apple and they're about to put this as an automatic download on everyone's watch. You think they would really check this shit out, but...

I guess not. And someone from Bell's team has even come forward and said that anytime someone asked her about the medicinal properties of certain foods, she would have to look it up on Google or Pinterest, which is just not giving science. I don't know what it's giving, but definitely not science. And had Bell not been caught before the Apple Watch was actually launched?

It's safe to say millions of people would have been exposed to her lies. And let me be clear here that the app and Bell's messaging really wasn't just about healthy eating and superfoods and recipes.

It was also about rejecting traditional cancer treatment. Bell promoted things like Gerson therapy, which is a type of treatment that encourages the use of a plant-based diet, raw juices, and coffee enemas to cure cancer. And it's not my opinion, but rather a statement of fact from Cancer Research UK that Gerson therapy is not only not backed by any science, but also can have severe side effects.

side effects. She also was very anti-vaccine and advised friends not to vaccinate their children after claiming that Gardasil, which is a cervical cancer vaccine, gave her cancer. Do you see what I'm saying here? Do you see where the problem is here? She is giving people advice on their children's health

based on something that is entirely untrue. Then there was the fact that Bell promoted the consumption of raw, unpasteurized milk, which is not only gross, but it is also extremely dangerous because unpasteurized milk carries a dangerous bacteria that can make you seriously, seriously sick. And in some cases, it's actually killed people. And I will say that while some of what Bell was promoting was explicit,

Some of it wasn't. At the end of the day, though, even if she didn't outwardly tell people not to seek traditional treatment when it came to their own cancer, her story gave people hope that her methods could work for them. I mean, here she was, supposedly living with terminal cancer years after she was expected to die, and the thing that she said kept her alive was a healthy lifestyle and alternative diet.

therapies. So then imagine someone who really did have cancer, who might have felt desperate for a solution. And then they came across Bell's miraculous story. Do you see where I'm going with this? The fact of the matter is there were real people out there suffering from real cancer that had downloaded her app and were following her methods and inspired by her story. And to give all of these people who are actually sick hope,

that you have the solution that was a miracle for you is wrong beyond comprehension. And it gets worse. Or should I say, Belle gets worse. In mid-2014, she made this post.

that I've been diagnosed with a third and fourth cancer. One is secondary and the other is primary. I have cancer in my blood, spleen, brain, uterus, and liver. I am hurting. Which this diagnosis, obviously sounds horrible, came from, according to Bell, a new doctor. And this new doctor was named Dr. Phil.

And to be clear, I'm not talking about Dr. Phil McGraw. I'm talking about a doctor who was named Phil. Yeah, anyway, different guy. And Bell said that he used the same kind of German technology that Mark Johns, the other doctor, who we can't find any record of, used to diagnose her. But here's the difference. This Dr. Phil is actually a real doctor. However, he has been very clear that...

since all of this has broke, that he never diagnosed Belle with cancer at all. In fact, he says he never gave Belle any type of diagnosis. He did run some tests on her, which cost her $9,000, but none of these tests could determine whether or not she had cancer. So this was another test.

lie from Belle. And as you can imagine, this lie about her cancer having spread throughout her body was devastating to the people who were following her.

I mean, I'm sure many of you out there have people that, you know, you follow, you kind of, I'm going to say bond with because it's kind of weird. I know it's over the internet, but you feel like a connection to certain people. Like for me personally, there are people that I follow who have really opened up about things that speak to me or things that I have been through.

or just things I have no idea about, but I have really appreciated their vulnerability and have felt weirdly connected to them through the internet. And if something like that were to happen to them, I would feel devastated as if it was happening to someone in my personal life. I know that sounds really weird, but I'm sure many of you can relate. We can get connected to people that

we hear about and read about online, that we see their life in action, you know, you can feel, yeah, like a weird type of bond. So imagine if one of those people that you followed, that you really felt that connection with,

told you something like that, that cancer had spread throughout their entire body. You're going to feel that emotion. You're going to send words of sympathy. And so the support that she got from people when making this post was insurmountable. And so many people got even more invested in her story at that

point. People genuinely saw her as this strong, courageous mother who, against all odds, was doing her best to battle cancer, you know, that she had lived far past when doctors told her she would die, and had the courage to share her story with the world and share these resources out of the kindness of her heart for, you know, a couple bucks. What they didn't see, though, was a completely healthy person who was pocketing other people's money,

for her own personal benefit. And let me tell you, people, she was certainly benefiting. Belle really started living the high life around this time. In 2014, which was Belle's most successful year, she bought a brand new BMW X3, moved into a beachside three-bedroom home, got veneers, went on cruises, and started wearing designer clothes. And her fans out there see her as...

Like Gandhi. I mean, they're so moved and impressed by her and think that she's so generous to try and help others in her time of need. And meanwhile, she's just out there spending their money. And what makes it even worse is this was money that she claimed to be donating to charities.

And yeah, that's when it really gets bad. And I'll get more into that later. But when I say 2014 was her best year, I'm talking about the fact that not only was she working on this huge project with Apple and bringing in a lot of money in app sales as well, but she

But she was also working with a major publisher to release the Whole Pantry Cookbook. Back in September of 2013, right after the app was released and became an overnight success, Bell reached out to a publishing house called Penguin, which I'm sure a lot of you are familiar. It's a pretty popular one. And together, they signed a book deal. So for the rest of 2013, in the first half of 2014, she worked to create the Whole Pantry Cookbook.

And what's a cookbook without a very long story about the author in the beginning of it? At the start of the book, Belle talked about her diagnosis and how she tried going down the route of traditional treatment. But ultimately, and these are her words, she empowered herself to save her own life through nutrition, patience, determination, and love.

How sweet. Really, though, Belle, you should have empowered yourself to shut up. Anyway, though, this book wasn't without pushback. And in summer of 2014, some of her friends decided to stage an intervention as they were starting to smell the bullshit. And this was before the book was actually released. She was working on it at the time. And her friends, I mean, they had put the pieces together and knew that she did not actually have cancer, that there was no way out.

that she had cancer, and so they wanted to give her the opportunity to come clean before the book was published. But, of course, she couldn't do it. She was adamant that she did have cancer, that she was sick, even though she wasn't able to produce a shred of evidence to prove it. I'm talking no doctor's notes, no hospital bills, no scans, nothing. And that's because Belle didn't like to keep that type of negativity around her. How convenient. ♪

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Plus, let's not forget about the heart surgeries she claimed to have, yet she had no scars to prove that she had them. And obviously her friends knew that she didn't have these scars because she didn't have any heart surgeries. And if that's not ridiculous enough for you, listen to this. During her intervention, Belle tells her friends that she is suddenly skeptical about this Dr. Phil guy because he...

had just disappeared. She said that he gave her that diagnosis and then poof, he's gone. So she starts saying that the diagnosis was questionable and her friends are like, okay, well, if you felt the diagnosis was questionable, why didn't you seek a second opinion, dude? And you're not going to believe this or maybe you will at this point, but she said that she didn't do that because she didn't have time. Didn't have time.

to get a second opinion to find out if cancer had actually spread throughout her entire body or not. You know, just that's such a waste of time, right? And then there was her boyfriend, Clive. Belle's boyfriend was upstairs during this intervention. And when one friend went to him to ask if any of it was real, well, in not so many words, he basically told them, no, it wasn't real. And he said that Belle would basically take down anyone that tried to question her. And in order to protect her son, he basically didn't ask her questions about it.

And at this point, it wasn't just her friends who had their suspicions. It was also people on her business team that really started to question her.

if Belle was telling the truth. There was one time that Belle made a post about having been at the doctor's office all day for some type of cancer treatment, but an employee later said that she was actually with her that day and that Belle was at the dentist getting veneers. And another person who befriended her in 2014 said that she was confused because even though her platform was about living this healthy lifestyle, she noticed that Belle was constantly eating fast food, drinking,

drinking alcohol and taking diet pills. Lovely. So basically she was doing the complete opposite of what she was promoting. And this same friend was also confused by the fact that Belle would never talk to her about her health in person. The only time that she knew what was going on with her cancer was when she would post updates on Instagram or Facebook.

And so as time goes on, Belle's friends, her inner circle, start realizing that she's full of shit and they start distancing themselves from her. Unfortunately, though, at this point, none of that stopped Belle and her success only grew. And that same year, Cosmopolitan awarded her the 2014 Fun Fearless Female Social Media Award, which they say she won by a landslide.

And then in October, the Whole Pantry cookbook launched, which was exclusively in Australia. And like the app, it was an overnight success. Copies of her book were literally flying off the shelves and there wasn't a single bad review. The business was so successful that she was even planning to expand it from the Whole Pantry to the Whole Life, which would mean making even more apps and eventually writing a second book.

At one point, she even toured a retail space in a children's hospital where she said she wanted to open a whole pantry, kitchen, and kiosk. But luckily, her application was denied when they looked her up and saw that she had a history of making non-evidence-based medical claims. And just imagine if everyone who worked with Belle had the foresight to dig into her a little bit, to...

You know, try to figure out who this person actually was before agreeing to work with her. Certainly would have saved a lot of people a lot of trouble. Luckily, the end of her charade was nearing. So Bell had spent most of 2013 and all of 2014 reaping the benefits from a platform and business that she had built based on love.

And like I said, she had lost most of her friends by this point and her inner circle was done with her. But they finally got to the point where they couldn't sit by and watch this happen any longer. So they tipped off the media. A reporter from Fairfax Media in Australia received the tip. And after pulling together all the information on Bell that he collected,

could, including what she claimed to be sick with and how she claimed to be healing herself, he sent it over to several oncologists to see if there was even a possibility that it could be true. And just like he suspected, Bell's claims were not plausible, not even a little. And considering the severity of the cancer that she claimed to have, none of the so-called treatments that she claimed to be doing would actually be able to save her life, let alone all

allow her to live this fabulous life where she could travel and work and function at the same level as a completely healthy person. It just was not possible with how bad she was claiming her cancer actually was. And of course, not everyone with cancer looks and acts sick.

But for someone who supposedly had cancer in her brain, her uterus, her spleen, her blood, and her liver, you would expect that she would have been hindered in some way, right? Which reminds me of the Maddie Russo case and how she was convincing people that she was still, you know, playing golf and earning a high GPA in school and just kind of like girl bossing her way through life, even though she had cancer. And that was so hurtful to so many of her followers who...

had similar diagnoses or maybe the same diagnosis she claimed to have. And they're comparing themselves to her and wondering, like, why can't I do all of that? I mean, that's one of the most hurtful aspects of all of this is flaunting the success and the wealth and the happiness that you are still able to obtain, even though you're so sick.

That's just truly evil to me. But no one who was actually spending time with her in real life saw her as anything less than a completely healthy person. Because she was. There was only one instance at her son's birthday party where Belle appeared to have suffered from some type of seizure, but it magically stopped when someone said they were going to call her an ambulance. Funny how that works. And here's where Belle's story gets even more whack.

I'm sure you didn't think it could, but it definitely does. Speaking of magic, after Belle started having these seizures, it gave her magical psychic abilities, which allowed her to read other people's auras and tell them information about their health. And if that doesn't tell you everything that you need to know about this woman, I don't know what else would. But getting back to my point here, Belle's whole story was clearly a load of shit. And now this reporter had reached out to...

several top cancer doctors in Australia and they were confirming that to be true. But there was an issue though because none of the people in Bell's inner circle who had tipped off this reporter were willing to have their name published. And because Australia

Obviously, reporters can't access someone's medical records. Higher-ups at Fairfax Media basically told the reporter that he needed to find a different angle to tell the story. You know, something that made it more solid with actual factual evidence to back it up. Which brings me to, drumroll please...

Bell's charity scam. From the very beginning of the whole pantry app, Bell told her followers and customers that a percentage of her sales were going to be donated to a list of rotating charities. Some weeks she even said that that was as high as 100% of profit being donated. Other weeks she said it was 25% of company profits being donated. I'm sure you can guess, nothing was donated. Well...

A very small amount, I'll explain. Now, this money was promised to go towards everything from funding schools in Africa, to providing medical support to kids with cancer, to helping with maternal health care in developing nations. One post reads, And you guys, there were...

Numerous times in 2014, Rebelle claimed publicly that she and her company had donated over $300,000 to charity. She even went as far as putting on actual fundraising events and would name specific charities that the money was going towards. Meanwhile, she was pocketing all of it.

all the cash. And so obviously this reporter starts reaching out to these charities to see if they had received any of this money. And when he did, he found out that most of these charities had never even heard of Bell Gibson or her business. And those who had heard from her and heard that she was planning to make these donations, of course, had never received any of the funds that were promised. And when they tried reaching out to her and her team, they

They were essentially ghosted. And this is really, really sad. But there's also this family who said that Belle became extremely close to them after learning that their son, Joshua, had terminal brain cancer. God, I truly cannot imagine what it would be like to be a parent of a sick child.

Oh, I just would never wish that on anyone. And for her to take advantage of a family like that. Oh, God, it just angers me so much. And what makes it so much worse beyond just reaching out to them and connecting with them is that she promised them the money from 100% of the app sales for a week and they never got it.

In fact, when it all came out that she was lying about being sick, they felt like she was just using them to learn about Joshua's cancer and steal his story. Which is unfortunately something that a lot of people feel that Belle did to them as well. She had used other people's stories, taken them as her own, profited off of it, and then lied about it.

about how she was going to give back to this community who supported her. And ultimately, the charity aspect of her scam was something that Fairfax Media was able to report on. But as reasonable journalists, they decided to reach out to Bell and give her the opportunity to explain herself before running these stories. So before actually airing the article, she was sent a 21-question email about her cancer, her diagnosis, her treatment, her business, and of course...

her donations. And just like she did any time that she was asked to show proof of anything, she dodged these questions, especially the ones about her health. As for the money stuff, though, she did have a very vague explanation for that. Bell said the reason that she hadn't actually donated any of this money that she promised was because

there were cash flow problems in the business. She said that her accountants told her to hold off on sending the money until their records were up to date. And once she could make them, she said she would. And what's honestly, it's sad, but it's kind of comical, is she...

after this, goes and makes a $1,000 donation to one charity, as if that is going to make up for the $299,000 that she still had left to donate that she had promised. It's so insane. I'm Victoria Cash, and I want to invite you to a place called Lucky Land, where you can play over 100 social casino-style games for free for your chance to redeem some serious prizes. ♪

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a good enough explanation. And she was going down. And so on March 8th, 2015, the story aired and it was titled Charity Money Promised by Inspirational Health App Developer Belle Gibson Not Handed Over. And not long after, I'm talking just

Hours later, a response was posted on the whole pantry's Facebook page that essentially accused the media outlet of airing inaccurate information. It reads in part, This evening, The Age, theage.com.au, posted an article which we have been communicating with them over the past couple of days. They contacted Bell, our previous managing director, who addressed some incorrect claims and assumptions.

But they still decided to run the story without even correcting factual errors. Unfortunately, the two journalists have been selective with their information. So here we are updating you with where we are actually at. And then it goes on to explain what I've already explained to you that, you know, they had cash flow problems and that their accountants told them to hold off on making the donations. But.

they did plan on eventually making them. Basically, a load of shit. And if you didn't catch it, this statement also referred to Bell as their previous managing director. And that's because as soon as all of this came out, Bell decided to step down from that role. And what's really interesting here is in the first few hours that all of this was coming out, a lot of people, most people, were taking Bell's side. They truly believed that this had to be some type of

misunderstanding and that some big media corporation was trying to take down this amazing woman, which honestly, I see where they were coming from, especially in the first few hours when you don't have all the facts and

This is someone that people really looked up to and believed. They were inspired by her. And you don't want to believe that you've been following a bunch of lies all this time. However, the support didn't last long. The opinions of the public really started to change that very night. When Bell's fans realized that she was starting to delete comments and posts from her multiple social media pages...

that mentioned donations and her diagnosis. So people started turning on her pretty quick, and it only got worse from there, and to this day. On March 9th, a second article was published that talked about the backlash that Belle was starting to receive, and in it they also brought up concerns about her apparent diagnosis. And do you want to just guess what Belle's response was to this?

She starts saying that she is actually going to start traditional cancer treatment. And I honestly, I'm so confused by this. I want to know what she thought she was going to accomplish by doing that. Was she going to claim to start these treatments, wait a couple weeks until she was cured and then just disappear from the internet? I don't really know. But it was fascinating.

It was far, far too late for that. And at this point, Belle was facing the wrath of the Internet. People were onto her and they were pissed. Everything was about to come to light. And in true Belle Gibson fashion, she decided to...

Try and save her ass with more lies. Two days after the story broke, a front page article came out that was titled, Now, Bell was actually interviewed for this piece, and to summarize what she said...

She was now under the suspicion that she had been misdiagnosed all along. That's right, people, misdiagnosed. Belle said that she thought it was possible that she never was sick to begin with and she felt confused.

And humiliated by the whole thing, basically just putting the blame on other people. And then another article came out that same day that only left people with even more questions about her story. And this article talked about the details of that intervention that her friend staged and how she was never able to provide any sort of legitimate proof of her claims and that she's even

even been lying about her age. Oh, and something else pretty major was revealed as well. And it was that her publisher, Penguin, admitted that they never looked into Bell's medical history to confirm her story. Even when they knew that there were holes in her story and that she was unwilling to clarify, even to them, they still published the cookbook without substantiating any of

of her claims, which obviously is a big no-no. Consumer Affairs Victoria, which is a government agency that protects the interests of consumers, said that Penguin had engaged in misleading content and that they ultimately had to pay $30,000 for their role in all of this. And they also had to change some of their business practices to prevent this from happening in the future. And as for

Apple, they never commented on any of this publicly, even when people were demanding that they do so. They were hesitant at first to take a stand, but eventually they pulled Belle's app from the app store and cut all ties with her. And they, of course, received the same backlash that Penguin received for giving her any type of credibility, which they absolutely deserved in my opinion, but ultimately the number one enemy here of the people was Belle. She went from being praised and adored by thousands and

thousands of people to being incredibly hated. People were demanding their money back and posting hate comments all across her social media. And eventually she ended up just disabling her profile and her business profile as well, which obviously doesn't help things at all. It just makes you look worse, makes you look

And people really did not like the fact that she's sitting here spouting out this whole story about how she was the one who was tricked, that she was deceived, not acknowledging the fact that she was the one deceiving everyone else, trying to make herself the victim in all of this. And in April of 2015, an article from the Australian Women's Weekly publication came out titled My Lifelong Struggle with the Truth.

And it featured an exclusive interview with Bell. And in this article, Bell finally admits that she lied. When she was asked if she really had cancer, her response was no, none of it is true. But if you thought that she was actually admitting to the whole thing being a scam, you'd be a little too optimistic. We are talking about Bell Gibson here. Like she said in the last article she interviewed for, Bell claims that she was tricked.

by natural therapists into believing she was dying. Poor Belle. Look at that face. The face of someone who was tricked. So again, just put

putting the blame on others as if she didn't know all along that she was not sick. And what's interesting about this article, though, is it raises the question of intent. Was Belle consciously lying, fully aware of her manipulation? Or is it possible that her childhood trauma led her to develop some type of mental health disorder that caused this to happen? And I guess it's sort of up to the individual to decide whether

how they feel about that, what they really believe, where the responsibility lies. Can we have some understanding and grace from her? Or is that no excuse at all? I mean, we don't even know if what happened to her in her childhood actually happened, considering she did make up so many lies about her past.

You know, it's just hard to know if anything that she says is true. But as for Belle, she certainly does not believe that she has any type of condition that made her lie. Do you believe you have a mental illness? No. It's been suggested perhaps you have Munchausen syndrome. Yeah. Or factitious disorder. Do you...

Except that perhaps you do. I don't accept that because I don't feel that I do. And with Munchausen's, it's a disorder where you create these syndromes and you believe it and you cause physical pain for that to be...

And I'm not doing that. And I didn't do that. But in the end, this article did not have the effect that Bell thought it would because people were still pissed. And that is putting it lightly. It was coming out now that she had earned an estimated $500,000 in sales. And to anyone who had ever contributed to that amount, they...

obviously felt extremely betrayed, hurt, and scammed. And just imagine how much money she would have made if that Apple deal had actually gone through. That would have been a massive, massive deal for her. And thank God that she was exposed before that happened. So then there's this interview with Bell,

from 60 Minutes Australia and there are a few clips of it on YouTube I don't know if it's the entire thing it's in like I think three 10 minute parts it's definitely worth watching if you have time I think it's interesting to try to hear her make sense of her lies and justify them and like still try to act like some of them weren't lies that she was the one that was tricked it's just

It's mind blowing to listen to people like that, in my opinion. But I have been sprinkling some clips of the interview here and there already. But I feel like it really confirms that Belle is like totally incapable of telling the truth. Do you know what the definition of truth is? Yes. What's your definition of truth? Speaking with honesty and with clear definition around fact.

And what's your definition of a lie? Well, obviously the opposite of that. Tara Brown was the one who conducted this interview, and I really have to give her a round of applause because she just went after Belle. I mean, she wasn't taking an ounce of her bullshit, and I loved it. There's a part in it where she really goes after her about lying about her age, and it's just like...

I would not have the patience to interview someone like this and try to reiterate that this was a lie and have to listen to the bullshit in front of your face. I would just lose my mind. Trying to get her to admit the truth was like trying to get a toddler to admit the truth when they are lying. Just impossible. I've always been raised as being currently a 26 year old. How old are you?

Well, I live knowing, as I've always known, that I would be 26. Okay, Bill. This is a really, really simple question. How old are you? I believe that I'm 26. I have two birth certificates and I've had my name changed four times.

The identity crisis there is big, but that was my normal when I was growing up, Tara, that... What do you know the truth to be now? That's probably a question that we'll have to keep digging for. Right. So currently, then, according to those documents, you're 23.

Correct. Bell's whole message in this interview was that she only did what she did because she believed she had cancer. She says she truly thought she was healing herself with food and alternative therapy because that's what her so-called doctors were telling her, which, reminder, one of them we're pretty sure didn't even exist. And the second one claims that he never told her she had cancer to begin with. But

She insists that they tricked her. Once I started to figure out where I stood and what reality actually was, and I had received the definitive, no, you do not have cancer, then that was something that I had to come to terms with. That takes a lot. And it was really traumatizing. I was feeling a huge amount of grief. And grief for not having cancer? No, that I had been lied to.

and that I felt like I had been taken for a ride. It took me a lot to unpack that. And once I was strong enough, I was ready to come out and speak with my community about it. And I had a definitive date. And that date was only 10 days before the media broke it. So basically in this interview, she's going on and on about how she's the victim, really, because she was the one who was lied to and she was operating under...

The idea that she really believed she had cancer, according to her.

Come on. But I think what's really difficult about this version of her story is let's let's just say it was true. Let's say that she really did believe that she had terminal brain cancer. Let's say that she really was tricked by these doctors. First of all, why would any doctor try to trick you into thinking you had something you didn't? But let's say that it was true that she really was tricked by these doctors. OK, fine.

How was she not able to produce a shred of evidence? Why wouldn't she produce a shred of evidence to prove that she was tricked by them? And then I know she said she was doing alternative therapy, but where's the proof of that? She didn't produce...

provide any proof of any of these therapies that she was doing either. Bottom line is she couldn't produce any of this because it doesn't exist. Oh, and here's possibly one of the craziest things that she revealed. Bell said that in 2010, she wasn't actually sure if she was sick, so she went to the hospital to get a scan. Well, apparently her doctor, Dr. Mark Johns, made her sign over the medical papers to him.

And when the results came back, Bell claims that he tricked her into believing that the scans showed that she had cancer when really they showed that she didn't. I went to the Alfred Hospital and I contacted Mark and I said to him, I'm not sure where things are at.

So I want to go and get a brain scan. He had me sign paperwork, which enlisted him as my medical professional, where the scan from the Alfred would be then passed on to him so we could also consult on it. Right. So what did the brain scan show? He brought in scans and it showed a brain tumour.

But that wasn't my scan because most recently I went back to the Alfred and I got my full portfolio from them.

And I did get that brain scan, but there is no brain tumor there. So just another example of her trying to put the blame on someone else, trying to put the blame on someone who does not exist. God, these people that lie are wild. If anything, all this really says to me is that a year after she was diagnosed with cancer, she had proof that she didn't actually have it. And until she can prove that Dr. Mark Johns actually exists...

I am led to believe that she was well aware that she wasn't sick the entire time. And I think most of you, most of the world agrees with me. I definitely want to hear from you guys on this one. But before wrapping up this episode, I do want to talk about the consequences that Bella had to face. Although they weren't enough in my opinion, I think most of you will agree. As you can imagine, many people believe that Bella should have faced jail time for what she did. Even her own brother thinks that she should have.

But unfortunately, that did not end up happening. In March of 2017, a federal court judge ruled that most but not all of Bell's claims were found to be lies and that what she said and did was both misleading and deceptive. In September of that year, Bell was fined $410,000 for making false claims about her donations to charity. But to this day, she has yet to pay that off.

In 2017, Consumer Affairs Victoria took the con artist to the federal court where she was fined $410,000. But two years later, she was hauled back here because Bell Gibson refused to pay up despite splurging on things like cryptocurrency and online gambling.

The same year, our cameras caught her returning from a month-long holiday in Africa. Six years on, we can reveal the fake wellness warrior's entire fine remains outstanding. You were fined by the court for a reason. With interest, it could now be well over half a million dollars. And because her fines have not been paid, Bell's house was raided not just once, but twice.

Police officers seized things to try and recoup her unpaid fines, but I don't think it's anywhere close to making up for that $410,000. Officers from the Sheriff's Department descended on Belle Gibson's rental home in a secret early morning raid. It's the second time in 15 months a seizure and sale warrant has been carried out on the Northcote property.

the infamous wellness blogger faked having brain cancer and duped thousands into believing she'd cured it with natural remedies in two thousand and seventeen gibson was found guilty of misleading and deceptive conduct and fined four hundred and ten thousand dollars

Add ongoing court costs and interest, and authorities are now chasing the con woman for more than $500,000. Item seized from today's raid will be sold to recoup the money following the mother of one's claims she's broke and unable to pay. Belle has gone mostly underground since her entire world blew up in her face, but she definitely hasn't stayed completely free from the spotlight. And honestly, this next part is so outlandish that

I can't help but laugh. It's ridiculous. In the last few years, she has gotten some more attention from the media, which I'm sure she somewhat loves. And I'm sure you will not be able to guess what it was for. It's because she has now claimed to have been adopted into Melbourne's Ethiopian community.

Yeah, you guys, there are actually images of her wearing a headscarf and speaking the Oromo language, and these images have gotten the attention of many, especially after she began talking about raising money for the people of Oromia. However, members of this community have since spoken out to say that they did not adopt Belle and do not accept her. Which, knowing what we know about Belle, I don't think any of us can blame them for wanting to...

steer clear. Belle has done some truly evil things in her lifetime, and I wouldn't blame anyone for not wanting to be involved with her. The way that she faked cancer, faked the heart condition, faked other things as well medically, tricked people into buying into the apps

and not only just paying money, but tricked people emotionally, took advantage of people's emotions. I mean, that is super fucked up. And then there's just lying about donating thousands of dollars to charity. I mean, who has the balls to do that? It is sick. And the fact that she doesn't seem remorseful about any of it tells me everything I need to know about this person. Belle is someone who is never going to learn. I

And that's just my opinion, but I don't see it happening. But anyway, I wanted to end this episode on a good note. And so I wanted to tell you about where I'm making this week's donation. And that is to Oligo Nation, which was established in 2014 to mobilize the oligodendroglioma community and help raise funds for medical research for new and more effective treatments. Now, this is a type of rare brain tumor and research funding is out of the question.

absolutely crucial. It has been more than two decades since a new treatment was approved and this type of cancer has really been ignored in general research studies for years. And because of this, treatment options are outdated and largely ineffective. And that's why Oligonation is focused on fast-tracking research for new treatments and supporting those who have been diagnosed

as well as their loved ones. This nonprofit is made up of real survivors and family members of survivors, and their efforts over the last decade have led to several clinical studies and millions of dollars raised. And what's really cool is this week I was able to connect with the founder of this organization, and they were kind enough to film a little clip for you guys talking about what they do. Hi, I'm Brock Kreen, founder of Oligo Nation.

oligodendro glioma is a rare cancer that is currently incurable specifically it's a form of brain cancer most people are diagnosed between the ages of eighteen and forty the prime of life when people are starting careers and families

I started Allergo Nation after my two sons, Spencer and Zach, were diagnosed at 17 and 21 years of age, more than a decade ago. This is Spencer with his wife, Stephanie, and this is Zach and his wife, Erica, today. When I investigated what research was being done on our disease, the answer was none. Drug companies, academic research centers, and the National Cancer Institute

have ignored our disease forever so oligonation's mission is to fund medical research that will lead to new more effective treatments in the next three to five years last year we invested a million and a half dollars in research but we need to do much more we have also launched an innovative new research program that brings leading scientists together

to identify and develop new treatments. We call it team science and it's already showing promising results. As a patient-led nonprofit, we work very hard to make sure every dollar goes to research. To date, 85% of the funds raised have been invested directly in research. You can find out more and support our mission at oligonation.org.

Thank you very much. And I want to say a huge thank you to Brock for taking the time to film that clip, to educate my audience. And I want to encourage all of you to learn more by checking out their website and their social media, which I will have linked below, of course. And if you personally are in a place to make a donation, a donation to their nonprofit is a great place to put your money and support an incredible cause where every dollar truly counts. Thank you.

That is going to be it for me today, guys. Thank you for joining me for another episode and make sure you follow the show on Spotify and Apple podcasts. It really does help me out. If you want to watch the video version of this show, you can find it on my YouTube channel, which will be linked, or you can just search Kendall Ray. I will be back with another episode soon, but until then stay safe out there.

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