A Highland woman targeted her own family in a £35,000 con involving a bogus Hollywood actress and a string of A-list stars.
Ann Dunlop, 68, claimed that a woman she knew was being lined up for million-pound contracts and convinced brother David Brunton, 51, to hand over cash.
She stated that the woman was mingling with A-listers such as Leonardo Di Caprio, Jay-Z, Beyonce and Quentin Tarantino.
But it was all a pack of lies and Dunlop, of Beauly, has now been found guilty of defrauding her family out of £35,368.
Sheriff Kevin McCarron said: “I’m driven to the conclusion that what she was telling her family was a work of fiction worthy of every one of the screenwriters or playwrights mentioned in this case.
“It is clear she led her family down a merry dance through this episode.
“She perpetrated a pretence that was clearly false to everyone.”
Glasgow Sheriff Court was told Dunlop also induced her sister Jean and her husband Steve with her string of lies.
Steve believed the Dunlop and the woman had “champagne on tap” at the plush London home they shared.
Steve stated the woman’s acting career was a “best-kept secret” and compared it to the nuclear codes at Faslane.
Dunlop later requested Steve and Jean to pay her gas and council tax bills as she did not have enough money.
Claims she went to Oscars ‘to make connections’
The court heard during the trial that the actress had appeared in a non-speaking role in a BBC period drama as well as a TV show starring comedian Noel Fielding.
David – a chief executive of a life science company – was approached by Dunlop in March 2016 after he sold his business.
He stated that he handed over £5,000 in order for the actress to “build her career.”
David told the court that he was informed by Dunlop that the woman was being represented by US entertainment mogul Irving Azoff.
He said: “There was talk about meeting Beyonce and Jay Z … movies with Quentin Tarantino and Michael Keaton.
“She went to the Oscars to make various connections.
“Azoff was her manager, she met Leonardo Di Caprio and she was working on promotional activity for Chanel which would go alongside her movies.”
The family was also told that the actress was set to star in a movie version of the musical Wicked directed by Tim Burton.
David said that he was unaware of the figure she was to receive but believed it was millions.
David handed over a further £27,000 to the pair as he heard that Dunlop and her husband, who also lived with them, were “struggling.”
He also footed a bill for their council tax and gas.
Prosecutor Redmond Harris asked about any repayment.
David: “It was promised … this was made clear by phone calls and texts.”
Private detective hired to keep tabs on aspiring actress
David was not paid back and his suspicions rose after the actress failed to appear in a Chanel Christmas advert in 2016.
Fears further heightened after he hired a private investigator to keep tabs on the actress.
He said:”[We wanted] to establish if there was a relationship with Irving Azoff and if it was true that she was an actor and was there any basis to what we had been told in previous months.”
Mr Harris asked: “Following things with the private investigator, were your suspicions greater or unfounded?”
David said: “It confirmed what our fears were.”
David met Dunlop in a London pub in 2017 but did not receive a satisfactory answer as to why he had not been paid back.
Mr Harris asked: “What do you know about the woman’s acting career?”
Mr Bunton: “From internet searching, there was no career to my knowledge.”
David and Dunlop’s brother-in-law Steven Allan, 66, claimed he was under the impression Dunlop and the actress were living a “movie-type of lifestyle in London.”
Steven recalled visiting the pair at their Notting Hill home for Dunlop’s 60th birthday party.
He said: “I had never seen so many bottles of champagne … the champagne was on tap there.”
Steven stated that the actress shopped at Harrod’s and went to handbag stores in London.
Steven paid for Dunlop’s £600 gas bill in November 2016 before transferring £1,000 of his overdraft to her as “she said she didn’t have enough money.”
He claimed Dunlop told him that he would be repaid in two weeks.
Steven added: “The explanation was there was a large sum of money in Coutts Bank but it was put in an investment fund and it was not available immediately but it would be sorted out.”
‘I thought I’d married into the Waltons … it was actually the Dingles’
Steven stated that he was later told by Dunlop that Tim Burton had collected the woman’s bank cards and put them in a safe.
Mr Harris asked about Steven’s relationship with his wife’s family before the bank transfers.
He said: “I thought I had married into the Waltons … I didn’t know I had actually married into the Dingles.”
Steven said the woman’s acting career was the “best kept secret than the nuclear codes at Faslane”.
Dunlop told the court in her evidence that she believes the woman did star in the roles she had been informed about.
She claimed that she asked for money from her family as her husband became unwell and had to stop working.
Fraudster granted bail
Dunlop told the court that the woman was to appear on a US TV show which she has filmed one episode of so far.
Kevin Banks, defending, asked if Dunlop and the woman wanted to pay David back.
She said: “Yes, as she is still due money from the film.”
Mr Harris asked Dunlop why the woman was not at court to come to her rescue.
She replied: “I didn’t want her to come. My husband has to have someone at home but I didn’t want to put her through this – what can she say that I can’t?”
Sentence was deferred pending background reports until the end of the month and first offender Dunlop was granted bail meantime.