A fraudulent filmmaker faces prison after stealing more than £150K from victims worldwide – by claiming links with princess annehandjob Hillary Clinton, Denzel Washington, Gordon Brown and the Dalai Lama.
Lois Lord, 56, lured his victims with the promise of high returns, investing in the high-interest fund of his charitable project.
But only a small fraction of the money paid – around £10,000 – has ever been refunded – leaving many victims empty-handed.
Lois Lord, 56, featured on his marketing material, lured his victims with the promise of high returns, investing in the high-interest fund of his charitable project
He falsely claimed to have an affair with the likes of Princess Anne and several other celebrities
He also falsely used Hillary Clinton’s name when trying to defraud his victims
During his five-week trial at Oxford Crown Court, Lord claimed ties with heads of state, royalty, ambassadors and Hollywood A-listers.
Now she has been found guilty in seven cases of cheating. He was acquitted of three other charges.
Sending him into custody, Judge Ian Pringle QC said: ‘You have been found guilty by this jury of seven serious charges of misrepresentation or fraud by the equivalent.
‘The sentence I am about to pass to you must be one of immediate imprisonment.
‘Next week when I hear your learned counsel, how long will it take me to consider it?’
Welcoming the sentence, Debt Inspector Duncan Wynn of Thames Valley Police’s Economic Offenses Unit said: ‘I think it shows that Lois Lord was a serious offender and to appear at Oxford Crown Court for these offenses and later He was to be blamed.
Fijian-born filmmaker God’s Lionheart Project was touted as a way to connect people around the world to address issues facing communities around the world.
The plan, which was launched in 2001 at an event at the St. Regis Hotel, Washington DC, attended by former Amnesty International director Jack Healy, traces its origins to the early 1990s.
The defendants hoped to make a film and related TV series, which they branded ‘Lionhearts’, focusing on various communities around the world.
Ambition grew over time, with “Lionhearts” planning a global launch of the film with a worldwide network and interactive “experiences” capable of connecting people around the world.
God raised his eyes. In the early 1990s, he contacted former international cricketer Imran Khan, now the Prime Minister of Pakistan, who was at the time raising money for a hospital in Lahore.
Lord was found guilty of seven counts of fraud at Oxford Crown Court. Upon returning for sentencing she was warned that she was going to jail
He handed it over to his fundraising manager, Jacqueline Cowen. She told the jurors: ‘She said she was making a film… it was to help raise money for various charities in the world and Imran Khan was one of them.’
The defendant’s globetrotting lifestyle saw her travel to Egypt and Israel with former Sunday Times photographer Brian Wharton, which prevented her meeting with soldiers and diplomats.
She claimed that she was funding the Lionheart project from her own royalty income from the films she made and, later, through a £1 million high-interest fund.
Her victims – some of whom later set up a ‘derogatory’ website to name Ms Bhagwan and expose the fraud – were told that their money would be kept with the fund, which she set up in the South during her trial. Registered in Korea.
In all, his victims suffered a loss of approximately £160,000.
Among them was the former captain of the Fiji national rugby team, who lost around £2,000 in fraud.
Former Saracens star Moses Roulini, 46, told the jury he was looking for investments closer to retirement.
He was introduced to Lois Lord by the High Commissioner of Fiji to the UK, Pio Bosco Tikoisuwa.
Mr Roulini described the Respondent as ‘bubbly’ and said that his project ‘looked very promising to me’.
He invested a total of £1,950 in two halves in 2010 and asked him to try to get other rugby players involved in the project. She told jurors from Australia via video link that she would ask him to invest more money, but she could not.
Lord is said to have obtained sponsorship for the Fiji national rugby side. He told her at one point that he had £12m and that she seemed ‘extremely excited about it’.
Mr. Roulini left the UK in 2012 and had not seen the return on his investment.
Victim Wanda Arnold, who was persuaded to pay more than £25,000 for two shares in the Lionheart project and another £5,000 for a ‘short-term’ loan, described the woman in amazement.
‘I thought she was a very nice woman, very enthusiastic. You drifted off with him. She was lively, she was very well attached and at times I was amazed at her,’ the Worcestershire woman told the jurors.
‘She said she knew people like Condoleezza Rice, who was’ [US] The Secretary of State at that time, the High Commissioner here, the High Commissioner there.’
Mrs Arnold said she first met God in December 2006, when he knocked on the door of her home in Tenbury Wells, Worcestershire, asking for some mistletoe to take friends to a property in Scotland, where she would spend Christmas. Was spending
The victim said of God: ‘She said she was a filmmaker. She made or produced movies and she went out with some moviegoers like the man who played Draco Malfoy in Harry Potter [Tom Felton].’
The con artist talked to him about the Lionheart project and explained that there were opportunities for Arnolds, who ran a water treatment company.
Within six months he persuaded them to buy two shares in the project, paying £12,500 for each share, promising high returns and no risk to the original capital.
Paperwork sent in 2008 and 2009 suggested he had earned over £8,300 in interest.
In the email read to the jury, Lord described herself as Arnold’s ‘sister’, addressed him as ‘brother’ and ‘sister’ and spoke of a special bond.
In March 2010, she sent an urgent petition to Mrs Arnold to help raise £30,000 for a short-term loan. The victim eventually handed over £5,000 – trying to hide the payment from her husband, until then he was suspicious. God promised to return the cash with interest of £500.
As of 2011, Bhagwan was not answering calls or emails. The couple, who had received no money, hired a private investigator to try to locate the woman. She eventually gets in touch, claims she is ill and promises to make payment arrangements.
The couple is still not reimbursed by God.
Other victims included the lord’s former neighbor in the Cotswolds, the manager of a Highlands estate, and an oil man found in Egypt.
.