$410k fine for cancer lies
Judge blasts Belle Gibson’s ‘relentless obsession with herself’
DISGRACED wellness guru Belle Gibson has been fined $410,000 by the Federal Court for misleading consumers.
Gibson claimed she had brain cancer, healed herself with natural remedies and lied to consumers about donating to charities from the sales of her Whole Pantry app and book.
In the Federal Court in Melbourne yesterday, Justice Debbie Mortimer ordered Ms Gibson to pay a total of $410,000 for five contraventions of Australian consumer law relating to false claims she made that money from the sales would go to various charities.
The action was brought by Consumer Affairs Victoria.
Justice Mortimer said Ms Gibson profited from her false statements about donating substantial sums of the proceeds of her sales of The Whole Pantry app and book.
For a year she repeated the claims and used those claims to help shape her profile.
“One of the clear demon- strations of the dishonesty and self-interest attending Ms Gibson’s conduct was the fact she . . . did not in fact make any donations to the organisations she had mentioned in her publicity statements until public questioning of her claims,” Justice Mortimer said.
The judge said Gibson had been “cavalier about the truth”, unconcerned about representations she had made and “prepared to tell outright lies”. She had been put on notice during a media training interview with publisher Penguin in 2014 that there were likely to be real questions about her charitable giving, but during and after “she chose to perpetuate the fantasy and deception she created”.
Gibson sought to use the terminal illness of a young boy for her own selfish purposes to garner sympathy for her own asserted brain cancer, her commercial causes and products, in what the judge labelled “unconscionable”.
Justice Mortimer said Gibson’s failure to attend any of the court hearings showed she did not take any responsibility for her conduct.
“If there is one theme or pattern which emerges through her conduct, it is her relentless obsession with herself and what best serves her interests.”