The half-sister of a girl who faked a brain tumour to con Brits out of £400,000 to pay for trips to Disney World has claimed her mother was 'by her side through every lie'.
Megan Bhari, of Kingston, South West London, founded the Believe in Magic charity aged 16 in 2011 to help 'other' children suffering from severe or terminal illnesses. She ran the organisation with her mother Jean O'Brien, 72, and they were backed by music stars including One Direction, Taylor Swift, Michael Bublé and Ed Sheeran.
Megan and Jean effectively became 'fairy godmothers' to other families whose children had cancer, and would organise experiences to put smiles on their faces. The teenager even got to enjoy a tea party at Buckingham Palace with Princess Eugenie and was invited to Downing Street by then-prime minister David Cameron.
But parents of ill youngsters found out she travelled on private jets and luxury cruise liners and stayed at the Florida resort while apparently being treated in US hospitals.
Now, her half-sister Nina has spoken about the astonishing fraud in new television documentary 'The Mother of All Cons' which continues on BBC Two this Sunday. Nina, who was aged 12 when Megan was born, told the programme: 'I'm not saying Meg's an innocent child. She was 23 years old, she was a fully grown adult.'
She also referred to an article in the Times newspaper on September 19, 2020 headlined: 'Girl faked brain tumour to dupe stars out of cash and live high life.' Nina said: 'In that whole article there was only one line about Jean, and it just says that her mum Jean was a trustee, and that's it. They were both the public faces of Believe In Magic. Jean was by her side throughout the whole thing, through every lie.'
Megan's charity was first announced in July 2011 when the News of the World ran an article in its final edition headlined 'Megan a magic girl' about how 'a young girl with an incurable disease has set up a charity to help other terminally ill children'. She quickly received support from One Direction, with the band and its fans raising millions of pounds over the following months towards funding treatment abroad.
Anne Twist, the mother of Harry Styles from the band, climbed Mount Kilimanjaro in 2012 to help the charity – and One Direction helped Megan raise £120,000 for radon therapy in 2015 after she claimed to have a second tumour. Johannah Deakin, the mother of band member Louis Tomlinson helped organise a fundraising ball at the Natural History Museum – and Tomlinson reportedly donated £2million. Ms Deakin later died from leukaemia aged 43 in 2016.
Megan was presented with a 'Point of Light' award by Mr Cameron for her work as an 'outstanding volunteer', and she visited Buckingham Palace where she met Eugenie and helped decorate Queen Elizabeth II's Christmas tree. The girl also received backing from stars such as Jessie J, Pharrell Williams, Little Mix, Professor Green, Fearne Cotton, Pixie Lott and Olly Murs and the footballers Lionel Messi and Didier Drogba.
But the parents of other seriously ill children began investigating the charity after raising concerns over Megan's accounts of her illness, which were vague and lacked detail in fundraising appeals. They discovered Megan had been repeatedly travelling to US on cruise liners and staying at Disney World – even once taking a private jet after being late for one liner's departure.
And in 2017 when she said she was returning home from treatment in the US, a private detective working for the families watched her as she disembarked the Queen Mary 2 ship at Southampton. She was smiling and pushing a trolley full of suitcases even though the charity had claimed 'her body has been through more than any should ever have to and is so weak right now'.
The Charity Commission regulator opened an investigation into the organisation and froze its bank accounts that same year. Cash withdrawals totalling £133,000 were found to have been made in the year to November 2015 and another £156,000 the next year. Between December 2015 and May 2016, £108,786 was transferred to one of its trustees.
Megan had been a trustee of the charity with her mother Jean and two close relatives, Nick and Louise O'Brien. Megan died aged 23 in 2018 and a coroner recorded at an inquest that her death was caused by heart failure related to her fatty liver – but there was no mention of a tumour in her medical records.
The inquest heard that the condition that actually killed Megan was most likely caused by obesity, and her brain was 'morphologically normal'. The Charity Commission found the trustees had 'failed to responsibly manage the charity's resources and financial affairs'. It shut the charity in 2020 – with remaining funds given to the Round Table Children's Wish.
The commission found trustees collectively failed to file the charity's accounts, amounting to 'misconduct and/or mismanagement', adding: 'It is also a criminal offence.' The watchdog added that the 'unexplained expenditure of charity funds was reported to the police, who undertook a criminal investigation but, due to insufficient evidence, did not proceed further'.
The commission said it had never been able to contact Nick and Louise – with Megan and Jean refusing to provide their contact details because they claimed that they 'feared this would expose them to abuse from individuals who were complaining about the charity'.
In 2022, Kingston social services carried out a review into Megan's case because of suspicions that her death was a result of abuse or neglect. They concluded that 'despite there being no formal diagnosis' it was 'likely' to have been Fabricated or Induced Illness (FII) or Munchausen by Proxy. An author of the report - which has not been released to the public - later said Megan's case was in the category of 'serious situations involving a carer deliberately inducing signs of illness... by really direct and deliberately harmful means'.
Jean has consistently disputed allegations of wrongdoing surrounding Megan's illness and the operations of Believe in Magic. She has never been charged with any criminal offence relating to the charity, fundraising appeals or Megan's medical claims. Jean was approached for comment by the documentary producers, but did not respond.
'The Mother of All Cons' continues on BBC Two on Sunday at 9pm and is on iPlayer.
