A Rogue's Gallery
IAN STRACHAN was jailed for blackmailing a member of the Royal Family over allegations of a sex and drugs ‘scandal’. But a media blackout ensured that little of the substance of the case was reported.
Jason O'Toole, 06 May 2009
I also heard that you used to go around saying you’d inherited money from your grandmother?
Sometimes you’d meet a girl and I’d take her back and she’d go, ‘Fucking hell!’ Because it was a stunning apartment. We used to drive around in a Bentley, always had nice clothes and I always had money on me. I don’t tell people what I do to make my money. So, on one occasion, I might have said, ‘Oh, I inherited it,’ to get off that question.
So, were you rich?
I made a substantial amount of money in the property market when I was in the Czech Republic. The majority of it was on paper.
One unnamed friend was quoted as saying: “He was always embellishing stories and put on a show for everyone, it was bound to get him into trouble.”
(Laughs) I’ve always sailed close to the wind, mate. But it’s got me very far – trust me!
Other reports claim you lied about being a solicitor involved in murder cases, and that you claimed you had a degree in law.
I read that. My brother’s a solicitor in Scotland. But no, I never claimed to be a solicitor and definitely not involved in murder cases at all. I think that was in a Scottish newspaper. I don’t know where that came from!
So, you never lied about having a law degree when trying to recover money owed to a fashion stylist you were representing?
That’s quite true. In the fashion industry, everyone’s quite flaky and nobody signs contracts and all this sort of thing and I used to work in a capacity as an agent for a stylist. It was quite hard to draw payment from certain companies. This girl would go six months without being paid. So, yeah, I bullshitted on the phone. I knew my law, so instead of paying a lawyer a couple of hundred quid to retrieve money through the small claims court I would phone up and say, ‘I’m representing blah blah as her legal advisor’. Now, I never actually said solicitor – I said legal advisor. And as soon as I used to say that, I would get her paid.
Page 16/19 <Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 Next>
©Hot Press 2012. Why be a member? | Terms of Service | Privacy Policy | About Us Jobs @ Hot Press