The death of the scammer and fake producer Pat Andrew turns one year old, shrouded in mystery | Culture

It is said that cinema has magic. But the one produced by Pat Andrew in Malaga was only capable of one spell: volatilizing. First, he offered big words. He cited Amazon, Hollywood, Warner or his alleged friend Steven Spielberg. He promised blockbusters, fame and million-dollar profits. Never, however, was the camera even placed. About twenty professionals told this newspaper over the last year and a half how they lost hope, time and money because of a scam that was always identical in its format and outcome. So much so that the lights, turned off on the sets, ended up being turned on in the courts.

Then, Andrew disappeared for the last time. His entourage reported his death and cremation, just a year ago, on April 28, 2023. There are documents and testimonies to believe it. And, at the same time, a history of deceptions, name changes (Pat Austin, Augustus…), convictions and previous escapes in France, Ireland or the United States, invites skepticism.

The truth is that the Spanish police could not confirm the death, which is why the judge put him in search and arrest on September 29, for an alleged crime of continued fraud. At the end of February, this newspaper was able to confirm with an official source that the order was still in force, with no known progress. Meanwhile, the Swiss justice system gathers information and questions on another front of the case. And the Malaga labor inspection also continues ahead, after another lawsuit, from several victims, for non-payment. Hence the story still awaits its closure: it may be the American illusionist’s final trick. Or that the definitive resolution of the enigma already rests underground. Along with all his secrets.

One of the cases that Andrew has pending is in the hands of the Investigative Court number 10 of Malaga. In the court order, to which EL PAÍS has had access, it is explained that he stayed between January and February 2022 at the city’s NH hotel, on San Jacinto Street. He registered as executive director of a production company and requested a suite-style room for himself and two other regular ones for a screenwriter and a photographer. They all used them for several days, “but then he left and didn’t pay anything,” explains the court’s chief judge, Estela Gómez, who after the hotel’s complaint tried to take his statement as an investigator. He was never located. In August of the same year he was searched and captured and in March 2023 he was detained by the National Police, as confirmed by police sources. He availed himself of his right not to testify.

At the end of the investigation of the case, the prosecutor requested two years in prison for continued fraud, in addition to compensation to the hotel for the amount he left unpaid: 7,515 euros. The letter could never be notified to Andrew because the Prosecutor’s Office could not find it either. When they tried to notify him of the opening of the oral trial, the same thing happened. The judge did inform the lawyer María Natividad de Leiva, so that she could transfer it to her client, but then the lawyer reported that he had died, although without a certificate confirming it.

Gómez then sent a letter to the National Police to inform them of the situation of the accused and the investigators assured that they had no evidence of his death and that they could not find him either. “The searches work very well and most people are located, but who knows where he is. Even if he were abroad they would find him. Today we don’t know where he could be,” the judge emphasizes. Police sources indicate that Andrew has a search and appearance warrant open, but that he has not been able to be located.

However, sources close to the producer sent this newspaper a death certificate. In addition to the date and name, the profession and country of birth coincide. Contacted by telephone, the West Sussex county registry service, in England, confirmed having issued the document. And a worker at the St Catherine clinic, south of London and where the producer died according to the paper, responded: “Due to privacy laws and practices in the United Kingdom, I can only confirm information that is already in the public domain, it is that is, the one obtained from the certificate.” EL PAÍS contacted the National Police three times in recent months to ask what steps they took to find Andrew, why he decided not to confirm his death and if he had proof of the certificate. He never received a response.

“He’s dead, it’s over. I was there,” Trudi Rothwell points to the phone. Andrew’s closest collaborator only gives a few statements before hanging up. “I worked as his secretary for 20 years, I took care of his children. I have nothing to do with anything he did, my life is destroyed,” she adds. She refuses to comment on all the accusations against the alleged producer. And against herself, since many victims implicate her as a key pillar of the alleged scam. They describe her as a “lover, figurehead or partner.” And they remember that she also used multiple identities: Anne Grey, Susan Handler or Lucy Carver.

Too much chaos, even for its protagonist. One day, Rothwell mistakenly signed an email with this name to two workers at Wanda-Halcyon, the company Andrew then ran. They, however, knew her as Annie Grey. It was enough for them to go to Google for the castle of lies to fall: they found all the skeletons that the producer kept in the closet. When George Van Mellaert was notified, the Swiss writer’s entire life collapsed. How many times had he wondered why all the money he had earned Andrew never translated into the promised audiovisual adaptation of his novel saga? Corruption in justice. After several deliveries, for a total of 497,600 euros lost, he finally obtained an answer. The worst.

“I don’t believe it at all. “He invents everything,” Van Mellaert told EL PAÍS months ago about Andrew’s alleged death. And he described the moment he found out about the deception: “Talk about a shock It would be an understatement. My world collapsed. I felt nauseous. The betrayals, the manipulation, the abuse that I experienced made it a hundred times worse than if that figure had suddenly been taken from me.” Once the scam was discovered, he denounced the producer and Rothwell before the criminal chamber of the cantonal court of Valais, in his country.

After some judicial back-and-forth, the writer maintains that the case proceeds: the prosecutor plans to begin interrogating witnesses and informed people in Switzerland and Spain, including Rothwell, in May. At the end of February, she maintained with some surprise that no one had contacted her: “The police never spoke to me or looked for me. Everyone has my cell phone. “I lived in Spain for eight years.”

Van Mellaert and his lawyer also insist on the importance of investigating the account that Andrew maintained in Malaga at the BBVA bank. And behind the money is also the lawsuit for non-payment that several affected parties, such as the health professional Juan Martín Romo or the communication expert José Carmelo Morillas, filed against Andrew and another of his companies, Global Operations Television.

Because the American repeated the modus operandibut I tested many profiles: actresses, musicians, photographers, hotels, directors of casting or set owners ended up entangled in their network. And giving you time, free work and even bank transfers. Many, to this day, still do not know what part of the story was real. If there was any. A week ago, a labor inspector from Malaga summoned the plaintiff victims to gather information, in the first official move in the case in months.

So the list gets longer. A default and escape in Paris, decades ago, when Andrew claimed to be a diplomat. A writer whom he convinced that he would publish her first novel, in 2006 in Dublin, and then backed out when she had already written it. A sentence never served to pay more than six million dollars, in 2014 in New York, for illicit enrichment, breach of contracts, extortion and various frauds against three plaintiffs. And, now, the Spanish and Swiss fronts.

Although many more questions remain in the air: Andrew claimed to have grown up on Long Island, the son of an Irish woman and an Italian; he swore that he had worked for espionage and served in the Gulf War and in the former Yugoslavia; He was, in a story that varied depending on the interlocutor, an investment banker, ex-soldier, editor or producer. Maybe it was all of that. Or, rather, nothing. He may never know. Unless the script awaits one last surprise.