Photographer David Hogan's hell as 'evil' woman conned him

Photographer David Hogan's hell as 'evil' woman conned him



NEWS: goo.gl/a3kAcQ



Celebrity photographer David Hogan built an enviable lifestyle by gaining the trust of some of the world’s biggest stars.

His unobtrusive working methods and striking images gave him entry into the inner circles of Michael Jackson, The Rolling Stones, Take That and Madonna, and he mingled with them backstage to produce intimate pictorial records of their world tours.

His 35 years in showbusiness earned him a modest fortune and an enviable property portfolio – or so he thought. For it was a question of trust that would prove Hogan’s downfall and, the faith he placed in his own Girl Friday, an ‘assistant’ who turned out to be a glamorous conwoman determined to clone his life and steal his income.



She was Caron Westbrook, and as Hogan would later discover, she was a consummate criminal who for more than a decade made herself an indispensable part of his world.

She adopted his identity, obsessively took on his hobbies and interests – even setting up as a celebrity photographer in her own right – and siphoned off his money to fund her extravagant lifestyle.

Hogan, meanwhile, came close to financial ruin, relying at one point on gifts from fellow churchgoers to pay his bills.

Westbrook is now finally behind bars, sentenced earlier this month to five-and-a-half years in prison for stealing more than half a million pounds. Her husband Martin will serve three years and four months for his part in the deception. Judge John Denniss described the pair as parasites. But that’s of little comfort to Hogan as he tries to piece together the ruins of a once-gilded life.

Speaking for the first time about his ordeal, he suggests the true scale of the loss is closer to £1 million.

And he says he can’t even trace where payments from his account went – due to the workings of the Data Protection Act.

He says: ‘What she did to my family – while coming into our house and smiling – was unforgivable. She is evil. But she will be out of prison in two or three years and will do this again.’

Hogan, 56, was a working-class boy from Wales when his talent for photography drew him to London in 1982.

He quickly earned a reputation as one of Fleet Street’s best, operating in a world of premieres and parties, and soon began to gain the ear of A-list celebrities and their jostling entourages.

Known as ‘Hogie’, he established his own picture agency and by the turn of the millennium was employing ten staff and earning a fortune.



The church-going father-of-three settled into a life of affluence with his TV producer wife Janice and their daughter in a £1.5 million home in well-heeled Muswell Hill, North London.

In 2003, Hogan, who has two children from a previous relationship, struck gold, selling his agency, Mission Pictures, to Getty Images and investing in a Suffolk mansion, which he rented out. He says: ‘I am a kid from a council house whose dad never earned more than £100 a week, so I thought I had done well.’

That was until Caron Westbrook came into his life. In May 2003, Hogan advertised for an administrative assistant in his local newspaper, the Hampstead & Highgate Express.

Among the applicants was Westbrook, who told Hogan she was a woman of independent means, thanks to a wealthy former professional footballer husband and a generous divorce settlement.

‘When I called her references, they were glowing,’ he recalls.

The truth was quite the opposite: she was penniless, and had recently been released from prison. Her lengthy criminal record included theft, fraud and forgery.

None the wiser, he gave her the job and came to rely on this invaluable new employee. ‘I needed a Girl Friday who could do the invoices, but suddenly it was, “I can do all these things for you.”

‘She became indispensable. She won my complete trust, had the keys to our house and nothing was too much trouble. I probably spoke to her more than my wife.’

It was only later that Hogan realised Westbrook’s ‘referee’ must have been her husband.

Westbrook, 53, compiled invoices and VAT returns and even ‘audited’ his books. Crucial to the deception was Hogan’s dyslexia, which Westbrook cruelly exploited.

The photographer says: ‘If I am with The Rolling Stones in front of thousands of people, I am in control. But put 20 spreadsheets in front of me, it is gobbledygook.’

Once Westbrook had gained access to Hogan’s life, she began to copy every aspect of it, using money she stole from him to mimic his hobbies and his lifestyle.

He says: ‘Caron said she was doing a photography course and showed me her pictures. They were good, but I did not realise she was paying for them to be professionally retouched – with my money.