Truth about Katie Price’s husband. He says he’s a billionaire with a PhD. Now we reveal unseen pictures that tell a VERY different story, eye-watering surgery and talk to the string of furious women he tried to con

As a master in the lucrative art of self-promotion, Katie Price knows a thing or two about dropping bombshells.

This week the 47-year-old former glamour model, businesswoman and mother of five set the internet on fire after flying to Dubai to marry her ninth fiance – a man she had only previously met online a few days earlier.

This whirlwind romance was documented via an avalanche of Photoshopped images of hunky ‘billionaire’ Lee Andrews, a man apparently so perfect that even Price’s most loyal fans began to question if they were AI-generated.

Was the chisel-jawed stud – who, as the Daily Mail can reveal, is the son of a Nottinghamshire coal miner – simply too good to be true?

This week, amid revelations that the 41-year-old is, in fact, a ‘Walter Mitty’ fantasist whose claims of rubbing shoulders with the likes of Elon Musk and Kim Kardashian are as phoney as his Cambridge PhD, the Daily Mail has spoken exclusively to those who know the truth about Price’s alleged fourth husband.

More, later, of whether their marriage is actually valid. For, as we shall see, Andrews – who has been living in Dubai for 20 years – is far from the man he claims to be.

Those who have spoken include one of several furious ex-girlfriends who once thought that the businessman, who has previously claimed to have been invited to meet Donald Trump at the White House, was also the man of their dreams.

An acquaintance in Dubai also told me this week that he is ‘a world away from the knight in shining armour persona he presents to women’.

‘He’s a wannabe,’ says the acquaintance of Andrews who sometimes calls himself ‘Weslee’ and uses the title ‘doctor’ without justification.

‘The problem is, he doesn’t know what he wants to be – one minute he’s posing as a billionaire, the next he’s an actor and a model,’ adds the acquaintance. ‘He even claimed to have turned down the role of James Bond for the new Amazon films. He wants to be everything but most of all he’s desperate to be famous. It’s all smoke and mirrors with Lee.’

More, in a moment, of the countless lies Andrews has told, not to mention the various cosmetic procedures he has undergone.

An avid gym-user, friends say he has had a hair transplant in Turkey, underwent a procedure to pin back his ears, has fillers and regular vitamin injections in his face. He uses filters to dramatically enhance his image on social media and during video calls so that even his eyes, which are brown, appear as blue or hazel.

His doctored photos also appear on male escort sites in Dubai, including in adverts for Massage Republic and Hot in which he styles himself as a ‘sexy educated professional’ called Noah who charges £915 an hour to women ‘seeking more than just companionship’.

Andrews denies the adverts are his, insisting: ‘I’m not a gigolo.’

While his mother, Trisha, a clairvoyant who gives psychic readings in pubs around Nottinghamshire, has given her full support to her son’s new relationship, Price’s family are said to be ‘completely horrified’ by its speed.

The star’s mother, siblings and five children are all said to have been in the dark about her dash to Dubai to get married to a man she had never met.

It came just a week after the end of her most recent engagement to reality TV star JJ Slater who, somewhat ironically, previously starred in the TV series Married At First Sight UK.

Katie’s older brother Daniel told me on the phone this week that the family were ‘still trying to figure it out’, while her younger half-sister Sophie said on Instagram that it had been ‘one hell of a week’.

Given recent concerns about the once curvaceous former Page 3 model’s dramatic weight loss and gaunt appearance, they have every right to be worried about a marriage made in extraordinary haste.

One of her associates told the Daily Mail’s Katie Hind this month that ‘the truth is that we don’t know how long she will be around for’.

Andrews’ acquaintance in Dubai is also concerned.

‘I fear for Katie Price,’ he said, adding that Andrews targets successful women who have large social media followings, hoping to capitalise on their popularity.

‘He will make her feel like she’s the only person in the world. He will tell her he wants to rescue her and take all her pain away. It’s what he does.

‘She seems very vulnerable and has fallen for all this nonsense. I’m worried that it’s not going to end well for her.’

Meanwhile, one of Andrews’ ex-girlfriends, American family nurse practitioner Crystal Janke, who met him online in May last year told the Daily Mail this week that she has sent messages to Price, warning her about him.

‘I truly feel she is being naive in this situation and unfortunately may not see the seriousness of it right now,’ she said.

Crystal, who, like Price, was love-bombed by Andrews online – and never actually met him in person – has shown the Daily Mail video messages he sent in which he calls her ‘beautiful one’ and ‘gorgeous’ and says he is in the middle of buying a house in Dubai where they will live together.

In another, he asks her to transfer thousands of dollars to his account – apparently to provide proof to potential investors that he is financially viable.

In the message he assures her: ‘Just so it’s there for trade so I can show it and send it directly back to you. That would be great. Thank you so much for believing in us and helping me on that one. I really do appreciate you.’

In another video, he asks her to transfer $18,000 (£13,000) into his bank account while telling her about the house he is buying for them – a house which, Crystal says, turned out to be a rental.

‘I hope you’re doing well. I really can’t wait to see you but, as I said, if you can please help with this. I know it’s only $18,000. I don’t want to put you in a position. It’s just that it’s in for Wednesday, out for Wednesday. I’ll send you some videos and pictures of the house,’ he says.

‘It is furnished but I’m going to be changing that and hopefully you can help me. I just want to send you so much love and also respect and prayers. I can’t wait to see you. And you will be credited. I’ll get this $18,000 straight back to you as well. I just need to show it’s in there.’

Crystal, who runs a successful fitness business in Galveston, Texas, has sent copies of statements showing the amounts she sent to Andrews’ UK bank account.

According to 40-year-old Crystal: ‘Lee made me believe I was the only person in the world and promised me so much. He was so convincing. Then I found out he was living two different lives.’

She has shown the Daily Mail documents showing how she eventually invested $169,000 (£123,000) in his business ventures. She claims that Andrews told her that the sum would ‘grow to $850,000 [£619,000]’, adding: ‘I was also promised an additional $2.5million [£1.8million].’

Crystal was about to fly to Dubai to meet him last September, she says, when a private investigator hired by her sister revealed he was dating another woman at the same time.

That woman, Alana Percival from Hertfordshire, shared photographs this week which showed Andrews proposing to her in September in exactly the same rose petal-strewn spa at the five-star Jumeirah Burj Al Arab hotel where Lee proposed to Price with what the pair are claiming is a Cartier ring.

Alana finally left him after being contacted by Crystal.

Alana told The Sun this week that when she decided to leave him: ‘He told me he had a heart condition and was living on borrowed time.’

She added: ‘Katie should run for the hills. He’s a liar and a narcissist and a manipulator. And I think he believes his own lies.’

Another who got her fingers burnt by Andrews was Palestinian-born health and fitness coach Dina Taji who met him in Dubai and was also engaged to him. In a podcast he made, introducing himself as ‘Dr Weslee Andrews’, he claimed to have fallen in love with her while they were both with previous partners.

He also said that he had embraced Islam and found God, adding: ‘If you can’t be honest with yourself, how do you expect other people to be honest with you?’

Lee Peter John Andrews was born in 1984 in Mansfield in Nottinghamshire where his mother, Trisha, still lives in a modest red-brick semi. According to relatives, her marriage to Andrews’ father Peter, 65, a former coal miner, was ‘troubled’ and Trisha, 64, raised her son and daughter, who now works as an ambulance driver, alone.

Photos of Andrews as a pupil at The Rufford School, a now closed comprehensive, show a geeky-looking boy with a wonky fringe. After leaving, a family source said he worked for his father’s fire insulation company.

According to a source in Dubai, it was his father who first moved to Dubai to expand his business.

‘He followed his father out here,’ said the source who added that, despite his claim to be ‘a global magnate’, Andrews also appeared to be living with him.

‘One minute he’d be flush with cash, the next he was selling watches and stuff on eBay,’ says the source.

Worryingly for Katie Price, who posted photos from inside the £180,000 Ferrari she says Andrews bought her as a wedding present, the source adds: ‘He would buy cars as gifts for women, then claim that the car needed to go into the workshop. They’d never see it again.’

Andrews has built up an extraordinarily elaborate online profile, claiming on LinkedIn to be the CEO of Aura Sustainable Vehicles and Energy, a company he says has ‘already reached a Market Cap of $1.3billion’.

Despite all this hot air, there is no listing for Aura on either the New York or London stock exchanges.

Another lie is his claim to be ‘director of philanthropy’ at what was The Prince’s Trust and is now The King’s Trust, which has told us he is not registered with them.

He has appeared on Dubai property programmes as a wealthy tycoon looking for property. He also has appeared in a couple of amateurish film shorts which can be viewed online.

In one he plays a secret agent. In another, he is a grieving widow who enters an alternative reality so that he can physically reunite with his wife. It goes without saying that his acting – along with his American accent – are dire.

Despite all the red flags, Price has clearly fallen for him, describing him as her ‘real-life Richard Gere’. In a statement bearing all the hallmarks of AI, she said that how they met was ‘esoteric’.

‘We connected by both checking each other’s socials and quickly realised, “Wow this is for me” in the old-fashioned way, first by words which captured us both.’

Andrews, meanwhile, gushed that when it came to his love for Price, ‘they haven’t even invented the words’.

Back in Mansfield, his mother Trisha described her son as a ‘good looker’ and told the Daily Mail this week: ‘As long as they are happy together, that’s all that matters.’

But, given what we now know, can this really be the ‘happy ever after’ Price is desperate for?

Even the celebrant who conducted their civil ceremony at a Dubai hotel – a part-time Welsh DJ – admitted Andrews was ‘a showman’ and said they would have to go to court to get their marriage legalised.

Despite everything they’ve posted online, Price and Andrews have provided no proof of that.

The other possibility, of course, is that this bizarre episode is just an outrageous publicity stunt.

Indeed, for all the reality TV shows Price has starred in, working out what’s real and what’s not in a life which has been played out in public since she shot to fame as a teenager, has never been easy.

In an attempt to clarify the situation, after it emerged that Price had already returned to the UK alone, Andrews posted a heavily filtered video in which he said that the couple are preparing to capitalise on the publicity they’ve already garnered – and would soon be joining her in Britain.

‘Our publicists are going to be releasing things and there will be an exclusive I’m sure,’ he said.

According to his acquaintance in Dubai: ‘His aim will be to increase his public profile. It would be his dream to star on a reality TV show but, actually, having flown under the radar for years, being in the spotlight may finally expose him.

‘He will promise her the world and when she realises the truth and tries to break up with him, he’ll play the victim. It’s very sad.’

It’s clear that Price has yet to learn from any of three previous marriages.

Her first, in 2005 to pop star Peter Andre, whom she met when they both appeared in the I’m A Celebrity jungle and which produced two children – Junior and Princess – ended in 2009.

Her second, in 2010, to former cage fighter Alex Reid lasted only a year. Her third, in 2013, to builder and former stripper Kieran Hayler lasted six years and produced two children but collapsed after allegations that he’d been unfaithful with their nanny.

‘It could take me nine times, 20 times, until I find the right one – or 40 actually. I’m not put off marriage,’ Price stated in 2011.

Sadly, the bizarre events of this week suggest she clearly hasn’t changed her mind.

Additional reporting: Barbara McMahon