Con Mum’s wild true story as Graham Hornigold refuses to forgive mother over £100k scam

TV chef Graham Hornigold has reflected on losing his family after he said his long-lost biological mother scammed him out of £100,000 cash as seen in Netflix’s Con Mum.

He told Yahoo UK: “There’s forgiveness but it’s not for her, it’s for me. So I can move on and regain my power and mind. So that’s really why there’s forgiveness. As for her, not to say that she is what she is, but I mean that’s where we are and you just have to learn to accept it.”

Adopted aged two but later raised by his father, Hornigold grew up never knowing who his mother was. Now he has no desire to meet his birth mother ever again, saying: “I’ve got no reason to see her anymore.”

At 45 years old, the TV chef almost had it all. The former Junior Bake Off judge was at the top of his successful career running the gourmet doughnut brand Longboys after years of working in the finest restaurants and hotels.

It was an exciting time for him in his personal life too: Hornigold had a loving partner Heather by his side and they were about to become parents for the first time. Months later — he would lose his family and his home.

True story of Con Mum

The lives of that young family changed forever when Dionne, a woman claiming to be Hornigold’s birth mother, reached out over email in 2020.

In the Netflix documentary, Hornigold revealed he got into debt after Dionne presented herself to him and Heather as a multi-millionaire with only six months to live due to a cancer diagnosis but asked to borrow money. Hornigold told Yahoo UK that he was being “love bombed”, in reference to a manipulative tactic that someone uses to overwhelm their target with attention and gifts to gain control and even dependence.

Over a period of 15 months Hornigold transferred around £100,000 in cash to his mother, covering the cost of five star hotel stays and designer gifts — all with the promise that she would pay him back and more. But it never materialised.

As well as the £100,000 cash, the debt that stacked up against Hornigold included £300,000 in car repayments which he said Dionne presented to him as gifts but she only paid for the deposits — leaving him and Heather liable to pay the rest.

Hornigold told us: “You lose your home, you lose your family, you lose your mum again, you lose your partner, you lose your baby, you have to try to figure out how to pay for everything.

“You have the family in New Zealand who are questioning you and everyone talking, you really do find out who your friends are — who’s in your corner. You really find out who you can or can’t trust because everybody goes.”

Dionne wasn’t a millionaire who was descended from Brunei royalty and she was never dying of cancer — the blood in the toilet was from food colouring and her medication wasn’t related to cancer treatment.

What happened to Graham Hornigold?

Hornigold said he had to “keep moving forward” and kept what happened to him mostly secret until now. “I’ve had a ton of messages going, ‘I didn’t even realise mate, why didn’t you call me? Why didn’t you tell me?'” He said.

He explained why: “It’s work. You don’t necessarily talk about these types of things, people obviously gossip about me and Heather because we’re in the same industry but apart from that, you try not to take it into the workspace because that’s your happy space. Why would you want to destroy the only place of happiness?”

By throwing himself into work, Hornigold has been able to move on from his life. “I’m quite resilient in the sense that on the professional side, you’re flying, you’ve got the businesses, you’ve got all the people around you that are there and they rally around you,” he said.

“It’s just on the private, it’s a bit darker, isn’t it? When you’re sitting at home at night, so you surround yourself with even more work.”

What happened to Graham’s partner Heather and son?

Four years have gone by since Hornigold last saw his ex-partner Heather and their son in 2021 who are both now living with her family in New Zealand. Would they have been together if Dionne had never come into their lives? “Probably,” Hornigold said.

“It’s not a question of amends because ultimately if myself or Heather wanted to be together, then we would be,” he explained. “But in terms of being there for our son; yes, we obviously do need to become amicable so that we can do that and maintain that relationship for him, not for anybody else. Getting down there [to New Zealand] is tricky because obviously still dealing with the ramifications of the debts and trying to get down there cos it’s not gonna be cheap, is it?”

Twice a week Hornigold video calls his son. “It’s a bit difficult in that sense [of not being able to see him],” he said. “But we have video calls, we have boxes that go down, we send him the Arsenal kits, of course. Artwork comes back. So it’s OK, but it’s just that it’s 115,000 miles away and that is as far as you can get on the planet.”

It was his son who kept him going through the toughest of times. “There were definitely days when you thought about, you know, when you thought about things like that [dark thoughts] but you put your picture of your kids on your watch and it’s easier,” he said.

Is Dionne Graham’s real mum?

Perhaps one of the most shocking reveals in the Netflix expose is that Dionne is Hornigold’s biological mother. “It’s sickening because it’s actually your mum,” he said. “It’s part and parcel of why we’re here because I lost everything. We’re regaining and life moves on but you lost everything at that stage because of this intervention.”

Con Mum gave a voice to other people who have shared their experiences of losing thousands to Dionne in the form of designer gifts and bank transfers when she told them that she was investing in their businesses but never did.

The businessman decided to make the documentary Con Mum to warn others because he felt it was his “duty” after experiencing “dark thoughts” himself.

“Because in society normally, when you are conned, it is to hide away and feel shame and not say anything,” he said.

“But the fact is that obviously now you know that this is my mum and she’s now going around using my name as part of her con. So on my professional side I’ve got full of integrity, light and bringing people up and stuff like that. But obviously it’s a bit of a mess on the private life but you can’t go around destroying families.”

Hornigold hasn’t let the experience break him as he shared his hopes for more success with his businesses and to be able to see his son in New Zealand. “If you allow it to take you down, it will, the moral of the story is to keep getting up,” he said.

Dionne has never faced criminal charges for the allegations made in the documentary. She did not respond to requests for comment when Netflix reached out to her.

Con Mum is streaming on Netflix now.

For confidential emotional support contact The Samaritans at any time by calling 116 123 or emailing jo@samaritans.org