Christophe Thierry Daniel Rocancourt, sometimes also called Christopher Rocancourt (born July 16, 1967), is a French impostor and confidence man who scammed affluent people by masquerading in turn as a French nobleman, the heir to the Rockefeller family or family member of a celebrity.
Biography
Rocancourt told Dateline NBC in a 2006 broadcast that his mother sometimes worked as a prostitute and his father was an alcoholic who took Christophe to an orphanage when the boy was 5. His first big con was made in Paris, where he faked the deed to a property that he did not own, which he then "sold" for USD $1.4 million.
Making his way to the United States, Rocancourt used at least a dozen aliases. He got the rich and powerful to invest in his schemes, he told Dateline, by tapping into their greed. He convinced them that he, too, was rich by paying for their lavish dinners in cash. He once estimated to Dateline that his various schemes/ventures netted him at least US$40 million, but this cannot be confirmed. In Los Angeles, he pretended to be a movie producer, ex-boxing champion or venture capitalist. He claimed to be related to famous people including Sophia Loren, Oscar de la Renta and Dino De Laurentiis, and was associated with various celebrities. He lived for a time with Mickey Rourke and apparently convinced actor Jean-Claude Van Damme to produce his next movie. He was also in talks with Jermaine Jackson to develop a line of fragrances inspired by Michael Jackson songs.
Rocancourt, using the name Christopher De Laurentiis and claiming to be the nephew of Dino De Laurentiis, married Gry Park in 1992 with whom he had a child. He married Playboy model Pia Reyes in May 1996; they had a son, Zeus. Beside being married to Pia Reyes, according to the press, he lived with Playboy model Rhonda Rydell for six months. She did not know Rocancourt was married, and said he had told her he was French nobility, the son of a countess.
In 1997 police raided Rocancourt's hotel suite. In 1998 he was arrested for an involvement in a shootout and jumped bail. In 1999 he was freed of charges of forging passports after he had bribed State Department employees to get a passport. He was arrested in 2000 in the Hamptons for an unpaid hotel bill, then jumped bail. He relocated to Canada where he assumed the identity of Grand Prix driver Michael van Hoven. On April 27, 2001 he and Reyes were arrested in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada, and charged with defrauding an elderly couple. Reyes was released after convincing authorities that she had no part in the scam, much less any idea of her husband's criminal activities. Rocancourt served a year in prison before being extradited to the United States, where he pled guilty to fraud and was sentenced to three years and ten months in a federal prison.
While being held in Canada, Rocancourt wrote an autobiography in which he ridiculed his victims. In March 2002 he was extradited to New York and pleaded to charges of theft, grand larceny, smuggling, bribery, perjury and fraud against 19 victims. In September 2003, the plea resulted in a fine of $9 million, an order to pay $1.2 million in restitution and a term of five years in prison. In Switzerland, the police have connected him with a jewel theft and barred him from the country until 2016.
Christophe Rocancourt returned to Paris in October 2005 after completing his prison sentence. He lived with former Miss France Sonia Rolland. They had a daughter together, named Tess. They announced their split on in early 2008.
In July 2009, French filmmaker Catherine Breillat accused Rocancourt of scamming her out of 700,000 รข‚¬. Breillat, who was diagnosed with a cerebrovascular disease in 2004, accused him of taking advantage of her due to her mental incapacity. Due to this event, the film Bad Love, with Rocancourt and model Naomi Campbell, was cancelled. Breillat told a French journalist that her first meeting with Rocancourt was the worst day of her life, even worse than the day when she was diagnosed with her cerebrovascular disease. In 2012, Rocancourt was convicted of "abus de faiblesse" ("abuse of weakness") for taking Breillat's money, and sentenced to prison.
References
External links
- Christophe Rocancourt at the Internet Movie Database
- CourtTV video files about Rocancourt
- Counterfeit Rockefeller (CBS News)
- Faux Rockefeller 'I misled people' (CNN)
- Con artist's luck runs out in British Columbia
- Pure People
- The Rockefeller from Honfleur and other lies