APPEARING on Britain’s Got Talent is supposed to be the start of a glittering career.
Not to mention a chance to perform in front of the royal family at the Royal Variety Show – and the ultimate prize of £250,000.
But for a few, it also means the nation is watching when they drop to their lowest point and get carted off to jail.
From £3m fraud schemes to drug scandals and faking cancer, the life of some of the stars, after the applause of the BGT audience has faded, has taken a turn for the worse.
Others, however, have seen it as a fresh start – giving them a platform to show how they have turned their life around after a stint inside.
As this year’s crop of wannabes prepare to battle it out in Sunday’s grand final, we have a look at the contestants who have found themselves on the wrong side of the law.
Drugs injected in sweets
Singer Olivia Archbold, now 27, was tipped to become the next Charlotte Church after appearing on BGT in 2010, aged just 14.
But seven years later she was up in court alongside her then boyfriend, Alex Nash, for helping him run a dark web drugs racket which saw them mail cannabis-laced sweets across the UK.
Nash would order the cannabis online from America and Holland using Bitcoin before Olivia would break it in to batches.
The pair would inject cannabis concentrate into chocolate bars and sweets before posting them onto buyers in a scheme worth £85,000 over three years.
At the trial, Judge Manley told her: “The psychological report prepared by the prosecution says you are someone who is, and has been, easily manipulated.
“But you knew the difference between right and wrong and you knew what you were doing was wrong.”
Archbold laundered £51,000 in dirty money through her NatWest and Santander bank accounts.
She admitted in court to production of cannabis, being concerned in the supply of the drug and possessing criminal property.
Archbold was handed a two year jail sentence, suspended for 24 months and ordered to complete 300 hours of unpaid work.
£450k Ponzi-style scam
Liam Collins made it to the semi-finals in 2009 as one half of the comedy dance duo Faces of Disco.
Instead of it being the start of a glittering career in showbiz, he was jailed a decade later for his part in a multi-million pound Ponzi-style scam.
He was sentenced to 21 months for the crime which saw an 82-year-old man lose £50,000.
The scheme came about after the student accommodation firm he ran with his cousin David Bone, now 42, collapsed, causing him to lose millions of pounds.
The pair then set up a nearly identical company and claimed they had secured a £20million business deal to get investors involved.
They were accused of swindling nine investors out of up to £50,000 each, which included 49-year-old Collins’ own family members. Both men, who had already been declared bankrupt in 2012, admitted fraudulent trading at Newcastle Crown Court in 2019.
At the time of the investigation, Collins insisted: “We are not conmen and there was never any intention of misleading anyone. I’m incredibly sympathetic to the investors – a lot of them are my own family members – but it’s a two-way relationship; you can be an irresponsible businessman but you can also be an irresponsible investor.
“Some people think I’m walking around like a millionaire, with money stashed in an offshore account and these people would like me dead. But I’ve lost everything – £3million, 29 houses, my cars, my friends, everything.”
Cannabis charges
Last year, mum-of-two Claire Connolly, 34, posed as a hopeful for the show to get her daughter Tia, 15, an audition spot.
During the interview section of the auditions, she admitted to having been jailed for a stash of cannabis worth £6,000 in her home in Accrington, Lancashire.
In 2012 police found the drugs hidden around her house in Celebration tins.
She was sentenced to 12 months in prison for allowing her home to be used for the supply of drugs.
Claire was also sent down for another charge of affray for her role in a drunken scrap that happened while on bail.
Speaking to The Mirror about the charges, she said: “I did go to prison and that’s something I have to live with – the stigma follows me around. Of course, I’m sorry.
“At the time, I was angry… angry at life. But I’m doing everything I can to make sure Tia doesn’t make the same mistakes I did.”
After Tia wowed judges with her rendition of Whitney Houston’s I Didn’t Know My Own Strength, she made it to the semi-finals before being knocked out.
Gangland youth
Comedian Axel Blake, who won the show in 2022, spent time inside as a teenager after falling in with the wrong crowd.
He wowed judges on the show and even got Simon Cowell’s golden buzzer which put him straight through to the final.
Talking about his stint in a youth offender institution, he said: “It was heavy in the gang life.
“You don’t wanna be a p***k, you want pride and you want respect and it consumed me.
“I was around the wrong kind of people, the wrong mentality, my mentality was poisoned.
“It eventually led to me going to prison when I was 18…19.”
He told ListenNotes podcast: “The governor said to me, ‘You will be back.’ I will never forget. I thought, ‘Never, never, never.’
“It changed me as a person, and it changed me for the better. It was very toxic in there. It’s a horrible place to be.”
Since winning the ITV show, Axel has been touring with his sold out show and focusing on being a dad to his two children.
Council fraud
Theatre events organiser James Edgington, 39, fell foul of the law when he illegally sold on complimentary tickets.
He had made the semi-finals of BGT in 2010, duetting with his father, Graham.
He was found guilty of stealing £20,000 of public money from his workplace, Albert Halls in Bolton, Greater Manchester.
James’ scheme was spotted when a fellow employee noticed that £737 was missing from a float.
It turned out that he had accessed the safe seven times to steal the money and faked invoices to producers for £16,539.
He had also made £2,485 by illegally selling 71 tickets that were supposed to be complimentary for Sir Ian McKellan’s show at the venue in 2019.
James had nicked the money to prop up his Bolton Pride charity, which had been backed by Sir Ian and Coronation Street’s Antony Cotton.
He pleaded guilty to fraud, attempted fraud and theft, resulting in being given ten months imprisonment suspended for 12 months and was ordered to complete 200 hours of unpaid work.
Drug offences
Comedian Nabil Abdulrashid, 38, bagged Alesha Dixon’s golden buzzer in 2020 for his hilarious gags.
It was a world away from his life in 2005 when he was sentenced to three years in prison for drug offences.
He only ended up serving half the sentence because of his good behaviour, and walked away from a life on the wrong side of the law.
Nabil, who has helped raise over £2million for charity as part of a charity comedy tour, said: “I found myself in the wrong crowd.
“I was still quite young, much younger than the people I was around and what I thought was friendship was really me being pushed to do stuff that I didn’t want and shouldn’t do and I ended up making mistakes that sent me to prison.
“It was a controlled substance charge. I had some stuff on me that I shouldn’t have had. I was naive at the time and also isolated, I was in a bad place and that’s the case for a lot of young people today.”
Since appearing on BGT, Nabil has been a regular presence on TV and this year he voiced characters for Disney’s Iwaju.
Britain's Got Talent winners
Britain's Got Talent has a gigantic hall of fame when it comes to its winners - from magicians, comedians to dance troops - the show has had it all. Here's a look back at each winner from each series...
2023 – Viggo Venn
2022 – Axel Blake
2021 – Cancelled by ITV due to the Coronavirus pandemic
2020 – Jon Courtenay
2019 – Colin Thackery
2018 – Lost Voice Guy
2017 – Tokio Myers
2016 – Richard Jones
2015 – Jules O’Dwyer & Matisse
2014 – Collabro
2013 – Attraction
2012 – Ashleigh and Pudsey
2011 – Jai McDowell
2010 – Spelbound
2009 – Diversity
2008 – George Sampson
2007 – Paul Potts
Fake cancer claims
Opera singer Christopher Stone wowed judges and audiences in 2010 with his singing voice – landing a place in the final.
After his initial audition, Amanda Holden Said: “Christopher could lead any show in the West End or in the world!”
Instead of finding fame in the world of theatre, Stone went on to be probed by police and lie about having cancer in 2017.
He was being investigated for £280,000 by the tax man when he fibbed that he couldn’t meet investigators because he was going to the USA for cancer treatment.
HM Revenue and Customs officers checked this claim with the US embassy, they discovered his deception.
Paul Barton, assistant director of fraud investigations at HMRC, said: “This was a despicable attempt to avoid justice by a crook desperate to save his own skin.”
Stone had registered a fake horse-trading firm, claiming he had spent £1.4million on horses, riding equipment and vet bills to generate VAT repayments for Otley-based SS Equestrian
His three-year fraud was uncovered when checks with Stone’s alleged suppliers revealed invoices were faked. Investigators concluded the entire business was made up in order to steal VAT.
The fraudster pleaded guilty to cheating the public revenue and was sentenced to 33 months in prison.