Concerns grow for former Sydney society 'It' girl and celebrity stylist Kelly Smythe after she was accused of shocking forgery scam
The one-time 2000s 'It' girl was arrested in May for allegedly forging prescriptions and was taken into custody at Surry Hills Police Station in Sydney 's inner east.
The 47-year-old, who lives on Australia's most expensive street in Point Piper, spent the night at the station before appearing before Downing Centre Local Court via video link, where she made a release application while being held on remand.
Now, her friends have broken their silence over the scandal, revealing that not all is as it seems and the 'truth will come out'.
'There was a huge amount going on for Kelly that only people in her inner circle are aware of,' one close friend told the Sunday Confidential.
From A-list scandals and red carpet mishaps to exclusive pictures and viral moments, subscribe to the DailyMail's new showbiz newsletter to stay in the loop.
The insider then shared a revelation regarding the celebrity stylist that sheds some light on her mental wellbeing at the time of the alleged offences.
'She was in a very scary place and a victim to serious DV for many years,' the source said.
'The man involved was eventually charged and pleaded guilty to his crimes, but it changed her and she never fully recovered.'
The New Zealand-born socialite's glamorous life unravelled overnight after she was charged with two counts of using a false document to obtain property and two counts of obtaining or attempting to get a prohibited drug by false representation.
A charge sheet showed Smythe allegedly used a false letter and two fraudulent scripts to get dexamphetamine and lisdexamfetamine from the Paddington Compounding Pharmacy on Oxford street in February 21 and May 15.
Dexamphetamine medication is used in attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and narcolepsy (sleep disorder) while Lisdexamfetamine treats moderate-to-severe binge eating disorder in adults.
Smythe's barrister Charles Alexander lodged a release application on his client's behalf.
'She knows she needs to stay on the straight and narrow,' he told the court.
She was known for living life in the fast lane before take a step away form the limelight several years ago
Magistrate Sharon Freund said the police facts indicated there may be further charges pending, but no fresh charges had been laid.
The magistrate granted bail but added: 'I suspect your client may have an issue with the drugs she has been self-prescribing.'
Smythe, who wore gold-rimmed sunglasses during her video-linked court appearance, said: 'Thank you so much, ma'am.'
The case will be back before the court in July.
At the height of her career, Kelly was a Seven Network stylist and the go-to fashion adviser to Sydney's elite, styling Miranda Kerr, Jennifer Hawkins, Jodi Gordon and Sonia Kruger.
But after five years at the helm of the wardrobe styling department, Seven cut ties with her.
With the local fashion industry teetering on the brink of collapse, Smythe struggled with freelance work and former friends say she vanished from the limelight.
She tied the knot in 2011 with Alex Nikolaidis, 10 years younger than her, at St Mark's Church in the ritzy eastern suburbs enclave of Darling Point in front of clients and Sydney's society set including Roxy Jacenko, Holly Brisley and Chris Bath.
The couple welcomed a son, who is now 14, a year before saying 'I do'. They are now divorced.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The Guardian
an hour ago
- The Guardian
Morning Mail: US attack on Australian ‘freeloading', mushroom trial's ‘ghoulish fascination', Demon downed
Morning everyone. Powerful American lobby groups are trying to persuade the Trump administration to retaliate against what they believe are the Australian government's 'unfair' tactics in controlling the pharmaceutical market. We are also unpicking the stories behind the verdict in the Erin Patterson mushroom murder case and how the Northern Territory coroner invoked two centuries of colonisation in her Kumanjayi Walker verdict. Elsewhere, Alex de Minaur is out of Wimbledon and left wondering what might have been. Demon downed | Australia lost its last singles representative at Wimbledon when Alex de Minaur (pictured) lost to Novak Djokovic in four thrilling sets – although the Sydneysider's 6-1 winning margin in the first set initially raised hopes that he could overcome the Serbian great. 'Ghoulish fascination' | After 10 weeks watching the Erin Patterson trial, our reporter Nino Bucci writes today about the combination of laborious detail and ghoulish fascination and how the case hinged on the absence of motive versus her self-confessed lies. Meanwhile, the key exhibits from the case such as the beef wellingtons themselves and the infamous dehydrator can be shown for the first time. Australian 'freeloading' | Some of the most influential lobby groups in Washington are pushing the US to retaliate against Australia's treatment of American exporters, pointing to drug approvals and domestic manufacturing incentives as proof of unfair 'freeloading'. Cyber contact | A potential cybercriminal has made contact with Qantas, the airline has confirmed, after a major attack on its network exposed the personal records of up to 6 million customers. Zoo reopens | A zoo in Queensland where a woman lost her arm after being attacked on Sunday by a lioness will reopen today after insisting the animal 'was not hungry' or maltreated. Moscow mystery | Russia's former transport minister (above right) has been found dead in his car from a gunshot just hours after he was sacked by Vladimir Putin. Officials said it appeared that Roman Starovoit had killed himself. But Russian media, including the local edition of Forbes, have reported that Starovoit may have died as early as Friday evening. Thought bubble | Tony Blair's thinktank worked with a project developing a postwar Gaza plan that included the creation of a 'Trump Riviera' and a manufacturing zone named after Elon Musk. In the West Bank, Palestinians fear a new Israeli directive will give a green light for settlers to demolish villages in Masafer Yatta where residents keep watch at night for attacks. And elsewhere in the Middle East, the Iranian president has said that Israel attempted to assassinate him by bombarding an area in which he was holding a meeting. 'Lifetime of pain' | A paramedic who tricked a woman into having an abortion by secretly inserting drugs inside her during sex has been sentenced to 10 years in prison by a court in Scotland. Tariff trouble | Donald Trump has risked stoking a trade war with Japan and South Korea after revealing plans to impose tariffs of 25% on both countries from 1 August. India landslides | India's mountainous state of Himachal Pradesh has been left reeling after it was hit by rainstorms, flash floods and landslides, with dozens of people reported missing. Mushroom trial: Erin Patterson found guilty Justice and courts reporter Nino Bucci speaks to Reged Ahmad about how the Erin Patterson verdict was reached and what comes next. Sorry your browser does not support audio - but you can download here and listen $ The death of Kumanjayi Walker in the Northern Territory town of Yuendumu in 2019 centred on 3.1 seconds between the first and second shots fired by then police officer Zachary Rolfe. But the state's coroner, Elisabeth Armitage, evoked centuries of pain in the Indigenous communities to make her 638-page report about how future deaths could be avoided. The case provides an obvious lesson in truth-telling, writes Lorena Allam. From Meera Sodha's vegan microwave chocolate, miso and banana mug cakes to Benjamina Ebuehi's grilled bananas with bourbon butter (above), and from Felicity Cloake's rhubarb crumble to Ravneet Gill's tinned cherry bakewell pudding, we pick eight winter warmer puddings to help you look forward to the winter nights. Sign up to Morning Mail Our Australian morning briefing breaks down the key stories of the day, telling you what's happening and why it matters after newsletter promotion Rugby league | The decision to bring Josh Papalii out of Origin retirement to bolster Queensland's forward line is the key talking point as both sides prepare for the series finale in Sydney tomorrow night. Formula One | Lando Norris has called his battle for world championship with Oscar Piastri as 'exhausting' in the wake of his controversial win at the British Grand Prix. Rugby union | Lion coach Andy Farrell has picked his strongest combination to date for his squad's match against the Brumbies tomorrow night as the countdown shortens ahead of the Test series against the Wallabies. The verdict in the Erin Patterson case is the lead in all the major outlets with the Age backgrounder claiming that 'one word on a tax form' sparked the murders, while the Herald Sun claims to be 'inside her mind'. A woman mauled by a lion at Darling Downs zoo is a relative of the zoo's owner, the Courier Mail reports. An elder has responded to the Kumanjayi Walker inquest findings by releasing a single demanding change, the NT News reports. Economy | The RBA's interest rate decision will announced at 2.30pm. Tasmania | A sentence is due for a racehorse trainer found guilty of hitting a horse with a whip 46 times in four minutes. Foreign affairs | Gareth Evans will speak at a webinar about Pacific region security. If you would like to receive this Morning Mail update to your email inbox every weekday, sign up here, or finish your day with our Afternoon Update newsletter. You can follow the latest in US politics by signing up for This Week in Trumpland. And finally, here are the Guardian's crosswords to keep you entertained throughout the day. Until tomorrow. Quick crossword Cryptic crossword
Daily Mail
3 hours ago
- Daily Mail
EXCLUSIVE 'I felt someone staring at me on the Tube. Before I could say anything he detonated himself... I landed on the tracks, on fire. I remember thinking, this should hurt more': The astonishing words of the most badly hurt man to SURVIVE 7/7
'Whenever I do interviews, people go, Oh, I don't want to take you back to that dark place of the day. That's where I live. That's where I am 24-7. 'It's as if the bombing happened 30 seconds ago, not 20 years ago. My brain still can't fully process what happened that day. 'I suffer from night terrors, flashbacks, panic attacks, depression, and it all stems from what happened that day, trying to live with that trauma. At times, it feels like life is worse than death.' Those are the chilling words of Dan Biddle, the most seriously injured survivor of the 7/7 bombings, as he relives the moment which changed his life forever, when he locked eyes with a suicide bomber who blew himself up in the London underground. It happened on a busy summer's morning in London, in 2005. Four terrorists, each carrying a rucksack packed with explosives, unleashed hell on the capital, blowing up three Tube trains and a double-decker bus in the deadliest Islamic terror attack in British history, claiming the lives of 56 people and injuring hundreds more. Dan was carried out, bloodied, burnt, his eye and both his legs blown off, with a two per cent survival chance. And despite the miracle of still being alive following such a brutal experience, 20 years on, while his physical wounds may have healed, the mental scars run just as deep. The ghosts of that dark July morning still haunt him, in his sleep, in his thoughts, and in every silent moment. That Thursday morning started like most days for the then-26-year-old, working on a construction site early in the morning. He said: 'I woke up at my normal time, about quarter past five in the morning. I had a really bad migraine and didn't feel very well, so I decided that I'd go back to sleep. 'Then, when I woke up later on, I'd ring in sick and let the guys know that I wasn't coming in. 'I woke up about an hour later and felt better, so I decided that I'd get myself up, have a shower, and take myself off to work.' That day, everything seemed to conspire against Dan Biddle. By the time he left his house in Romford, Essex, he was already running 90 minutes behind. A small delay, which would end up setting the course of events in motion. A bus was waiting just around the corner, an unexpected bit of luck, or so it seemed. But it only made it a short distance before a burst water main halted everything. Dan sat there, torn between returning home to fetch his car and waiting it out. He chose to stay. Finally reaching Romford station, he moved through his usual commute: Romford to Liverpool Street, then on to Baker Street, and from there, the Bakerloo line to Wembley Central and then to the site. A route he'd taken countless times. But nothing about that morning was routine. As he climbed the stairs to the platform, he realised he'd forgotten his travel card which forced to rely on a ticket machine. Eventually, he boarded a fast train to Liverpool Street. A silver lining, or so he thought, until a signal failure at Stratford delayed them again. 'Normally I would have bought a cup of coffee, a sandwich, a newspaper, a couple of cans of Red Bull and a couple of Mars bars just to get me through the day. I didn't do any of that. I just ran straight through the concourse, put my ticket into the ticket barrier. 'As I'm coming down the steps onto the Circle Line platform, there was a train already on the platform and it was heaving. 'And I just decided that I'd just wait for the next one. I was late anyway, so a couple of minutes wasn't going to make a difference.' As he gets into the carriage packed with commuters going about their everyday business, it catches his attention. 'I remember we pulled into King's Cross Station, and I saw a guy get on at the front of the carriage I was in. 'He walked past me, went to the far end of the train, and basically stayed there. 'He had a baseball cap on, a parka-ish looking jacket, blue jeans, and was carrying a rucksack. 'He also had a beard, but it was a tightly shaven beard. It wasn't really long or out of control; it was neatly trimmed.' The man, who ended up sitting inches from Dan, was bomber Mohammad Sidique Khan. Dan went on: 'And then I just saw him walk back past me and he sat down next to where I was standing. 'And at the time, I was training up a young site manager on the site I was running. So I had the idea of typing a text message in my phone, getting off at Baker Street, running outside the station, sending a message, coming back in, getting the next train and finishing my journey.' He looked down to his phone, frantically typing up a message, but misses his stop, but quickly works out quickly he can stop at Paddington and change to the Bakerloo Line. They're now at Edgware Road station, and the train's doors have just closed and it's about to go into the tunnel. 'The train pulled out of Edgware Road Station, and we travelled a little way into the tunnel when I felt somebody staring at me. I looked around, and the guy sitting next to where I was standing was just staring at me. I thought it was a bit odd, but I went back to what I was doing. 'It was almost like he was looking through me. It was just this intense stare, as if he was looking right through me. 'Then, when I saw him lean forward and look down the carriage, he sat back and started staring at me again. He began to make me feel a little uneasy because he was staring at me so much. 'I was about to turn around and say, "What's your problem, mate? What are you looking at? Then I saw him reach into the bag, and suddenly there was a big white flash, an immense amount of heat, and a huge shockwave hit me. 'It blew me off the train. I hit the tunnel wall and landed in the crawl space between the tunnel wall and the track.' His first instinct was that there had been an electrical explosion and that Dan was thrown off the train by the shockwave hit the tunnel wall and landed in the space between the tunnel wall and the tracks. 'I realised I had landed in a prime position with my arms above my head. When I brought my arms down, both my arms and hands were on fire. I just lay there looking at them, thinking, "Surely this should hurt more". It stung, but it wasn't excruciating. 'I literally watched the flames go out, then looked around to see what was going on. 'That's when I saw the first dead body behind me, and everywhere I looked after that, the horrors just got worse.' In the shocking seconds after the blast, Dan says there was a deadly silence, no screams, just stunned confusion. Survivors lay tangled with the dead, everyone desperate to make sense of the horror unfolding around them. The terrifying stillness screamed louder than any explosion, as panic and disbelief battled for hold in those heart-stopping moments. 'You could have heard a pin drop in that tunnel,' the 46-year-old said. 'It was like there was the blast and then it was almost like everybody had took an intake of breath and waited for somebody to make a noise. 'And when one person did, it was like opening the gates of hell. The screams, the crying, the fear, it just all kind of hit like a tsunami.' This was the second blast of three, which were all carried out within 50 seconds of each other, with the first happening on a Circle line train between Liverpool Street and Aldgate and then on a Piccadilly Line service which had just departed King's Cross St Pancras. Soon after this, it became apparent that Dan had the catastrophic and life-changing injuries he had sustained. His left leg had been completely blown off, whilst the bones on his right leg were shattered from the knee down. His liver, colon, bowel and kidney had all been lacerated by a pole which went through his body whilst also suffering similar injuries to his head and mouth. Frankly, it was a miracle he was still alive, and in the middle of all that, he was trapped under debris. It was during this time that he heard a voice out of the darkness, 'What's your name?' It was Adrian who promised, 'Keep talking to me, I'll find you.' Adrian, severely injured himself - he'd dislocated his shoulder, broken ribs, and had a deep head wound - had crawled under the train to reach Dan. A former Austrian combat medic with Kosovo experience, the man calmly lifted debris, assessed Dan's injuries. 'He knew exactly what to do. When he found me, he lifted the debris off and assessed my injuries. 'The first thing he said was, "I've been in this situation before and never lost anyone". Then he asked, "Do you have anything I don't want to catch?" I replied, "No, all good". 'He knelt down in front of me and said, "I'm not going to lie to you, this is really going to f***ing hurt". 'With that, he forced his hand into what was left of my left leg, found the femoral artery, pinched it shut, and stopped me from bleeding to death.' For 40 agonising minutes, Dan and dozens of others lay motionless on the tracks in the pitch-black tunnel with time stretching like minutes, not seconds. 'A minute felt like a week. It was a horrendous wait. I thought I was going to die. The atmosphere down there was fear and panic, and nobody knew what had gone on. 'People just wanted to get out. And it was terrifying. There's no other way to describe it. It was absolutely terrifying.' Four terrorists, each carrying a rucksack packed with explosives, unleashed hell on the capital, blowing up three Tube trains and a double-decker bus in the deadliest Islamic terror attack in British history As paramedics descended into the tunnel and found him, they quickly rushed to get him out as soon as possible. They spent a long time pumping fluids and painkillers into him and then secured him onto a scoop stretcher and began the slow process of getting me out of the tunnel. It was only as he emerged from the station that Dan finally got a sense of the magnitude of what had happened. He was rushed to St Mary's Hospital, and there began an almost year-long process of recovery for him. He was sedated, had three cardiac arrests, all three in which he had to be resuscitated and had 87 units of blood; he had his left leg amputated near his hip, while the right leg was amputated through the knee. He was treated for burns and was in a coma for eight weeks, and during that even contracted a rare infection from bacteria which had been kept in the Victorian tunnels. He was in intensive care for 12 weeks and in the hospital for 51 weeks, and he was finally discharged on June 30, 2006. '[The doctors] can't understand how I'm still alive. 'The lead consultant who looked after me at St Mary's was a gentleman called Duncan Black. And Duncan's South African, and he said over the course of his career, he's dealt with landmine injuries, gunshot wounds, and machete attacks, all during apartheid in South Africa. 'And he basically said to my parents that any one of my injuries singly should kill me. How I'm still alive, he had no idea.' In the years that followed, he struggled with mental health after witnessing the horror of that day, and when he reached out to mental health teams at the time, he was told that it would be 18 months before he could see a clinician. It was only after seven years and three suicide attempts that he was able to get the support he desperately needed. But 20 years on, he still finds himself re-living that awful day. 'I've not slept properly for almost 20 years now. I have night terrors constantly. If I sleep for more than four hours a night, I've done well. 'And it's never four hours solid. It's four hours of broken sleep. And I just have nightmares. The 7-7 is like a horror movie on repeat in my head that I can't turn off.' On the 20th anniversary of the attacks, the now-married 46-year-old, who has published a book called ' Back From The Dead ' on his horrific experience which changed his life forever, is calling for a full inquiry into how the attacks slipped through the net. Despite calls from survivors, families, no full public inquiry has ever taken place. Instead, in 2006, the government released a Home Office narrative report, a summary of the attacks and what was known but critics slammed it as a whitewash. Then came the Intelligence and Security Committee (ISC) reports in 2006 and 2009, which admitted 'missed opportunities' by MI5, but still no courtroom-style public inquiry. In 2011, a coroner's inquest into the deaths of the victims finally gave more details and found that the attacks could not have been prevented, but MI5's decisions were open to criticism. He added: 'I don't have any form of closure. It's still as raw and as painful now as it was when it happened. 'I think closure comes when you get some understanding of how this could happen. And we've never had a public inquiry into 7-7. So you can't get closure until you have some understanding as to how this happens and how these individuals can slip through the net and carry out these atrocities. 'So when we talk about closure, I don't think anybody would ever fully get closure from the day. 'But I certainly think if we knew what had gone wrong, if we knew what the failings were and things like that, you get some understanding of how it happened. But unfortunately, the government have treated most of us who were there on 7-7 with utter contempt, and they won't do a public inquiry, so they're just happy for us to keep suffering.'
Daily Mail
3 hours ago
- Daily Mail
EXCLUSIVE Remorseless, narcissistic and dumb - criminologist delivers damning assessment of mushroom killer Erin Patterson as she is found guilty of mass murder
Criminology professor Dr Xanthé Mallett delivered a scathing assessment of Erin Patterson 's character after the Australian mother-of-two was found guilty of mass murder. Speaking to the Mail's award-winning The Trial podcast, she described Patterson, who murdered three family members by poisoning, as a 'vengeful' woman who believed she could pull the wool over investigators' eyes. When veteran crime correspondent Caroline Cheetham asked what could drive a seemingly 'average' woman to kill three people, Dr Mallett identified Patterson's inability to process her divorce as the key factor. Erin Patterson was found guilty today of three counts of murder and one count of attempted murder for poisoning her estranged husband's relatives with death cap mushrooms hidden in a Beef Wellington lunch at her home in July 2023. 'I am divorced, I understand toxic marriages and simmering loathing – but I have never poisoned anyone', Dr Mallett began. 'I have seen cases where people - for example, those with narcissism mixed with a borderline personality disorder - can be led to a place where if they feel wronged, they act like an avenging angel. 'There's this righteousness to them… what I believe happened is that Patterson had this simmering rage for her ex-husband Simon and felt perhaps as if his family hadn't supported her. 'She then transferred some of that rage on them and felt justified in harming them because of this.' Dr Mallett argued that Patterson's choice to use Death Cap mushrooms reveals her callousness and extreme sense of vengeance. She told the podcast: 'Death Cap mushrooms have four different toxins within them. They're incredibly toxic and an awful, awful way to die. 'They shut down your organs and cause internal bleeding. There is a very small chance of survival once you've had a single dose. 'It takes a certain kind of person to want to use toxins of that nature. If Simon had gone to the lunch, he would have watched his family die. 'Not only that, but their grandchildren, her children, would have watched them die a painful, drawn-out death. What kind of person does that?' Drawing from her experience analysing similar cases, Dr Mallett believes Patterson feels little remorse for what she has done. 'I have seen and spoken to people like her - I expect her to be totally arrogant, totally assured in her actions – thinking she's done nothing wrong', the criminologist said. 'When she gave evidence, she kept talking about how difficult it was for her, how it had affected her life, how all the attention was impacting her. The Trial of Erin Patterson is available now, wherever you get your podcasts. Listen here 'Even when the family were in hospital, there was never any concern for them. It was all me, me, me. 'I think she feels justified in what she's done. I don't think there would be any remorse or guilt in her.' Having viewed her in court, host Cheetham thought Patterson came across as an 'academically intelligent woman.' She then asked Dr Mallett whether she agreed with that assessment, given Patterson's meticulous planning of the murders and her attempts to throw investigators off the scent. 'I think she's intelligent in some ways, very dumb in others', the professor argued. 'Frankly, this was obvious premeditation. It was not well planned; it was not well carried out. Her sense of own abilities is vastly overrated. 'She thought she could outpace the police, all the experts and the witnesses because she is so smart, right? That's the narcissist in her. 'I worked on a similar case where the accused was a narcissistic psychopath – they are not as smart as they think they are. 'Patterson is cunning though – she's manipulative, a good liar. A bit of a chameleon who can bend the truth. 'When she's caught in one lie, she twists it more and more.'
