The rascal Christophe Rocancourt: a false descendant of Rockefeller, who deceived Rourke and Van Damme

The literary history of Ostap Bender's "son of a Turkish subject" is known to everyone. The real story of "Rockefeller's relative" and "Sophia Loren's son" Christophe Rocancourt is much less familiar to the masses. Meanwhile, the story about the adventures of this clever swindler deserves no less public attention, if only because the list of his victims included world-class stars.

The great combinator of the 1990s, Christophe Rocancourt, was born in 1967 in France, in Lower Normandy. His hometown Honfleur is called the "city of artists", but this time he gave the world a creative personality of a completely different plan. Christophe's father was a drunken artist, and his mother was a prostitute, so the boy and his younger sister were left to themselves.

The young Rocancourt was a little over a year old, his father went to work, and his mother attached him and his sister to no less asocial grandparents. The old people lived in a dilapidated trailer, where there were no amenities, so when at the age of five Christophe got into a shelter, it seemed to him that he was at a resort.

Fate gave the boy a good chance for a normal life when he was adopted as a teenager. But life by the rules no longer attracted Christophe, so he ran away from his foster parents in 1985 and headed to Paris, where he hoped to start an independent life.

In the capital, the guy tried to earn honest work, but very quickly became disillusioned with his endeavors. Christophe wanted to live in a big way, and ordinary work was not suitable for this. The thirst for a beautiful carefree life forced Rocancourt to get on the slippery slope of crime and start stealing in shops and on the streets.

Soon the young thief got a partner with a solid criminal experience, which allowed him to pull off serious cases, such as robberies of pawnshops and small banks. After a while, the criminals who "inherited" in Paris move to Switzerland, hoping that it will be easier to make a living in the "country of bankers".

Expectations did not justify themselves and after five "jail terms" Christophe Rocancourt realized that he needed to work not with a pistol and a lock pick, but with his head. The first scam - the sale of real estate using forged documents was successful and the criminal realized that he had finally found his vocation.

For the new "job" Rocancourt had to work hard on himself. Working with real estate required the criminal to create a certain image, so Christophe changed the style of clothing and worked hard to get rid of the street manner of conversation. Innate acting talent allowed him to quickly change and acquire the appearance of a respectable businessman.

Frauds with houses and offices were not as risky as bank robberies, but the income from them also did not suit Rocancourt. The attacker wanted to grow, and for this he needed to move into the upper strata of society. In 1991, an event occurred that prompted Christophe to change his occupation. He decided to shake up the old days and robbed a jewelry store in Geneva, but he was identified and put on the wanted list.

It was not safe to be in Europe and Rocancourt went to conquer the USA. By this time, he already knew for sure that the path to success was a beautiful legend, the illusion of material prosperity and the skillful manipulation of human greed and vanity.

Having settled in America, Christophe first of all engaged in hunting wealthy ladies. The villain was not only a good actor, but also a good psychologist. Skillful flattery, expensive gifts and dinners in fashionable restaurants opened the way for Rocancourt to the mansions of wealthy women, after which he simply robbed them.

To implement his plans, the criminal deftly changed masks and legends. He knew that the more absurd a lie is, the easier it is to believe it. He rented an expensive hotel room and without hesitation called himself a relative of Rockefeller. Christophe knew that this surname works flawlessly on people and boldly used it.

A fake relative of a multi-billionaire was embarrassed to demand money for hotel rooms, rental of expensive cars and dinners in restaurants. Many people themselves offered Rocancourt money to invest it profitably in the family business and, of course, Christophe was so kind that he did not refuse anyone.

The criminal had a lot of tricks to lull the vigilance of the victim. Sometimes he inadvertently forgot a diamond-studded watch or a tight wallet at a party, and sometimes he casually "shone" a business card of a famous politician or financial magnate. Thanks to thefts and falsification skills, there is a lack of such attributes in There was no Rocancourt.

Christophe Rocancourt had dozens of names for all occasions. He was known as Fabien Ortuno and Christopher Reyes as Formula 1 driver Michael van Hoven and even as the nephew of producer Dino de Laurentiis. Once the criminal was so brazen that he called himself the son of Sophia Loren. At the same time, the crook behaved so naturally that no one doubted that he was who he claimed to be.

At the same time, the combinator was well versed in the situation and knew when to call himself by one name or another. On the Hollywood stars, whose fame was gradually fading, the name of Dino de Laurentis had a magical influence. So Mickey Rourke and Jean-Claude Van Damme were on the list of deceived by Rocancourt.

Christophe was simultaneously married to two Playboy models - Pia Reyes and Rhonda Rydell, and Reyes even gave birth to his son. Both of these girls knew the impostor as a descendant of an old count's family from France and were flattered by such an alliance. Later, when the criminal was detained, the police had a list of 19 people deceived by Rokankur. Only he himself knew exactly how many people the attacker had actually tricked around his finger.

The conman had been incredibly lucky for many years — he was on the verge of arrest several times, but almost got out of it. It was only in 2001 that the police managed to prove some episode and put Christophe in prison. Behind bars at Rocancourt's talent as a writer woke up and he wrote his autobiography, where he mercilessly ridiculed the simpletons, at the expense of whom he lived in a big way for many years.

Oddly enough, but instead of censure and contempt, the fraudster gained popularity. Rocancourt was considering a contract for the publication of a new, expanded biography and was even ready to agree to a film adaptation of his story. After serving two years out of the required five and paying $ 9 million in fines, Christophe was released and went back to his old ways.

The combinator began to live with the former "Miss France" Sonia Rolland and the couple had a daughter, Tess. In 2008, they broke up, and just a year later, director Catherine Breya accused Rocancourt of taking advantage of her disability and female weaknesses, took possession of savings in the amount of 700 thousand dollars.

Because of this, Catherine Breuil's film "Bad Love" with Naomi Campbell was never filmed. But this did not prevent Rocancourt from appearing with Campbell on his arm on the red carpet of one of the social events in the same 2008. Finally, it is worth saying that Christophe Rocancourt is now free, living happily ever after and the world will probably hear about him again.