WHAT a crazy few days it has been trying to make some sense of the latest twist in Katie Price’s chaotic life.
At the weekend she claimed her apparent millionaire businessman hubby – AKA conman Lee Andrews – had been kidnapped, days after he failed to turn up for a Good Morning Britain interview.
The glamour model says Lee – who is believed to have a travel ban – FaceTimed her late last Wednesday night claiming he had been “detained” in a van in Dubai.
He told her he had been tied up and taken to a “black site” – a hidden state-run detention facility – and she last heard from him in the early hours of last Thursday.
Truly terrifying stuff, and a tale many might usually take at face value… had it not been told by a bloke who multiple women (the latest being my colleague, Clemmie Moodie) insist is a scammer.
The story has gripped Sun readers and Katie’s millions of fans, so, in light of these developments, I was dispatched to Dubai to try to find out what’s really going on with 43-year-old Lee.
My first port of call was to head to the apartment where he had most recently been living.
Lee previously claimed he paid £36million cash for a mansion in Dubai, although he has never shared any pictures of said mansion.
He is, however, known to have been staying with mum-of-five Katie, 47, in an apartment in a 14-storey block on Dubai’s beautiful Palm Jumeirah.
The building’s interior consists of white tiled floors, white walls and – you guessed it – white doors.
If (and that’s a big if) his claim of owning a £36million property of some sort is true, then it definitely is not the place where he was crashing with Katie.
The block’s interior is nice but unremarkable and, one would have thought, not quite up to the standards of a man who allegedly has so much cash to burn.
A studio is said to be valued at just over 1.2million United Arab Emirates Dirham (£255,310), while three-bedroom apartments can go for around 6.3million AED (£1.2million).
Apartments there can be rented, with some costing around 310,000 AED (£62,814) for a year.
I knocked the door of Lee’s apartment yesterday and on Tuesday, but there was no answer.
One expat told me that Lee is a regular at Chalk Training Ground gym on the Palm, near to the apartment he had been staying in with Katie.
But the man added: “I’ve not seen him there for quite a while.”
Other Brits say they have heard rumours that Lee is being held in a Dubai jail after being arrested as part of an operation in which 15 others were also nicked, although these claims have not been verified.
Katie has filed a missing persons report and she is being supported by the British Embassy. Pals say she believes her fourth husband was detained near the Dubai-Oman border.
However, when I spoke to cops in Dubai’s Criminal Investigation Department, they insisted they could find no record of a Lee Andrews having been arrested in recent days.
The UK Foreign Office, meanwhile, simply stuck to its original statement when I enquired about Lee’s apparent arrest.
A spokeswoman said: “We are supporting the family of a British man and are in contact with the local authorities.”
Two phone numbers I have tried for Lee do not work. One rings briefly before an automated message says: “The number you have dialled is not valid. Please check the number and try again.”
The other does not ring, with another automated message saying: “The customer you are calling is not responding. Please try again later.”
WhatsApp messages to both phones deliver with one tick, meaning they have not gone through to him.
His family and Katie are desperate to locate Lee, who earlier this week was exposed by The Sun’s assistant editor Clemmie for fleecing her of £1,000.
She sent Lee the cash to invest in his “zero risk” scheme earlier this month, and he claimed he could turn it into £3,000 in just seven days.
He then said he would transfer her £2,900 – but he has so far failed to pay her back a penny, despite repeatedly promising to do so.
This follows similar claims by ex-girlfriends, including Crystal Janke, who says he swindled her out of £123,000.
Lee has always denied any wrongdoing in relation to previous partners.
He is also being probed by Hertfordshire Police over allegations made by another ex.
He tied the knot with Katie in a whirlwind marriage in Dubai in January, having proposed to her using rose petals – the same method he used when asking another woman the same question four months earlier.
I’ve reported on the life and crimes of Katie since 2017 – from driving bans to bankruptcies and beyond – and nothing ever surprises me about her anymore.
This latest drama, though, is a strange one.
It would appear that she genuinely is not “in on” whatever is happening with Lee, as some have suggested.
Perhaps she is just saving face after becoming the latest victim of this grifter, who lied about having a PhD in biotechnology science from Cambridge University as well as working for the Labour Party and The King’s Trust.
This is something that those close to her feared was inevitable after she married Lee (she had only met him on social media just days earlier).
And maybe he actually has been nicked – although his account to Katie seems farfetched, to say the least.
In one of his last WhatsApp messages to Katie before going off-radar, Lee told her: “I’m in the van, just being detained wtf.”
What the f**k indeed, Lee.