A FORMER flight attendant who falsely claimed to be in business with James Packer and Lachlan Murdoch conned 16 investors out of up to $8.5 million by pretending to be a wealthy, well-connected music industry executive, a court has heard.

French-born Dimitri De Angelis sent his victims doctored photographs of himself with the Dalai Lama, Vladimir Putin, the Queen and former US presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, boasted of cooking meals for the former prime minister John Howard at Kirribilli House, and rented luxurious holiday homes and offices to entice them to pour hundreds of thousands of dollars into his company.

Fake images … De Angelis put himself in doctored photos, pretending to be a wealthy, well-connected music industry executive. Credit:Janie Barrett

In September, De Angelis, formerly known as Slobodan Pavicevic and Dimitri Pavicevic, pleaded guilty to 16 fraud charges after a District Court judge dismissed an application that he was unfit to stand trial due to a psychotic illness or narcissistic personality disorder.

De Angelis's victims included the former deputy lord mayor of Sydney Marcelle Hoff and her husband John, who lost $1.01 million; Anne Keating, the sister of the former prime minister, Paul, who lost $100,000; Melbourne solicitor Jayne Gregory, who lost $1 million and her partner, Victorian barrister Graeme Uren, QC, who lost $20,000.