Katie Price’s best friend Kerry Katona takes dig at ‘bonkers’ marriage to Lee Andrews

Kerry Katona has weighed in on Katie Price’s whirlwind romance with Lee Andrews.

Less than a week after meeting the Dubai based businessman, 41, the former glamour model announced her shock engagement and then marriage to him just over a week ago.

But since then, it’s emerged that Lee’s business Aura Group is a farce, while two of his ex’s have urged Katie to ‘run for the hills’, alleging he was a ‘lying swindler who preys on women’.

The 47-year-old’s family also said to be worried about her rushing into this new relationship, also being ‘blindsided’ by her wedding. Then, last night, reports emerged that Lee had served prison time for suspected fraud after allegedly forging an ex-girlfriend’s signature to take out a £200,000 mortgage in her name.

While none of Katie’s family have spoken publicly about Lee yet, Kerry has now said that while she supports her best friend, she views her decision to get married so quickly as ‘bonkers’.

Writing in the latest new! column, Kerry wrote: ‘Katie Price has got married for the fourth time, she says she’s met her Richard Gere.

‘As Katie’s friend I absolutely love and support her no matter what she does – but she’s absolutely bonkers. Kate just wants to be loved.

‘But, for me personally, I wouldn’t have got married. When I do get proposed to I want to make sure it’s forever.’

Katie’s wedding to Lee marks her fourth marriage – after previously being married to Peter Andre from 2005 until 2009, Alex Reid from 2010 until 2012 and Keiran Hayler from 2013 until 2021.

Her engagement to her new husband also marked her ninth overall, having previously also being proposed to by Gladiator star Warren Furman, businessman Scott Sullivan, model Leandro Penna, personal trainer Kris Boyson and car salesman Carl Woods.

Meanwhile Kerry, 45, has been married three times. She tied the knot with Westlife singer Brian McFadden in 2002 before they divorced in 2006, then going to marry former taxi driver Mark Croft in 2007. They split in 2011.

Kerry later married George Kay in 2014, though they separated in 2017. He died from a drug overdose two years later.

The Atomic Kitten singer also split from fiancé Ryan Mahoney last year but is now in a relationship with personal trainer Paolo Margaglione, 33, whom she met on Celebs Go Dating in 2025.

Kerry and Katie first met when appearing on I’m A Celebrity…Get Me Out of Here! in 2004, with Kerry also being a bridesmaid at Katie’s wedding to Peter, who also appeared on the ITV reality series.

Although the pair have had an at-times tumultuous friendship in the years since but in 2023 Katie declared: ‘We will be friends forever nobody will tarnish our friendship, we will always support each other and if we really need help we are there for each other.’

Last year Kerry said of her friend: ‘I want to say thank you to Katie because she has been an absolute lifesaver through all of this heartbreak and it’s been a massive distraction for me. The one thing I am learning is that I will never put my happiness in anybody’s hands ever again.’

In the days since her wedding, Katie is now reportedly concerned that her decision to marry Lee may have been a ‘huge mistake’.

‘Katie has been inundated with direct messages from her new husband’s former girlfriends warning her what he is really like – and pleading with her to dump him,’ a source has told the Daily Mail.

‘He is not a nice man. These women have been doing everything they can to make her see sense. They have no ulterior motive other than to try and stop her going through what they went through. At first, she ignored them and wrote them off as being bitter and jealous.

‘But now she is actually starting to believe the women because they have so much information and details documenting what he did to them. And even though she’s starting to suspect that she’s made a huge mistake by marrying a man she didn’t even know, she’s not admitting it to those closest to her.’

The source added: ‘She is very, very stubborn like that.’

Despite this, Katie has said nothing but good things about her husband to date.

After marrying him and branding him her ‘Richard Gere’, her statement said it was all ‘fate’.

‘I’m just so happy with my person that is just as happy as I am. What we have, they haven’t even invented the words,’ she shared in a statement.

Katie then went on to declare that Lee has ‘the best version of [her]’, which ‘can only grow more, knowing [they] are each other’s’.

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