Sex to success: call girls who launched new careers

TWO YEARS ago former teen prostitute Zahia Dehar was at the centre of a sex scandal involving three French footballers. She has since returned to the spotlight as lingerie designer, wowing fashion critics in Paris Haute Couture Week. She is not the first prostitute or escort to capitalise on her notoriety...

ZAHIA DEHAR: OOH LA LA LINGERIE
French footballers Franck Ribery, Karim Benzema and Sidney Govou were accused of paying Dehar thousands of pounds for sex when she was 16 years old, although charges against the men were dropped on the grounds that they didn't know how old she was. Trading on her notoriety as a sex symbol, Dehar became a lingerie model, appearing on the cover of V magazine and in Vanity Fair Italy. She has since become a designer, launching her 'Zahia By' lingerie label in January this year. Her first 'lookbook' was shot by Chanel creative director Karl Lagerfeld, who described her as "very French courtesan, like Liane de Pougy or the Belle Otéro". Her latest show at Paris Haute Couture Week attracted praise from French actresses Emmanuelle Béart and Béatrice Dalle.

• Paris Haute Couture Week – in pictures

BROOKE MAGNANTI: BEHIND BELLE DE JOUR
Brooke Magnanti worked for a London escort agency while completing her doctoral studies between 2003 and 2004. Her anonymous blog, Belle de Jour: Diary of a London Call Girl, became increasingly popular and as a result she was given a publishing deal under her pen name. Her first two books became UK top 10 best sellers and her tales were made into a television series starring Billie Piper. In November 2009 her identity was revealed and it emerged that the former call girl was now a child health scientist. When Dr Magnanti's identity was outed, she wrote on her blog: "It feels so much better on this side. Not to have to tell lies, hide things from the people I care about. To be able to defend what my experience of sex work is like to all the sceptics and doubters."

DIVINE BROWN: HUGH GRANT TO MILLIONAIRE
Divine Brown's infamous mugshot went down in Hollywood history when it emerged that she had given Hugh Grant oral sex in a car on Sunset Boulevard in 1995. But the former LA hooker claims that it was the 'trick' that changed her life. Brown, who now goes by her real name Estella Thompson, says she made more than £1m through media interviews and guest-show appearances following the scandal. When the Daily Mail tracked her down in 2010 she was a mother of three living in the suburbs of Atlanta, running a music production company with her fiancé. "I was just trying to pay a few bills that night," she told the Mail. "Lo and behold I got a celebrity. I'd agreed to go with him for $50, but ended up with more than ten thousand times that. God has a path for us all."

ASHLEY DUPRE: FAME FROM SPITZER SCANDAL
Ashley Dupre's clinch with New York governor Eliot Spitzer led to his resignation in March 2008 after his dealings with an elite escort service run by Emperors Club VIP was revealed in The New York Times. Dupre was hailed as "the most famous hooker in America". She has since worked as a sex columnist for the New York Post and posed nude for Playboy in 2010. Dupre has reportedly found a music manager to help pursue a career in singing too, but record companies are apparently waiting until her infamy recedes.

DANIA SUAREZ: SECRET SERVICE TO ALTRUISM
High-priced Colombian call girl Dania Suarez went public in April with allegations that a US Secret Service agent had refused to pay her the $800 she was owed for her "services". Suarez has since announced plans to open a non-profit organisation to support prostitutes. She is said to have turned down a $500,000 pornography contract with Vivid Entertainment Group, an adult production company. Instead she chose to create a television documentary about her life with a small screen local TV network, which she says will pay for her son's education, a new house and the non-profit organisation. ·