ITV’s Joan: Did Joan Hannington go to prison and was she ever caught for jewel thefts?

Joan Hannington’s life and crimes are the focus of ITV’s Joan, but some changes have been made for the six-part series and viewers might now be wondering if she ever went to prison.

From the matter of whether Boisie Hannington was a real person, to what happened to the jewel thief herself, ITV’s Joan has sparked a fair few questions as well as a lot of attention since it started. Starring Sophie Turner as the legendary Joan Hannington and Frank Dillane as her husband Boisie, the crime drama tells the story of how Joan strove to give her daughter a better life and ended up becoming an expert at stealing gems in 1980s London. The real Joan Hannington is understood to have amassed a huge fortune during this time and so some fans of the ITV drama might now be wondering if she evaded the police. Here we have all the details about whether Joan Hannington went to prison and if she was ever caught for the jewel thefts.

*Warning: Spoilers for Joan episode 6 ahead*

Did Joan Hannington go to prison and what was she arrested for?

Joan Hannington spent 30 months in prison after being arrested in 1980, but surprisingly, given how she rose to become one of Britain’s most accomplished diamond thieves, this had nothing directly to do with her former career. Instead, Joan was arrested for using a stolen cheque book and she served her sentence at Holloway prison in North London. According to Digital Spy, Joan Hannington reportedly married her second husband, Boisie Hannington, at Acton Register Office just a few weeks before she was sentenced.

Joan: The True Story Of How I Became Britain's Most Notorious Diamond Thief by Joan Hannington | Was £10.99, Now £9.79 at Amazon

If you've found yourself drawn in by Joan Hannington's story in ITV's Joan you might be intrigued to learn more about her. This fascinating biography explores how she defied the odds stacked against her and rose to become one of the most accomplished jewel thieves Britain has ever known.

View Deal

After serving her sentence, Joan was released from prison and secured a job at a jewellery store where she resumed stealing jewels to make a living. She and Boisie had a son together named Benny in 1987 and after this, it’s said that Joan began to scale back her criminal escapades. In 1990, she was left heartbroken when Boisie was killed and The Sun has reported that Boisie Hannington allegedly died after setting fire to a building as part of a supposed insurance fraud.

As per the publication, the real Joan described the loss of her beloved husband as the "lowest point" in her life. She explained that she decided to go straight for good after his death, knowing that she had made "more than enough money to last for life".

This sequence of events was changed quite dramatically in ITV’s Joan, where Boisie was shot in the leg during a raid that Joan was also a part of. In the show Joan Hannington dropped her daughter Kelly (Debbie in real life) back at her foster family’s house and she was later arrested at her home. She willingly accepted this and explained that all she’d wanted was her own family but that without Kelly and Boisie, there’s "no point".

At the end of the final episode of ITV’s Joan, we see Joan in Spain four years later after she has been released due to "good behaviour". She declared that she was going to build herself an "empire" rather than going back to "little cons". This couldn’t be more different from the real Joan true story, where Joan retired from her criminal career after Boisie’s death and wasn’t arrested again. For those wondering where Joan Hannington is now, she’s said to have settled on the coast with her dogs.

To this day, Joan Hannington has never been to prison for her involvement in the jewel thefts that have made her famous. However, she was arrested once before, earlier in her life, for a crime that is depicted in ITV’s Joan.

Joan Hannington drove a stolen car to go and see her daughter Debbie (named Kelly in the six-part drama) who was at that point living in foster care. She was caught and arrested for this, though this was before she ever became a jewel thief. As reported by The Sun, Joan wasn’t actually sent to prison for this particular crime, but she did allegedly receive a two-year probation order.

All episodes of Joan are available to watch now on ITVX and the series is also airing on Sundays and Mondays at 9pm on ITV1.