I've been mulling this fascinating but disturbing thread over the last couple of days.
One thing occurred to me - I could be completely wrong, but it may just fit the expressed facts.
Is it possible that our hero's 45 hours are actually 40 hours of flying with mates and playing with his iPad (or even flying a PC sim), and maybe 5 hours of dual with several instructors all of whom he peed off? Possibly because of clearly rather "strong" personality, he bull****ted his way into persuading people that those were real hours, rather than pax/playing hours? Who knows, maybe he believes it himself.
I don't know, wasn't there, am conjecting wildly - but it might just fit.
G