Did TV bosses turn a blind eye to Savile? Anger grows as string of under-age girls come forward to say star abused them

• TV star is accused of grooming girls as young as 12
• Esther Rantzen admits many in the industry 'blocked' their ears to claims about Savile
• ITV documentary claims some BBC producers were aware of behaviour as far back as the mid 1960s
  

By Keith Gladdis, Chris Brooke and Jane Fryer

PUBLISHED: 22:34 GMT, 30 September 2012 | UPDATED: 10:15 GMT, 1 October 2012

Sir Jimmy Savile: Accusations have been made against the TV star from six women

The BBC faced growing anger yesterday amid claims it turned a blind eye to Sir Jimmy Savile’s alleged abuse of under-age girls.

There were also questions over why, in the months after his death, the corporation axed a Newsnight investigation into the star’s ‘predatory behaviour’.

Savile, who died last year aged 84, is accused of grooming girls as young as 12, by offering them sweets, cigarettes and tickets to be in the audience of his shows.

Six women have come forward to say they were sexually abused by the former Jim’ll Fix It star in his Rolls-Royce, at a hospital, at a school and BBC Television Centre.

One of the alleged victims claims the former Radio 1 DJ raped her in his dressing room.

An ITV1 documentary to be aired on Wednesday night also features damning contributions from BBC production staff who claim Savile’s predatory behaviour was an open secret.

One former BBC producer who saw Savile in a restaurant with a girl aged around 12 describes Top Of The Pops as his ‘happy hunting ground’.

Broadcaster and ChildLine founder Esther Rantzen admits many in the television industry ‘blocked our ears’ to claims made about Savile during his 40-year career at the BBC.

Writing in today’s Daily Mail, she says: ‘I felt Jim had persuaded us all, audiences, fans, television professionals, even the Pope, to create a myth around Saintly Jim so that he became untouchable.

'One of the assaults had even been witnessed by the member of a television production team. So why was nothing done?’

The BBC insists its ‘well resourced’ investigation into Savile was shelved by Newsnight editor Peter Rippon for editorial reasons.

But sources at the BBC claimed it was scrapped at the ‘eleventh hour’ because executives felt ‘incredibly uncomfortable’ broadcasting allegations of Savile’s sexual misconduct.

A reputation in tatters: Sir Jimmy Savile was widely lauded for his charity work, as well as being a TV favourite for over four decades with shows such as Jim'll Fix It

It is also claimed the report would have clashed with a glowing Christmas Day broadcast about Savile on Radio 2.

The ITV1 documentary claims some BBC producers had been aware of Savile’s behaviour as far back as the mid 1960s.

Wilfred De’Ath, a former producer on the BBC radio show Teen Scene, claims he saw Savile in a Chinese restaurant with a girl as young as 12 in 1964.

Mr De’Ath, now 75, says: I said “where did you pick her up?” And he said “Oh Top Of The Pops”. I remember saying “Is that your happy hunting ground?” and he said “Yes”.’

Another former BBC producer, Sue Thompson, says she saw Savile in his dressing room kissing a girl sat on his knee who was aged around 14.

Roger Holt, 70, who worked for Polydor Records in the 1960s, claims Savile’s reputation for liking under-age girls was well known in the record industry and at the BBC.

He said: ‘It’s a shame Savile is dead because if he wasn’t they would arrest him now.

‘The BBC must have turned a blind eye to what was going on because all of us in the record industry knew what he was like.

‘It was difficult for anyone outside the BBC to say anything because that could wreck our careers.’

Singer Coleen Nolan has previously revealed she was horrified when she was intimately cuddled by Savile when she appeared on Top Of The Pops in 1979 aged just 14. She said: ‘He was all over me.’

The BBC last night said it found no evidence of any misconduct by the broadcaster in relation to its conduct towards Savile.

In a statement it said: ‘The BBC has conducted extensive searches of its files to establish whether there is any record of misconduct or allegations of misconduct by Sir Jimmy Savile during his time at the BBC. No such evidence has been found.

‘Whilst the BBC condemns any behaviour of the type alleged in the strongest terms, in the absence of evidence of any kind found at the BBC that corroborates the allegations that have been made, it is simply not possible for the corporation to take any further action.’

'He was all over me': 14-year-old Coleen Nolan (pictured with Savile on Top Of The Pops in 1979) said she was horrified when he intimately cuddled her on the show

The BBC also defended its decision to drop the Newsnight investigation. Newsnight editor Peter Rippon said: ‘We have been very clear from the start that the piece was not broadcast because the story we were pursuing could not be substantiated.’

Sources at the BBC claim the Newsnight investigation had uncovered evidence that two other celebrities – who are still alive – allegedly sexually abused underage girls on its premises in the 1970s.

The ITV1 documentary also includes a 2009 recording of Savile talking in support of Gary Glitter, real name Paul Gadd, who was jailed for four months in the UK in 1999 for downloading child porn and later jailed for child sex offences in Vietnam.

Savile’s nephew Roger Foster said his family was ‘disgusted’ the allegations were being made against him when he was unable to defend himself.

Savile's 'attacks on schoolgirls': Accusers tell of abuse in Rolls-Royce and in his BBC dressing room

Fame: Savile when he was a DJ on Top Of The Pops

Sir Jimmy Savile was a national icon and a British institution.

He was adored by generations of children, raised more than £40million for charity and, for decades, was the face of the BBC.

Today his reputation is in tatters.

A number of women have come forward to tell how, when they were children – just 14, 15 and 16 years old – the TV star carried out a string of appalling sex attacks on them, including rape.

Two claimed he abused them in the back of his Rolls-Royce, in return for sweets, cigarettes, records and tickets to his hit BBC television series.

Several were sexually assaulted on BBC premises after meeting him on shows such as Top Of The Pops and Clunk-Click, the forerunner to Jim’ll Fix It.

Sometimes he would molest them on a couch in his BBC dressing room. Occasionally, he’d just pin them roughly against the wall in the BBC corridors.

Three of the girls were hand-picked by Savile from Duncroft Approved School ‘for intelligent, emotionally disturbed’ girls near Staines in Surrey, which Savile frequently visited in the 1970s to help raise its profile.

Two were raped, repeatedly. Both claim he gave them sexually transmitted diseases.

The revelations follow a year-long investigation by former Surrey police child protection officer Mark Williams-Thomas for an ITV documentary.

In Exposure: The Other Side Of Jimmy Savile, due to be screened on Wednesday, the women, now all middle-aged, tell how they were groomed by Savile for sex from the age of 12.

According to Mr Williams-Thomas, the victims were too afraid to speak out until Savile died last October, aged 84.

He said: ‘This was a man who was Mr BBC. He was everywhere, he was iconic and he was incredibly well-connected.

‘The women thought no one would believe them then. And even now they are terrified of the potential backlash from his fans and from his estate.’

Significantly, the women, none of whom have been paid for their revelations, tell strikingly similar stories. The BBC dressing room with its sordid couch and ‘sex alcove’ crops up again and again.

'Untouchable': Rantzen said Savile was made into a 'god-like figure'

Accused: The explosive documentary is set be screened this week on ITV

There are endless references to the speed, brute strength and lack of emotion in Savile’s assaults.

None was able to fend him off. Williams-Thomas interviewed many more victims of Savile’s assaults who did not want to take part in the programme. He insists the four who were prepared to speak out could be the tip of the iceberg.

Even now, only two of the victims have agreed to waive anonymity. One woman, ‘Anna’ declined to take part in the programme but has written about her experiences online.

Here, we present their shocking – and graphic – accounts of what they say happened to them at the hands of Savile.

ORDEAL IN HIS ROLLS-ROYCE

Fiona, a former pupil at Duncroft, claims Savile cherry-picked girls for ‘special outings’ in his gleaming Rolls-Royce. She was sexually assaulted on numerous occasions and forced to perform sex acts on him. She was 14 years old.

‘We would go to the headmistress’s office and he would sit there with a few of us and then he made his selection [of the girl he wanted].

‘Being taken out in his car was a treat because we didn’t get to go out much. The very first time he abused me it was in the back of his car. We were in the car park and the other girls were at one of those picnic tables.

‘I knew [what was going to happen] the moment he asked me to stay in the car with him – I was having this wonderful day out and I was expected to pay for it. By the time I’d finished spending some time with him, the wire from my bra had come up over the top of my breast.’ She said he had also assaulted her sexually.

Fiona claims Savile later abused her at BBC Television Centre when she was invited with classmates to be in the audience of his BBC1 show, Clunk-Click which he hosted in 1973 and 1974.

‘He had an alcove in his dressing room that had a curtain over it and he would take you behind the curtain.’ She said there she would be subjected to a series of sexual assaults.

Reputation: His personal assistant of 40 years claimed he would never risk destroying his public image

MOLESTED IN HIS CARAVAN

Charlotte was also at Duncroft. She was sexually assaulted by Savile in 1974 in a caravan on the school grounds where he was supposed to be making a recording for his radio show. She was 14.

‘We all went into this caravan and Jimmy Savile was there and the teacher was saying to us, “Oh he’s going to do a recording of you girls to play on the radio!”.

‘She told me to sit on his lap and I felt this hand sort of go up my jumper and on my breast.

‘I shouted at him, “What do you think you are doing?” and the next thing I knew I was dragged out of the caravan by two of the staff and told what a filthy mouth I had and that Uncle Jimmy did nothing but good for the school and I needed to apologise.

‘I was taken to the school’s isolation unit and left there for two or three days.’

RAPED IN THE TV CENTRE

‘Angie’ (not her real name) claims Savile first raped her in a London hotel room in 1974 when she was 15. ‘He invited me to come round to his hotel and before I knew it he had me on the bed and was having sex with me.’

That was just the beginning. Savile had sex with her again and again at the BBC Television Centre.

‘He had a little couch in his dressing room and we’d have sex there or sometimes he’d pin me up against the wall. It happened on a number of occasions. It was very, very quick, very unemotional and that was it. I was a teenager and very naïve and I blamed myself for what he did.’

Savile later gave her a copy of his 1974 autobiography, As It Happens. He had written ‘No escape!’ in the inside cover and signed it ‘Her Keeper’.

Savile, who died last year would have faced arrest if still alive, a child protection expert claims on the documentary

THE CHOIR GIRL VICTIM

‘Karen’ (not her real name) claims Savile attacked her in 1973 after watching her perform in a choir at Stoke Mandeville Hospital where he did a huge amount of charity work. She was 14.

‘After the concert, I ran up to him to let him know I was the one who had sent him a letter about the choir. Before I knew what had happened he’d stuck his tongue in my mouth.’

ATTACKED IN THE DRESSING ROOM

‘Val’ (not her real name) was 15 when she met Savile at the BBC in 1968 where he was the face of Top Of The Pops. He sexually assaulted her ‘dozens of times’, raped her and gave her a sexually transmitted disease.

‘The first time he got me into an alcove in his dressing room, ‘ she said.

He then pushed her against a wall and sexually assaulted her.

‘There were dozens of times after that. It was always a very quick fumble,’ she said. ‘He was very strong and he’d pin me up against a wall, a corridor, wherever he could he’d grab an opportunity, have a quick fumble and then carry on as normal.’

When she was 16, one of the ‘fumbles’ turned into sex.

‘He kept saying he wouldn’t go the whole way but when I tried to push him off he held me down with his body weight. There was a struggle and then it was over.

‘There was no foreplay, no romance. I’m sure it’s why he always wore a shell suit… so he could just whip the bottoms down very quickly.

‘I later discovered he’d given me a sexually transmitted disease.

‘I was very young and naïve and he was in his 40s and a very charismatic and powerful personality. I think as young girls we got caught up in that whole experience at the time… because you know if you were with him you had access to places and you met famous people.

‘There was an air about him that he had power and contacts and you didn’t want to mess with him. When he was alive I would have been too frightened to have spoken out.

‘People need to know that there was a dark side to him. He was a predator on young girls.’

Visits: Sir Jimmy arrived at Duncroft girls' school in Surrey in the 1970s in his caravan

MAULED IN HIS SPORTS CAR

‘Anna’ (not her real name), is a former pupil from Duncroft who has written her recollections online but did not take part in the documentary.

‘I looked forward to Jimmy Savile arriving because it meant pleasant food, rides down the lane in his sports car and extra cigarettes,’ she writes.

‘Sadly it also meant one of us had to put up with being mauled and groped when he pulled into a layby some five miles along the road.

‘He often tried to press me to “go further”…. He promised all manner of good things if I would.’

This included an invitation backstage after a recording of his show Clunk-Click where, she claims, Savile looked on while two other stars (still alive) abused an underage girl in his dressing room and one had sex with her in full view.

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