Ex-Harrods staff detail decades of abuse

Girls working at Harrods had been like “lambs to the slaughter” throughout the years Mohamed Al Fayed was in a position to make use of his London division retailer to hold out abuse at will, one among his accusers has mentioned.

Lindsay was one among 5 girls who shared their story with BBC Breakfast, and mentioned the evening she says she was drugged and subjected to an tried rape throughout a piece journey to Paris.

Jen additionally spoke on the programme, opening up in public for the very first time about her ordeal 35 years on.

Their tales paint a standard image of Fayed’s behaviour and accusations of the way it was enabled at Harrods over many years. A rising variety of accounts have emerged as a part of a significant BBC documentary investigation, Al Fayed: Predator at Harrods.

The 5 accusers urged different girls with tales like theirs to come back ahead.

Sexual assault, harassment, each day groping, trafficking, tried rape, false imprisonment: that’s what Lindsay says her actuality was whereas working for Fayed as a private assistant for 5 months in 1989-90.

She has instructed a few of her story earlier than however this morning shared harrowing new particulars concerning the evening she believes she was drugged and attacked in Paris.

Lindsay recounted having dinner with Fayed, one other colleague and three celebrities, when she obtained a “faucet on the shoulder by safety” and was taken away.

Lindsay assumed she and her colleague had been going to lodging on the Ritz, the unique Paris resort which Fayed additionally owned.

As a substitute, she was taken to a flat belonging to his son, Dodi.

“As you walked in, all of the doorways locked behind you. I mentioned to the safety man ‘what’s that every one about’.

“He mentioned, ‘it is simply to maintain you secure’ – however it was to ensure you could not escape.

“It was probably the most terrifying evening of my life.”

Lindsay says she has no reminiscence of coming back from Paris and sustained vital accidents. She says she was later held in a Harrods workplace by a colleague below the orders of Fayed.

She managed to flee.

“Harrods won’t ever depart me,” she added.

“The ideas, the reminiscences I’ve from these tragic episodes are inside me.”

Fayed purchased Harrods in 1985 and offered it in 2010.

The BBC has unearthed proof which reveals there was a tradition of concern on the retailer throughout his tenure, a interval when he might seemingly act with impunity with out his predatory behaviour being challenged.

Its present homeowners have apologised unreservedly and mentioned his actions had been that of “a person who was intent on abusing his energy”.

Harrods has additionally confirmed it’s investigating whether or not any employees nonetheless on the retailer had been concerned in any of the allegations in opposition to Fayed, after the BBC revealed one girl claimed a supervisor nonetheless employed there failed to research when she mentioned she had been sexually assaulted.

Lindsay instructed the BBC that Harrods as a wider organisation must be held to account over a system which allowed Fayed to focus on girls.

She added: “Who wants 25 PAs? They enabled this case and left us like lambs to the slaughter.”

Jen, who has instructed her story publicly for the primary time after waiving her anonymity, says she was subjected to numerous sexual assaults and tried rape throughout 5 years working for Fayed.

“I’ve been residing with this secret I have been deeply ashamed of for 35 years,” she mentioned.

“I have not instructed a soul.”

She spoke about how Fayed “nonetheless felt like a menace till the second he died” and the way his loss of life in August 2023 “helped me to have the ability to come ahead with out concern of any consequence”.

Jen not too long ago instructed her household about her expertise, a dialog she described as “one thing I hoped I would by no means should do”.

The accusers who spoke out in the present day had been in settlement that Fayed’s modus operandi was to make his victims really feel remoted.

“He made you are feeling such as you had been the one individual this was taking place to,” Jen mentioned.

She recounted how he requested to be known as “papa” in non-public.

Fayed would inform her she ought to “look upon him as a father determine, that he would shield me and take care of me”.

He offered a flat in Park Lane, central London, for her to remain in on the pretence that she would not should journey house alone late at evening.

Jen later found it was fitted with secret cameras.

Katherine was employed in 2005 by way of an outdoor company and was initially solely instructed she can be working for a “excessive internet value” particular person.

Quickly after assembly Fayed, her new job turned a distress.

“The primary week or so was actually humiliating. I had the Harrods apparel of a black go well with and he would name me into his workplace and inform me ‘this does not would not work’.

“He would rip the buttons off the entrance of my shirt and stuff cash into my shirt pocket and inform me to purchase extra fits. I might come again the following day and he would repeat it and repeat it.”

That first week left Katherine “shattered”, and he or she realised she was in additional hurt’s approach throughout a piece journey to Paris.

“I realised I used to be at risk there as a result of my door did not lock, I needed to barricade it with a suitcase and a chair.

“In the end he compelled himself upon me in his workplace. I fought him off and I instructed him ‘I am a PA and a PA solely, and that is what I do’.

“He mentioned ‘then you need to have labored within the Publish Workplace’. The subsequent day my desk was gone and I misplaced my job.”

Gemma labored as a private assistant for Fayed between 2007 and 2009.

She described how he would turn into “extra scary” throughout abroad journeys, a sample a number of of his accusers have attested to.

Gemma says she was raped throughout a kind of journeys in Paris.

She mentioned: “It is one thing that is most likely by no means going to go away… in the end it seems like Harrods isn’t going to vanish.”

Like the opposite girls the BBC has spoken to, Gemma fears there could also be many extra victims of Fayed on the market.

She mentioned: “It is surprising the quantity of girls who’ve most likely been concerned over these years.

“It may very well be 1000’s, you simply do not know.

“In my time there will need to have been a whole bunch of girls who had been introduced as much as the workplaces and disappeared into assembly rooms and left crying.”

Gemma additionally spoke about how telling her story had been “useful” for coping with that trauma and praised the “wonderful help” she has obtained from her co-accusers.

“We’re getting stronger collectively, daily.”

A typical theme among the many tales of girls who labored at Harrods is of not realising the hazard they had been uncovered to and the dimensions of Fayed’s abuse.

Nicole – who was additionally sharing her story publicly for the primary time – mentioned: “I actually did really feel that individuals weren’t being sincere and open however it was a troublesome factor to broach.

“I did not know what was true and wasn’t true, there have been numerous rumours, folks talked.

“However for me, his popularity was ‘he is a little bit of a letch, he is a bit handsy’ – there wasn’t the extra critical accusations, as a result of there’s completely no approach I might have labored for him if that was the case.”

Nicole, who labored for Fayed between 2005 and 2007, additionally spoke concerning the concern he instilled amongst those that labored beneath him: “There was a palpable anxiousness, you might actually really feel this hum within the air…

“On a regular basis you had this anxiousness… [and think] ‘how am I going to get via at the present time’.

“It was a battle to come back via the day smiling.”

In a press release launched after the BBC aired its documentary, Harrods mentioned it’s a very totally different place below its present possession.

The shop has reached monetary settlements with a number of accusers and says it’s dedicated to agreeing new ones speedily.

Many ladies are selecting to pursue justice by way of an alternate authorized course of. One of many attorneys main that effort is Dean Armstrong, who mentioned his staff has heard from as much as 200 girls.

He instructed BBC Breakfast that his authorized staff are engaged on assembling a “worldwide declare” centred on Harrods involving incidents in a number of nations.

Mr Armstrong mentioned there was a “complete system to facilitate” Fayed’s abuse on the retailer, which gave him the ability to threaten girls who threatened to talk out.

“I known as him a monster final week,” the lawyer added. “I stand by that comment.”

The entire girls who shared their tales with the BBC had yet one more factor in widespread: they urged others on the market who could have been attacked at Harrods to come back ahead.

Jen assured victims who haven’t shared their expertise that they might be listened to and supported, and urged them to talk to somebody.

“We will not maintain him to account as a result of he is lifeless – however we are able to ensure that folks know the reality about this man,” she added.

“He was not a gregarious, charity-giving clown – he was a harmful sexual predator.”