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Jimmy Savile presenting “Top of The Pops” in 1964. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
For those of you who don’t know who Jimmy Savile was, he was a DJ, TV presenter of Top of the Pops for 20 years, and Jim’ll Fix It as well as known for his charity work and hospital support.
He was a highly intelligent member of mensa, was commended by Prince Charles, and he was given an OBE and knighted by the Queen. I remember watching his eccentric, white mullet haired, track suited, gold jewellery laden frame on Saturday TV as a kid. He looked a bit creepy, but everyone put it down to his eccentricities.
He was also a prolific paedofile who was not publically outed until a year after his death in 2011 aged 84.
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Jimmy Savile – circa 1960
Why did this take so long considering 5 decades of abuse had gone unpunished? I didn’t say unreported because this was reported, but as it was often by children, against a well known celebrity philanthropist, it was brushed under the carpet by those who should have been outing it – Police and BBC employers alike.
The report of the investigations undertaken jointly by the police and the NSPCC, Giving Victims a Voice, was published on 11 January 2013. It reported (but did not attempt to prove) allegations covering a period of fifty years, including 214 alleged crimes by Savile, some involving children as young as eight, and including 34 claims of rape or penetration. Offences allegedly took place at 13 hospitals as well as on BBC premises.[6]
[Source Wikipedia]
It could have been because he was a celebrity, or the reports of abuse were coming from children in an age where children were arguably less listened to, or because he couldn’t possibly be doing those evil things while he was so philanthropically involved.
Still begs the question why something didn’t break the cycle earlier.
His abuse took place ranging from the TV sets, to hospitals he was visiting, from strangers to family members.
Singer Coleen Nolan said Savile invited her to a hotel when she was 14 and had been involved in a TV recording at the Top of the Pops studio and that it made her “uncomfortable”, “But you didn’t talk about those things then.”[39] Savile’s great-niece Caroline Robinson said she had been sexually abused by him twice at family gatherings. She believed some members of the family knew about his abuse but had turned a blind eye to it.[40]
[Source Wikipedia]
Someone surely could have shouted louder than they did, or were we all really that blind?
Claims were made about Savile’s activities in hospitals. It was claimed that he sexually abused a 13-year-old patient during a visit to Stoke Mandeville Hospital in 1971 and an eight-year-old girl in the same hospital recovering from an operation.[30] Staff reported he searched the wards for young patients to abuse and they instructed patients in the children’s ward to feign sleep during his visits.[31] A hospital spokesman said, though it was working with the police, it had no record of inappropriate behaviour by Savile.[32] A former nurse said she saw Savile molest a brain-damaged patient at Leeds hospital, saying, “He kissed her, and I thought he was a visitor coming to see her, and he started rubbing his hands down her arms and then I don’t know of a nice way to put it but he molested her.”[33]
…Savile was a volunteer at the adult high-security psychiatric Broadmoor Hospital, and in August 1988 was appointed to chair an interim task force overseeing the management of the hospital, after its management board had been suspended.[34] It is alleged that Savile had hospital keys and access to patients’ rooms. In a separate allegation, a lawyer said a client had been abused by Savile when he was a 10-year-old at the Haut de la Garenne children’s home in Jersey.[35]… Savile’s former colleagues said he made no attempt to hide his interest in girls from them, while another said she had walked in on him french kissing an underage girl. One woman who said Savile had sexually assaulted her when she was 14 in 1970 explained she had not pursued her complaint to police in 2008 after being told it would lead to a “media circus“.[25] The founder of ChildLine, Esther Rantzen, was shown the interviews by Williams-Thomas and commented that “There were always rumours that he [Savile] behaved very inappropriately sexually with children.”[26]
[Source: Wikipedia]
Image may be NSFW.
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I could rant and paraphrase, but really the report speaks volumes about the unbelievable cover ups that occured in the Police force for the sake of celebrity and charity work. He was even linked to a child sex ring the year he started presenting Top of the Pops.
A male victim who came forward in 1963 to claim Savile raped him was told by police to “forget about it”.
A police intelligence file linked the notorious paedophile to a child sex ring in 1964 but it was overlooked until last year.
[Source: Mirror]
Here is what the report itself that was released today had to say:
Numerous police failings left Jimmy Savile free to sexually abuse hundreds of young people over five decades – when he could have been stopped in the 1960s, according to a highly critical report by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary (HMIC).
The watchdog’s inquiry into police handling of Savile revealed that the disgraced DJ, who died in October 2011, could have been stopped as early as 1964 but police mishandled evidence and dismissed victims. In a 61-page report to the home secretary, Theresa May, HMIC raised fresh concerns about information sharing in the police and warned that officers could fail to prevent a Savile-like scandal happening again.The inspectorate described a “cultural mistrust” of evidence from children, warning that procedures adopted by various agencies over many years had left vulnerable young people unprotected by the criminal justice system.
“The findings in this report are of deep concern, and clearly there were mistakes in how the police handled the allegations made against Savile during his lifetime,” said Drusilla Sharpling of HMIC. “However, an equally profound problem is that victims felt unable to come forward and report crimes of sexual abuse.”
Five allegations of sexual assault were recorded against Savile in his lifetime, according to HMIC – compared with the 600 made since October last year when the Metropolitan police launched its Operation Yewtree investigation…In 1963, a Cheshire man was told by a police officer to “forget about it” and “move on” when he reported an allegation of rape by Savile, according to HMIC. Another man who tried to report an assault his girlfriend had suffered at a recording of Top of the Pops was told by police he “could be arrested for making such allegations” and dismissed…HMIC said it was sufficiently concerned that it will review information management in the police later this year – just two years after the Police National Database (PND) was set up.
Referring to Michael Bichard’s recommendations to reform intelligence sharing in 2004, the HMIC report said: “It is a matter of some concern that, in 2007, in the post-Bichard era, the failures of the past may still have been repeated.” Evidence uncovered by HMIC suggests Savile was known to Met officers investigating child sex offences as early as 1964 – the same year he presented the first edition of Top of the Pops. The inquiry also turned up an anonymous letter received by the Metropolitan police in 1998, which it said was “never properly investigated”, despite suggesting that Savile changed his telephone number as a result of a blackmail attempt.
HMIC’s report also raises further questions for West Yorkshire police, which said in February that some officers regularly visited Savile’s Leeds home while on duty. Two former West Yorkshire police officers and a relative of an officer have come forward to state they were aware of concerns surrounding Savile’s contact with young girls, the report said. As the force for the area where Savile lived throughout his life, West Yorkshire should have received three key pieces of intelligence, according to HMIC, but has only been able to confirm receipt of a letter from the Met in 1998.
An inspector from the force who may have “acted on behalf” of Savile is currently under investigation by the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC).
[Source : Guardian]
Image may be NSFW.
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Here are the points of issue in summary
- A missed opportunity to investigate Savile in 1963 when a male victim reported to Cheshire police that he had been raped by Savile. An officer told the victim to “forget about it”. Cheshire Police says it can find no record of the allegation.
- A man who reported to police in London that his girlfriend had been assaulted at a recording of Top of the Pops and was warned that he “could be arrested for making such allegations” and sent away
- In 1964 intelligence about Savile was entered into a ledger used by the Met’s paedophile unit. It said the DJ had visited an address used by girls who had absconded from Duncroft Approved School in Surrey. There is no record of any investigation
- Anonymous allegations sent to the Met in 1998 in a letter that described Savile as a “deeply committed paedophile”
- In 2003, the Met also compiled a crime report relating to a complaint about a 1970s incident
- In 2007, Surrey Police compiled a report after complaints from three victims and the following year a Sussex report focused on a complaint from one victim.
Source – BBC
Hopefully we learn a lesson here. It can’t be swept under the carpet any more and 5 decades is simply unacceptable.
As a mark of respect and support to the victims, relatives of Savile removed the headstone, destroyed the grave and sent it to a landfill site. Good on them. Seems they were fooled like the rest of us.
Sources
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2013/mar/12/jimmy-savile-metropolitan-police
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jimmy_Savile
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/jimmy-savile-report-rape-victim-1757308
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-21750548
Related articles
- Savile claims ignored for 50 years (bigpondnews.com)
- Police scathed in Savile abuse report (bigpondnews.com)
- Police ‘could have stopped Jimmy Savile’ as far back as 1964 (metro.co.uk)
- Police, prosecutors and hospitals: How Jimmy Savile’s victims were let down by every authority (itv.com)
- Police blasted for ignoring claims (standard.co.uk)
- “Forget about it”: What police told Jimmy Savile rape victim as vital evidence ignored for 50 years (mirror.co.uk)
- The letter to police that could have stopped Savile in 1998 (itv.com)
- National News: Jimmy Savile: Police under fire as report claims presenter could have been stopped in 1964 (coventrytelegraph.net)
- UK News: Jimmy Savile: Police under fire as report claims presenter could have been stopped in 1964 (walesonline.co.uk)
- Jimmy Savile: Police failed to join the dots, HMIC report concludes (telegraph.co.uk)
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