How axe fell on birthday girl
Ellis Hillon DID make efforts to remove offensive material from her social media accounts before stepping into the Big Brother house.
But the 20-year-old says she was unable to access her historic posts on Twitter – and neither could Big Brother staff, apparently.
However, the racist slur made on September 11, 2014, was unearthed by someone who had spent a while trawling through hundreds of posts on her Twitter page.
Ellis said:“Before I went into the house I had a look on my Twitter page and if there was anything offensive I deleted it.
“But it wouldn’t go back beyond 2016 and Big Brother staff said they couldn’t see past 2016 either.
“Whoever has found those tweets has gone in deep to try and find something to ruin it for me.”
Sectarian content on Ellis’s Facebook page also caused controversy and sparked strong criticism online.
Ellis first applied to be a contestant on Big Brother in January this year and did an audition at the Hilton Hotel in Glasgow a couple of months later.
She was then invited to London in April for further interviews with show producers and was finally confirmed as a contestant around five weeks ago.
A Disclosure Scotland check was carried out on Ellis to make sure she had no convictions and the TV show’s staff looked over her Twitter and Facebook pages before she stepped into the house on Friday, September 14.
Ellis made her TV debut and she was tipped to be a show favourite when her funny video audition was shown where Ellis described herself as“a wee ned fae Glasgow”and also said“there better be Irn-Bru in the house”.
She walked through the Big Brother doors at around 9.30pm wearing a tartan mini dress, but around three hours later Big Brother bosses had phoned her twin sister Nevada quizzing her about the tweets that had come to light.
Yet the next day, as Ellis marked her 20th birthday, Big Brother threw special celebrations for her in the house.
Ellis said:“The housemates had made me breakfast and told me I wasn’t to do any cleaning up because it was my birthday.
“I was called into the Diary Room and was asked how I was getting on with everyone and what I wanted them to do for my birthday.
“So I said some refreshments would be nice and for some music to be played too.
“All the housemates were having a good time and were singing happy birthday to me.”
Ellis had been enjoying the hot tub and was then chatting with housemates while smoking a cigarette when she was called to the Diary Room again around 5.30pm on her birthday.
That’s when the celebrations turned sour.
“I was cheery and thought it was something to do with my birthday,” said Ellis.
“I thought that day was going to be my best birthday – but it didn’t turn out like that.”