Don’t blame Charles for sex abuse bishop ... I was duped by Rolf Harris

SURELY the most shocking thing about Madonna attempting to go incognito at an airport was not her faux burka but that she was wearing Birkenstocks, the sandals of the living dead.

OVER the years, i have been a fierce critic of Prince Charles. Yet now an inquiry has ‘damned’ him over his misguided backing for a bishop exposed as a serial paedophile, i find myself in the unusual position of being his defender.

Peter Ball, the former Bishop of gloucester, was convicted in 2015 of abusing 18 boys and young men. By then, he had been a friend of Charles for more than 20 years — despite Ball having been cautioned by the police in 1993 for gross indecency and resigning from the Church in disgrace.

Charles saw him regularly and corresponded with him, telling him he was the victim of ‘monstrous wrongs’ and giving him money. The bishop prayed with the Prince at Highgrove and became Charles’s long-term mentor.

The Prince claimed that he never realised Ball’s 1993 caution carried an admission of guilt. But that seems naïve, particularly for a future head of the Church of England.

And yet still i defend him. Because i, too, was taken in for years by a notorious paedophile — called rolf Harris.

i was his friend for 16 years. He came to my parties, sent me cards and cartoons. i went to his shows with my mum and dad, who also got to know him, and we were treated like VIPS, welcomed with his great bear hugs.

And to my shame, i stuck by rolf when he was accused of child abuse. i was utterly convinced of his innocence at first and said so in this newspaper. Only when i saw all the evidence did the scales fall from my eyes.

Today, i realise he used me, even groomed me, to ingratiate himself into my group of friends and fellow journalists who might be useful to him. Just as Bishop Ball targeted Charles.

Some will say Charles was complicit in an Establishment cover-up.

But any criminal psychologist will tell you that a serial sex offender grooms those they believe will protect them and give them cover, just as they groom their victims.

Think of Jimmy Savile, a friend to royals and prime ministers.

i am convinced Charles was a pawn in Ball’s vile game. So, too, were many others — from Archbishop Carey, who allowed Ball to return to his duties after his 1993 caution, to senior judges and politicians.

To his credit, a mortified Charles has spoken of his ‘deep regret’ that he was deceived by Ball over so many years.

Like me, he has learned to his great cost that you can be too trusting — and that even the canniest of us can be duped by evil men.