Millionaire cleared of yacht club sex attack
A MILLIONAIRE sailor was yesterday cleared of sexually assaulting a young woman at an exclusive yacht club.
Peter Bonham Christie, 39, had been accused of forcefully groping the then 25-year-old student outside the royal Thames Yacht Club in Knightsbridge, central London.
A jury of 12 took under two hours to deliver a unanimous not-guilty verdict after a four- day trial at Isleworth Crown Court.
Mr Bonham Christie had vehemently denied the assault which he maintained had been made up to get him thrown out of the membersonly club.
He told the court the club was like ‘home’ to him because he stayed there on a regular basis and had been visiting it with his parents since the age of four.
The competitive sailor, who once held the offshore powerboat world speed record and represented Great Britain in sailing until 2010, said the accusations against him were ‘complete nonsense’.
He insisted the claims by the woman, who is now 27, and her friend, a fellow club member who he said he had fallen out with, may have been concocted to get him banned from the 245-yearold institution.
They had both accused the businessman of grabbing her between the legs when they were having a cigarette following a drinks reception.
The sailor, who runs a classic and luxury car transport business, had returned to the club after dinner at auctioneers Bonhams followed by drinks at Claridge’s with business guests and his then girlfriend.
The incident on November 30, 2018, was reported to the police in March 2019 and Mr Bonham Christie voluntarily attended a police station interview.
He is the scion of a wealthy family which formerly owned Brownsea Island off the coast of Dorset, where Lord Baden-Powell founded the Scouts. The court was told he overcame ‘profound dyslexia’ to make his first £1million selling an office water cooler company utilising water sourced from his family’s Dorset property.
He was educated at £40,000-a-year Millfield School and told the jury he was a ‘high achiever’ who liked to win and had amassed as many as 60 trophies as a competitive sailor.
In 2012, he and his former girlfriend Mel Hatton broke the British speed record on Lake Coniston.
Their relationship ended a short while later.
Mr Bonham Christie now lives in Hampshire with his fiancee who supported him in court yesterday and broke down in tears of relief as he was acquitted. He had denied one count of sexual assault.
‘Concocted to get him banned’