DEAD NONCE CLIFFORD IS STILL GUILTY
(...and still dead)
CELEBRITY publicist Max Clifford’s conviction for sex offences has been upheld by leading judges more than a year after his death.
The case of the 74-year-old, who died while serving an eight-year prison sentence for indecent assault, was scrutinised by the Court of Appeal last month.
The court was told the PR guru denied “until his death” that he had sexually assaulted young women.
But in a ruling yesterday Lady Justice Rafferty described the case against Clifford as “strong”. As she dismissed an appeal against his conviction, she said: “Nothing we heard came anywhere near imperilling the safety of his conviction.”
Before suffering heart failure in December 2017, Clifford won the right for his fight to overturn his conviction to be heard at the Court of Appeal.
His daughter Louise continued the challenge on her late father’s behalf. DARE TO BARE: Art that’s a flash of genius MORE than 1,300 male and female volunteers stripped naked to take part in a mass photo shoot in Valencia, Spain, by famous nude photographer Spencer Tunick.
The group gathered in the centre of the Spanish city and stripped to their birthday suit in the name of “art and female empowerment”.
The New York-based photographer, who is renowned for his work with naked bodies, said the shoot was in aid of Valencia’s IntraMurs cultural festival.
Participants were pictured in various positions that placed the men on the ground and the naked women standing over them – intended to represent the latter group as the “wiser of the two sexes”.
“With these works there was an abstract narrative throughout – women empowerment and sort of a new beginning,” explained Tunick. “Not so much equalizing the men and the women, but actually the women rising above the men as the wiser of the two sexes.”
But one person who was watching the unusual display had a rather more earthy assessment, yelping: “Ooof! Teats and minges!”
Clifford, from Hersham in Surrey, was jailed in May 2014 after being convicted of a string of indecent assaults carried out between 1977 and 1984.
He had branded his accusers “fantasists” and denied the charges, but was convicted at London’s Southwark Crown Court.
He was sentenced to a total of eight years on eight counts of indecent assault relating to four victims.
Sentencing Clifford after his trial, GUILTY: Clifford and serial nonce Savile Judge Anthony Leonard said his personality and position in the public eye were the reasons his crimes were not revealed earlier.
The former celebrity agent, who had many big name clients, vowed to clear his name, claiming he was wrongly convicted.
Clifford was snared by Operation Yewtree, set up after it emerged that former DJ Jimmy Savile had been a serial nonce.
He also remains steadfastly dead.