The Courier & Advertiser (Perth and Perthshire Edition)
Assault claims are ‘alllies’
PUBLICIST MA X Clifford has branded allegations that he carried out a catalogue of indecent assaults on different women “ridiculous” and “a load of lies” as he returned to the witness box for a second day.
The 70-year-old is standing trial accused of 11 counts of indecent assault against seven girls and women, all of which he denies.
Giving evidence at Southwark Crown Court, he denied ever meeting many of the women, and dismissed their claims as completely untrue.
One alleged victim claims she met Clifford on holiday inTorremolinos, Spain, in 1977, and he kept in touch with her family, coming to her house and taking her out in his car after she returned to the UK, where he would persuade her to perform sexual acts on him.
But under questioning from his defence barrister, Richard Horwell QC, Clifford said: “That’s totally and utterly untrue.
“If I wanted to have a relationship with someone, there were hotels, there were places where I had already been in relationships.”
A sked if he was ever sexually interested in a 15-year-old in 1977 or 1978, he said: “No, it wasn’t me. There were plenty of people I knew who were into young girls etc etc but it’s never been me.”
Clifford said he holidayed in Torremolinos in 1977 and had gone with singer Tom Waits, who performed there, but he said he did not recall meeting the girl and her family.
The veteran celebrity agent also denied recognising the name of another of his alleged victims, who claimed that she worked in the same office as him in central London, and that he pushed her up against the wall in a corridor in his office and tried to assault her in 1975.
The PR guru was then questioned about claims he had assaulted a 12-year-old girl whilst on holiday in Marbella in 1983, and whether he had any sexual interest in girls of that age — the same age as his daughter Louise — at that time.
“I have said it before, the thought is utterly repulsive and repugnant and one of the worst things I have heard of all the dreadful things I have been accused of.”
The trial was adjourned until today.