Journalist accuses BBC of ‘betrayal’ over sexual assault claim
A WOMAN who claims she was sexually assaulted by a powerful French fashion executive while working undercover for the BBC has accused the corporation of refusing to hand over evidence vital to her legal case.
Lisa Brinkworth was working as an undercover journalist for the MacIntyre Undercover programme in 1998, when she claims she was attacked by Gérald Marie, 72, president of the European arm of the Elite Model Management agency.
The 55-year-old has launched legal action against Mr Marie in the Paris courts along with 14 other alleged victims, but is being hampered by France’s 20-year statute of limitations rules.
She believes her case would be significantly helped if she was granted access to material gathered during the filming of the expose, but claims BBC lawyers are refusing to hand it over.
Her lawyers fear that without the vital evidence her case will be thrown out by the French courts and they are urging the BBC to co-operate before it is too late.
Ms Brinkworth said: “The BBC must now co-operate with the victims and our lawyers and provide the materials we [have] requested, including filmed and audio footage of the events immediately surrounding my assault.
“I filmed my testimony in the immediate aftermath of the assault as my own personal record.
“On the recording, I am visibly shocked and it is obvious I have just undergone a traumatic experience. This tape was never intended for broadcast but still the BBC refuses to hand it over.”
At least a dozen other women have also made sex assault allegations against Mr Marie, who was married to the supermodel Linda Evangelista.
Ms Brinkworth said she is not just fighting for justice for herself but for all the other women who have been too frightened to come forward with their own allegations.
A judge is due to begin assessing the evidence in the case in the coming weeks before making a final decision on whether to set aside the 20-year statute of limitations rule.
Ms Brinkworth had been filming surreptitiously, posing as a model, when she alleges Mr Marie pinned her down on a chair and attacked her.
The BBC subsequently broadcast an expose on the fashion industry, but Elite Models took legal action against the corporation.
As part of the settlement, agreed in 2001, the BBC agreed not to rebroadcast the show and also not to share any of the material gathered during the research.
Ms Brinkworth claims as a result of the legal settlement she was barred from having access to the material she had gathered during filming and that prevented her from going to the French police with any concrete evidence.
But in 2019 she discovered the BBC had shared some of the material with another journalist who was undertaking an investigation linked to the Me Too movement and made a fresh request to obtain the material.
While the corporation has released some material, the evidence which she believes is so vital to her case remains beyond her reach.
“The settlement silenced me, a sexual assault victim, for two decades and enabled a predator,” she said. “It also betrayed countless victims.
Donal MacIntyre, the programme’s eponymous presenter, said: “It is egregious and extraordinarily unsettling that the BBC is being unco-operative at this juncture.
“This is now a matter that should be directly referred to the board of the governors and taken out of the hands of the lawyers who come to this with too much history.
“I am quite sure that when cool and dispassionate heads are applied to this matter, with the recognition that the licence fee payer expects the best of the BBC in these instances, that the board of governors will take control and put things right.”
A spokesman for the BBC said: “We take these matters very seriously and we know this is distressing for Lisa Brinkworth. We are doing everything we can to help her pursue her complaint with the French authorities.”
‘The settlement silenced me, a sexual assault victim, for two decades and enabled a predator’