Jimmy Savile

Ha ha! Was that a Freudian slip MiceElf

Persecute?

Clearly, now Savile is dead, no trial can take place. But it should be posdible for the CPS to acquire all the evidence and evaluate it. If any of those in positions of power and authority, for example senior employees at the BBC or other media are found to have colluded in a cover up, it should be possible to persecute them.

jeni I don't know what would constitute proof apart from a lot of people, victims and those who were in the know, saying he did it.

More objective proof would be difficult. Always is in assault/rape cases.

Yes, I enjoyed that programme Jess and I would listen with anticipation, thinking 'when will he ask such and such?' Of course, Clare knew how to hold back and make the interviewee do the work. I was surprised that Louis Theroux didn't get more out of Saville. I will watch the programme about this issue tonight with interest.

I used to enjoy the series In the Psychiatrists Chair on R4 with Anthony Clare.
Saville's interview is one of the two that sticks in my mind years later. Clare was an expert at getting "under people's skin" - he managed to get right under the bluster of Clare Rayner to the sadness beneath.
Saville was a brick wall. Even though he had consented to come on the programme, he just presented a bland, impenetrably defended public image of himself and Clare could not find a chink.

I don't think he feared exposure because he had an ego as big as a barn door and a bank balance to match. I could never understand why some people idolised him.

jeni what you say makes sense. But these are different circumstances.
There will never be proof now, since the guy is dead.
I believe the women who have made the allegations.
They were children at the time. Am I right in thinking they were girls in children's homes?
What chance did they have ?? Against an Icon? I dread to think what it must have been like in a home for children in the sixties?
Nobody, not another soul , looking out for them.

I also think he got away with it because he knew many people who had/have their own secrets.

It is a fine balance! When does 'flirting' and 'playfulness' become exploitation & even abuse. It is a fact that some young women/girls are attracted by the 'glamour' of celebrities /musicians/ actors etc and a fact that celebrities /musicians/ actors etc have taken advantage of that. I do think age is a factor..even a girl over the age of consent can be intimidated by an older person and may 'consent' to behaviour she might have said no to with a lad her own age. I think celebrities /musicians/ actors etc who have slept with young fans/groupies have exploited them at least.

These days a consoling quick hug can be judged sexual harassment. Twenty five years ago as a young secretary I remember having a buttock squeezed by a passing boss was just one of those things we had to put up with, part of the job. Standards have changed. Perhaps people are only coming forward now because there'd have been little reaction if they'd complained then.

It's not proven don't convict without proof!

It now looks as though his charitable works were a very convenient cloak. What else did he do or spend his money on that we know about? There's no doubt he was generous. I know a family who benefited when he anonymously paid for their daughter's treatment for leukaemia after the NHS withdrew. There was a lot of media attention at the time and the girl sadly died but not many people knew who the benefactor was.
How awful that people who knew or suspected he was abusing young girls were afraid/reluctant to blow the whistle. I don't think it would happen these days. You can't really gag social networking.

Oh right! I missed that bit.

From what I just read it sounds as if the police had investigated several allegations?

Was it over many years though - the accusations? Haven't the alledged victims only recently spoken out?

Surely if one person had so many different accusations of abuse over many years from different sources alarm bells should have rang out loudly?

Seems he may have been involved in the Jersey children's home case

Thank you absent and for not mentioning my typo! I will be interested to read the results of your pondering.

I wish I could remember which (autobiographical) book I read that included reference to a similar thing. It might have been "Tis", by Frank McCourt, who also wrote "Angelas Ashes"

*phoenix *I'm not sure whether you're right (I shall think about it), but I certainly know what you mean.

At the risk of being shot down, and leaving aside for the moment the "innocent until proven guilty" issues, I feel that there might be some common ground between those abused by Catholic priests and those claiming abuse by Jimmy Saville.

In both cases there seems to be a very long gap between the alleged abuse and the alleged vistims coming forward. I would suggest that in both cases the social standing of those accused seems to almost put them "beyond reproach". (Not really the phrase I'm looking for, but hopefully you will know what I mean).

In many communities the priest was seen as the ultimate authority, and whose word was not to be questioned.

He was certainly a very odd man but not necessarily a bad one. I have no knowledge of illegal sexual activity, but if it happened, it does need to be addressed and "put in in its proper place" for the sake of those to whom it happened.

There was absolutely no mention of him on BBC's news yesterday, inspite of the allegations being all over the newspapers and a top item on ITV's news.

What about that woman who says she's his daughter? Is her mother still alive I wonder?

It is difficult baublesbanglesandb to judge with so many people now coming out, they can't all be climbing on the band wagon. And as someone has already pointed out there is strength in numbers, pointing the finger at the time , on your own would have been very hard especially at someone who had such a high profile. But he is now dead and we may never know the whole truth.

I would usually agree with that view, baubles, but in this case there really doesn't seem to be much doubt. All those people haven't suddenly decided to blacken JS's name on a whim, and the girls' stories are all remarkably similar.