152 new allegations of sexual abuse leveled against BBC in Jimmy Savile scandal

Jimmy Savile, 1973
image credit: Beacon/Flickr

Madison Ruppert
Activist Post

The scandal surrounding allegations of sexual abuse at the BBC continues to get more insane as a whopping 152 new allegations of sexual abuse and harassment have been leveled by 81 current and former BBC employees.

So far, not all that much has happened in response to the many allegations, aside from the resignation of BBC director General George Entwistle.

However, that was only indirectly related in that it was a response to the airing of a program that reportedly made false accusations of child abuse against a former Conservative official.

Thirty six of the new accusations involved individuals who were under the age of 18 at the time of the alleged sexual assaults, according to The New York Times.

According to the Telegraph, which first discovered the new figures through a Freedom of Information request, twenty-five of the recent allegations involving current BBC employees have been reported to police.

The majority of those cases resulted in no further action being taken, five were outstanding and three that resulted in no police action were currently under investigation by the BBC.

Yet these figures are dwarfed by the 450 claims made against Savile from the period of October 2012 to March 2013.

Seventy-nine offenses were recorded against 71 people across West Yorkshire alone, targeting victims ranging from age five to 45, according to the BBC. Thirty-five of those attacks occurred in hospitals.

“The BBC has been appalled by the allegations of harassment and abuse that have emerged since the Savile scandal broke,” a BBC spokesman said to the Telegraph.

“We have launched a series of reviews that aim to understand if there are any issues with the current culture of the BBC or the historic culture and practices from as far back as 1965 to see what lessons can be learned to prevent this happening again,” the spokesman added.

The investigation into the many allegations made against Savile, who died in October 2011 at age 84, has resulted in some troubling discoveries.

Jimmy Savile receives a Bevin Boys medal from then Prime Minister Gordon Brown
in 2008 at Downing Street (image credit: Downing Street/Flickr

It was discovered that Savile had a close relationship with many officers in the West Yorkshire police force, where dozens of complaints have been filed.

“There is no doubt that police forces made mistakes in relation to sharing and keeping information relating to Savile so no single clear picture of his offending could be made,” Assistant Chief Constable Ingrid Lee said in an introduction to a report.

Police officers and others The New York Times described as “members of the elite” regularly met at a social gathering at Savile’s house known as the “Friday Morning Club.”

The New York Times described the club “a cozy and largely undocumented network of high-level contacts.”

However, the report published by West Yorkshire police maintain that, “All the officers spoken to describe the visit to Savile’s home as nothing more than a short social gathering where people would chat and drink tea.”

Still, it seems quite interesting that these police “failed to join up the dots” over the years, as Alan Collins, a lawyer representing 40 of Savile’s accusers.

“They had intelligence that something wasn’t right, if I can put it as mildly as that, and, against that background, they were using Savile for crime prevention campaigns and so on,” Collins said.

Police obviously deny any involvement in protecting Savile from allegations of abuse.

“It is now clear that Savile was hiding in plain sight and using his celebrity status and fundraising activity to gain uncontrolled access to vulnerable people across six decades,” a government report said, according to NBC.

“For a variety of reasons the vast majority of his victims did not feel they could speak out and it’s apparent that some of the small number who did had their accounts dismissed by those in authority including parents and careers,” the report added.

So far there has only been one conviction of sexual abuse.

Former BBC broadcaster Stuart Hall, 83, pleaded guilty to 14 indecent assaults on girls ranging from 9 to 17 between 1968 and 1986, according to the Guardian.

Some have raised questions about the knowledge of upper-level BBC staff, though much of it is pure speculation.

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This article first appeared at End the Lie.

Madison Ruppert is the Editor and Owner-Operator of the alternative news and analysis database End The Lie and has no affiliation with any NGO, political party, economic school, or other organization/cause. He is available for podcast and radio interviews. Madison also now has his own radio show on UCYTV Monday nights 7 PM – 9 PM PT/10 PM – 12 AM ET. Show page link here: http://UCY.TV/EndtheLie. If you have questions, comments, or corrections feel free to contact him at [email protected]