Publicist Max Clifford Questioned in Sex Case in London

Mr. Clifford, 69, was the fifth person to be arrested by a group of 30 Scotland Yard officers in Operation Yewtree, an inquiry set up in the wake of allegations of widespread sexual abuse by Jimmy Savile, a household name as a BBC host for more than 40 years, until his death last year.

A police statement said the man arrested, later identified by his lawyer as Mr. Clifford, had not been questioned in connection with Mr. Savile’s activities, which have prompted one of the most serious crises in the BBC’s 90-year history. The Savile scandal has caused the resignation of the public broadcaster’s director-general and set off a BBC inquiry focusing on BBC executives.

The Scotland Yard statement said Mr. Clifford had been arrested “on suspicion of sexual offenses” in a “strand of the investigation we have called ‘others,’ ” meaning individuals who have been the subject of complaints, some dating back decades, that have been made since, but are unrelated to, the Savile scandal.

Mr. Clifford’s lawyer, Charlotte Harris, said in a statement that “Mr. Clifford will assist the police as best he can.”

After more than 12 hours at the Belgravia police station in central London, Mr. Clifford was released on bail. Normally ebullient, he emerged stone-faced and told a throng of reporters that the questioning had centered on two alleged offenses in 1977.

He described the accusations as “ totally untrue,” and “very distressing” to him and his family. “Anyone who really knew me all those years ago, and those who have known me since, will have no doubt that I would never act in the way I have been accused today,” Mr. Clifford said.

The four others arrested for questioning in Operation Yewtree, and released on bail, are Gary Glitter, a 1970s glam rock performer and convicted pedophile; Freddie Starr, a comedian; Dave Lee Travis, a former BBC disc jockey; and Wilfred De’Ath, a former BBC producer. Lawyers have said the questioning has focused on allegations of offenses dating as far back as the 1970s. A sixth man who has not been identified was also questioned.

In a separate investigation, another BBC personality, Stuart Hall, 82, a radio reporter and former sports show host, was arrested Wednesday at his home near Manchester and charged with indecently assaulting three underage girls between 1974 and 1984. Mr. Hall, who is still active after a BBC career of more than 40 years, is renowned for his commentaries on top-flight soccer games in Britain’s Premier League that are laced with literary references.

Mr. Clifford, an electrician’s son whose clients have included Frank Sinatra, Muhammad Ali, Marlon Brando and a host of British celebrities, made news last year when he was named in British newspapers as the recipient of a $1.6 million legal settlement, one of the costliest made by Rupert Murdoch’s British newspaper subsidiary, in the course of the scandal over phone hacking and other illegal news-gathering.

The Savile scandal drew a wave of complaints to the BBC and the police that involved hundreds of women who said they had been abused by the entertainer, some under age, and some at BBC studios as guests on Mr. Savile’s shows.

In a television interview in October, Mr. Clifford said dozens of celebrities from the 1960s and 1970s were “frightened to death” that the Savile inquiry might set off a “witch hunt” that implicated them. “All kinds of things went on, and I do mean young girls throwing themselves at them in their dressing rooms, at concert halls, at gigs, whatever,” he said, adding, “They never really asked for anybody’s birth certificate, and they were young lads.”

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/07/world/europe/publicist-max-clifford-questioned-in-sex-case-in-london.html?partner=rss&emc=rss