Scotland Yard last night urged women to come forward after David Walliams was identified as the celebrity accused of attempting to suppress allegations that he had targeted teenagers.
The children’s author and entertainer allegedly used his celebrity status to groom schoolgirls and pursue young women, according to a media investigation.
Walliams, 55, was accused of sexually assaulting a 15-year-old, targeting another girl while she was preparing for her GCSE mock exams, and sexually harassing several other young women. He denies all the allegations.
Although he acknowledged behaving ‘thoughtlessly’ at times, he said: ‘I am not a sexual predator.’
The controversy intensified yesterday when footage from the 2004 Comedy Awards resurfaced. In the clip, Walliams laughs as presenter Jonathan Ross tells a room filled with celebrities and television executives: ‘The comedy awards is 15 years old – and like most 15-year-olds, it’s drunk, it’s unpredictable and it’s probably going home with David Walliams.’
It is understood that Ross did not write the joke and was only delivering it.
The High Court was told last month that Walliams threatened to take his own life if the women’s claims became public. The former Britain’s Got Talent judge had sought an injunction to prevent the investigation from being published, prompting widespread speculation about the identity of the ‘well-known individual’ at the centre of the case.
His application was rejected, and yesterday The Guardian and ITV News published more than 17,000 words online alongside a one-hour documentary detailing the allegations.
Lilly Creightmore, a former model, was 18 in 2003 when David Walliams allegedly ‘constantly pestered’ her for sex
Another woman, known only as Alex, alleged that Walliams groomed her from the age of 15 while she was preparing for mock GCSEs and had met him at a Little Britain fan event
The Metropolitan Police said they were aware of media reports concerning a man in his 50s but had not received any allegations of sexual assault or other offences. The force added: ‘Should we receive any reports, they will be carefully assessed.’
The Met said it had provided information to the media organisations last week so that any potential victims they had spoken to could learn how to report possible criminal allegations to police.
Comedian Lucy Beaumont last night said she had acted as a whistleblower in the investigation after hearing that girls were being taken to Walliams’ dressing room. She also claimed that one of the women had signed a non-disclosure agreement, or NDA.
Ms Beaumont told Sky News: ‘She was in a really bad way. I was worried she was going to take her own life because of it.
‘She had signed an NDA, not just not to speak to the media, but she couldn’t talk to her family, friends or a therapist.’
The award-winning comedian added: ‘I want to protect young women. I feel it [sexual harassment] is still going on.’
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Walliams – the millionaire star of television shows including Little Britain and Come Fly With Me, and a bestselling children’s author once described as the ‘new Roald Dahl’ – is accused of using his fame to attract teenage girls and young women.
A woman identified as Jade said she was 15 in 2007 when Walliams molested her. She alleged that he contacted her through MySpace, the now-defunct social networking site that predated Facebook, and asked for her telephone number. They spoke about ‘where I lived, what I do in school’.
Abby Tomlinson, now a senior aide to Andy Burnham, was a 17-year-old BGT fan in 2015 when she says she found herself in Walliams’ dressing room with girls aged 13, 16 and 17, without any other adult present
They arranged to meet in Soho, where Walliams, then 36, bought her coffee before taking her down an alley and kissing her, she claimed. She alleged that he then drove her in his Aston Martin to his home, Supernova Heights, the Primrose Hill mansion once owned by Oasis star Noel Gallagher. There, she said, he ‘lifted my top up and sucked on my breast and then tried to put my hand down his trousers’.
‘That’s when I pulled away and said no. I was only 15. It’s a sexual assault. It’s grooming. It’s completely wrong in every way.’ Walliams’ lawyers said he had never groomed young women and denied any sexual contact with Jade. They described the allegations of serious criminal conduct as false.
Another woman, known only as Alex, alleged that Walliams groomed her when she was 15 and studying for her mock GCSEs. She had met him at a Little Britain fan event, where her mother took a photograph of Alex handing him comedy sketches she had written. A few days later, he called her and said: ‘Hi, it’s David Walliams. You know, off the telly.’
They discussed her school, exams and her upcoming 16th birthday, it was claimed. Walliams helped with her writing and offered to arrange work experience in television. Alex said they had consensual sex when she was 17, in 2005, but added: ‘It felt very… pushy. I felt like a prostitute, essentially. I think I was groomed, 100 per cent.’
Walliams’ lawyers said he believed Alex was 18 when they had sex and was ‘mortified to learn’ that their ‘brief, consensual relationship has caused her sadness’.
Abby Tomlinson, now a senior aide to Andy Burnham, is among those who have spoken out. She was a 17-year-old BGT fan in 2015 when she says she ended up in Walliams’ dressing room with girls aged 13, 16 and 17, without another adult present. She told The Guardian: ‘The door was shut and we were alone with him.’ Walliams’ lawyers said the account was misleading.
Jonathan Ross joked about 15-year-olds ‘going home with David Walliams’ at the British Comedy Awards in December 2004
Walliams, identified yesterday as the celebrity who attempted to suppress allegations of sexual misconduct, was filmed laughing at the remark
Sarah, another BGT fan, said she was invited to Walliams’ home when she was 18. She claimed that he got her drunk, stroked her leg and then tried to lead her to bed. Lilly Creightmore, a former model, alleged that Walliams ‘constantly pestered’ her for sex when she was 18 in 2003.
A whistleblower at Walliams’ former publisher, HarperCollins, claimed: ‘There was an agreement: if you went to his house, you had to go in a pair. You couldn’t go by yourself.’
The allegations against Walliams emerged a day after his friend Russell Brand was sentenced to more than ten years in prison for rape and sexual assault. They have further intensified scrutiny of the entertainment industry following claims that Brand’s offending had been an open secret.
Downing Street said the Government was ‘concerned’ about the use of injunctions, while Labour suspended Walliams from the party.
The High Court was told that Walliams was sectioned under the Mental Health Act for his own safety on October 22. The Guardian reported that he was still in a psychiatric hospital when the judge dismissed the case last week.
