‘I heard this noise and it was my dress being crunched between Rolf’s fingers’: Vanessa Feltz relives moment she was groped by disgraced star during live Big Breakfast interview as his wife Alwen stood in the same room
- Broadcaster said convicted sex attacker assaulted her during a 1996 interview
Vanessa Feltz has revealed she was groped by Rolf Harris on live TV as his wife stood just feet away.
The broadcaster, 61, said the convicted sex attacker assaulted her during a 1996 interview on Channel 4’s The Big Breakfast.
She described how Harris – whose death from neck cancer at the age of 93 was announced yesterday – pulled up her dress and tried to touch her knickers during a segment called ‘On The Bed’.
She told TalkTV Drivetime: ‘We crowded into the little tiny bedroom where The Big Breakfast bed was because it was situated in a real lock keeper’s cottage.
‘So a tiny little bedroom, there’s the bed, there’s me on it and Rolf Harris next to me and the cameraman, director, and Rolf Harris’ wife standing literally a foot away to the side of the bed.
Vanessa Feltz has revealed how she was assaulted by Rolf Harris during a 1996 interview on Channel 4’s The Big Breakfast
She described how Harris – whose death from neck cancer at the age of 93 was announced yesterday – pulled up her dress and tried to touch her knickers during a segment called ‘On The Bed’
‘We go live, and I’m like, ”Hello, guess who’s on the bed with me today? It’s the wonderful Rolf Harris”…. and I can hear this noise.’
She revealed that Harris was ‘crunching’ her dress and pulling it ‘further and further and further up my legs’.
‘And you can actually see in one of the pictures me, taking a blue cushion and putting it between us to try to make some space between me and him. And he completely ignored it,’ she added.
READ MORE – BBC Radio host who claims she was assaulted by paedophile three times when she was 16 breaks her silence after disgraced star’s death
The broadcaster said she could feel his hand going ‘past my knees up to my thighs’ while Harris’s wife was standing in the same room as them.
She said: ‘I didn’t know what to do because I knew that I couldn’t say, ‘Get your hand off my leg’ or ‘What the hell do you think you’re doing?’ or ‘Get off me’ and I also couldn’t jump off the bed because I was all mic-ed up and it’s a live program. I didn’t know what to do at all.
‘I tried, as you can see, to put the cushion between, that was no good. I couldn’t move any further away because you can see I would’ve fallen off the edge of the bed… his hand meanwhile was getting closer and closer and closer and closer and closer.
‘And then it got to the edge of my pants, my knickers, or whatever. My lingerie, and I knew, that if I didn’t do something immediately, it was going to be a proper full-on assault.’
The 61-year-old, who says she reviewed the incident when she was interviewed by police while officers were investigating Harris, said she was so concerned about what was happening that she told the crew to cut to a commercial break early.
‘I just went [gasps] like that because the hand was coming right up and I went like this, ‘Um, right. Okay. Well, we’ll throw to a break now. We’ll go straight to a break. That’s what we’re going to do. we’ll, we’ll go to a break! We’ll go to the break right now!’ and then I jumped off the bed and then it was the adverts.
The broadcaster, seen in London on Monday, said she could feel his hand going ‘past my knees up to my thighs’ while Harris’s wife was standing in the same room as them
‘I didn’t say a single word, he didn’t say a single word, his wife didn’t say a single word and then when we came back after I just got back on the bed and we carried on again.’
Harris died of neck cancer and old age earlier this month after spending the last six years following his release from prison living as a near-recluse with his wife, Alwen Hughes, in their £5million riverside mansion in Bray, Berkshire.
News of the abuser’s death on May 10 and his subsequent secret cremation was revealed yesterday after it was registered with Windsor and Maidenhead Council bringing closure to some of his victims.
Dr Lin Berwick, who accused him of assaulting her when she was 27, screamed ‘Yippee, thank God’, while BBC radio host Karen Gardner – who claims she was assaulted by him when she was 16 – pointed to a statement where she described him as ‘evil’.
Harris’ wife Alwen, 91, a jeweller and sculptor, stood by him despite his conviction for numerous sex attacks
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