Disgraced Harrods boss Mohamed Al-Fayed forced teenage girls to conduct twisted horse parade in front of him so he could ogle them
Disgraced Harrods boss Mohamed Al-Fayed forced teenage girls to perform a bizarre horse parade for him so he could watch them.
The “creepy” Egyptian billionaire, who died last year at the age of 94, loved watching their “young bodies bouncing up and down”.
A former groom told how Al-Fayed would sit in a tent on his lawn at his Barrow Green Estate in Surrey ‘and bark at us to run his horses past him’.
The woman, who was 15 years old when she worked for the sex predator in 1987, said The Sun: ‘He’d like to see us in our Harrods tops and jodhpurs.’
She said it made him “turn on” when people were afraid for their jobs and made him angry, but he wasn’t afraid of a comeback because he was “the god of his domain.”
Disgraced Harrods boss Mohamed Al-Fayed forced teenage girls to perform bizarre horse parade for him so he could watch
The ‘creepy’ Egyptian billionaire, who died last year aged 94, loved watching their ‘young bodies bounce’ in their Harrods tops and jodhpurs
A former groom told how Al-Fayed would sit in a tent on his lawn at his Barrow Green estate in Surrey (pictured) and ‘bark at us to jog past him with his horses’
She told how he would go around his luxurious estate offering money to girls he was in love with and how he would try to lure them to London with the promise of more money.
“He knew how young I was, but he still asked me to come to London and visit him when he didn’t have his family around,” she said.
“I pretended to have a boyfriend to get out of it.”
Lawyers representing women who allege they were sexually abused by Al Fayed say they have received “more than 150 new inquiries” since a damning BBC documentary aired.
Five women claim they were raped by Al Fayed, while dozens of others claim they were sexually abused.
The new investigations involve a “mix of survivors and individuals with evidence about Al Fayed”.
Lawyer Bruce Drummond, part of the legal team representing 37 alleged victims in a civil case against Harrods, told BBC Radio 4 on Saturday: “This is the worst case of corporate sexual exploitation of young women that I have ever seen, and I don’t think the world has ever seen anything as bad.”
Gemma (pictured), who worked as his personal assistant between 2007 and 2009, says she was raped by Al Fayed during a business trip to Paris
Mohamed Al Fayed pictured at the unveiling of the Dodi Al Fayed and Diana Memorial at Harrods
Lawyers representing women who claim they were sexually abused by Al Fayed say they have had “more than 150 new investigations” since a damning BBC documentary aired
Mr Drummond added that his legal team is working “very closely” with Gloria Allred, who is seen in the US as a stalwart advocate on women’s rights issues, as the attacks are also said to have taken place in America.
He said some survivors came from Malaysia, Dubai, Canada and France. The Ritz Hotel in Paris, which Al Fayed once owned, was also said to have been the scene of alleged attacks.
Mr Drummond said on the programme: ‘It really is a global issue, it’s not just the UK. It happened all over the world.’
Harrods said in a statement earlier this week: ‘We are deeply shocked by the allegations of abuse made by Mohamed al Fayed.
‘These were the actions of an individual who sought to abuse his power wherever he operated. We condemn these actions in the strongest possible terms.
‘We also recognize that as a company we have failed our employees who were victims of this act during this time and for that we offer our sincere apologies.
‘The Harrods of today is a very different organisation to the one Fayed owned and led between 1985 and 2010. It is an organisation that puts the wellbeing of its employees at the heart of everything we do.’
Harrods added that it was a “priority” to resolve the claims as “new information came to light in 2023 regarding historical allegations of sexual abuse by Fayed”.
In response to that statement, Mr Drummond said it was “absolutely inconceivable” that Harrods’ current owners, the State of Qatar, could not have been aware of any “outstanding claims or obligations” to the company at the time they bought it in 2010.
He added: ‘When you buy a company, you also take over the responsibilities of that company.’
Maria Mulla, another lawyer in the legal team, told Times Radio she had heard stories of women at Harrods being “put in cupboards” while Al Fayed walked around so “they wouldn’t be spotted”.
The comments came after a former Harrods employee, who wished to remain anonymous, told BBC Radio 4’s Today Programme that “facilitators” at the luxury retailer were “just as guilty as Al Fayed, because they were not just passive bystanders”.
The woman, referred to on the programme as Catherine, said she worked at Harrods in a “very junior role” when she was 21.
Al Fayed is accused of raping and assaulting multiple women during his time as owner of Harrods, from 1985 to 2010
She said: ‘They basically made sure that one girl after another ended up in a total nightmare.
‘I think some people should be identified and questioned about their involvement.
“It is in fact a form of grooming, as the evidence suggests, and they should be brought to justice for that.”
Sources within Harrods have said the company has accepted liability for Al Fayed’s conduct in order to settle claims brought to its attention by alleged victims since 2023. Settlements have been reached with the vast majority of victims.
In a statement about the BBC documentary Al-Fayed: Predator At Harrods, which aired on Thursday, Harrods said it was “a very different organisation to the one owned and led by Al Fayed between 1985 and 2010”.
The store added that “since new information came to light in 2023 regarding historical allegations of sexual abuse by Al Fayed, our priority has been to resolve the claims as quickly as possible, avoiding lengthy legal proceedings for the women involved.”