A BRITISH pop legend is being probed by cops over claims he raped a 14-year-old girl.

The solo superstar’s bodyguard is alleged to have plucked her from the front row of a concert crowd.

The woman says the singer then plied her with champagne and attacked her in his hotel suite.

She said: “It affected my entire life.”

The woman says she was a “naive 14-year-old virgin” when he pinned her down on a hotel bed. The then-teenager was so confused she even thought she had hurt him, she claims.

She said: “I was very young, I had never been with a guy, never French-kissed.

“I couldn’t understand the grimace on his face when he was probably climaxing.

“I hit a moment of confused panic because I thought I had done something wrong.”

Cops have launched a probe into her claims and she met detectives last week.

The alleged victim and her pals had been given free tickets to the solo star’s concert in the 1970s.

They were spotted giggling near the stage when a bodyguard picked them out and invited them to the singer’s hotel the next day.

The girls, aged 13 and 14, went along hoping to meet the star and get his autograph.

But an aide separated her from her pals and took her to a suite.

A comedian, a female pal and a backing singer were relaxing in the room when the star appeared wearing a short white robe.

He led the girl to a balcony and put his arm around her waist while they posed for photos, taken with her camera.

She has produced them in evidence.

The woman, now in her 50s, says: “He offered me Dom Perignon Champagne.

I didn’t know what it was at the time.

It looked like soda.

“You just feel you have to be with the crowd so I took a sip and thought it was the most vile tasting thing I’d ever had.

“All I wanted to do was get it down in one gulp then get it out of the way.

That is what I did, not realising I was now drinking alcohol for the first time.

“Then he gave me another glass and was telling me how lovely I was…and you have beautiful eyes…I really like you… and he carried on with this flirtatiousness.

“Before I knew it, it was like an immobility had set in there and then.

He had me down on the bed in one fell swoop.

“His gown was off. I was wearing a jumpsuit.

He zipped it down and what had started as ­affectionate and safe, almost, was suddenly becoming painful and forceful, not comfortable.

“I was confused and couldn’t understand where the pain was coming from.

“It was just beyond me.

I was very numb and found that I could not move.

All I heard repetitively as he was pinning me down was, “relax, relax”, ‘It won’t hurt if you relax’.

“Those words have just stuck with me over the years.

“I never understood at the time what he was trying to say.

I was very naive.

I thought I had hurt him and was so frightened.

“My father was very strict with me — and I just knew I had to get the hell out of this place.

“I came to my senses, sat up, zipped myself up and got the hell out of there.

I ran as fast as I could.”

She fled to the exit but told how she inexplicably went back to the suite — because she had forgotten to get his autograph.

She says the star tenderly cupped her face and promised to stay in touch.

Only when she showered back at her family’s room did she realised her body was covered in bruises.

And she says she was left traumatised for years because she was too ashamed to confide in friends and family.

The woman wept as she alleged: “I had bruises all over my body, in my groin and on my neck.

“I had hand imprints on my arm and I was trying to understand what happened.

I couldn’t.

(My mother) said if your father sees that he’ll kill you so I just dried my hair and fell asleep.

“I woke up the next day and it as though nothing had happened at home.

Nothing was spoken about and I got dressed for school.

“In my mind I was completely confused about how to process this.

Was it a good or bad thing?

What actually happened?

“The more I tried to speak about it — the loss of innocence at that time — nobody would hear me.

It affected my entire life thereafter.”

The woman said the incident left her obsessed with the singer and wrecked any chance of normal relationships with men.

In 2013 she emailed her allegations to Scotland Yard.

The alleged offence, which happened overseas, was out of their jurisdiction.

But chiefs agreed to register the case for intelligence purposes and passed her claims to their counterparts abroad.

An official probe was opened by the police force abroad in August 2014, only to be dropped six months later.

But it was disclosed last month that a new prosecutor and investigating officer have been assigned to the case.

A spokesman for the prosecution service said yesterday:

“We can confirm that charges were registered in respect of events which are alleged to have occurred in the 1970s.

“The case has been referred to police with a request for further investigation.

“This is with a view to enabling us to make a decision regarding prosecution.

The docket will be further considered upon its return from the police.”

A police spokesman said: “This office can confirm an investigation has been conducted regarding a rape case reported during 2014.

It is still under investigation.”

And a lawyer in the city where the rape is said to have happened said:

“The alleged victim is a credible witness with excellent recall of the facts.

“The key to a successful prosecution is finding witnesses who place the complainant in the star’s suite and who can speak for her childlike demeanour.”

Tom Jones

Source: http://www.thesun.co.uk


Read more on these Tags: