Rolf Harris
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Rolf Harris (born 30 March 1930) is an Australian entertainer whose career has encompassed work as a musician, singer-songwriter, composer, comedian, actor, painter and television personality. He was convicted in 2014 of the sexual assault of four underage girls, which effectively ended his career.
Harris is known for his songs "Tie Me Kangaroo Down, Sport" (a Top 10 hit in Australia, the UK, and the United States) and "Jake the Peg", and his recording of "Two Little Boys" (which reached number 1 in the UK). He often used unusual instruments in his performances: he played the didgeridoo; is credited with the invention of the wobble board; and is associated with the Stylophone. During the 1960s and 1970s, Harris became a successful television personality in the UK, later presenting shows such as Rolf's Cartoon Club and Animal Hospital. In 2005, he painted an official portrait of Queen Elizabeth II. He lived in Bray, Berkshire, England, for more than six decades.
In July 2014, at the age of 84, Harris was sentenced to five years and nine months in prison on twelve counts of indecent assault on four female victims during the 1970s and 1980s. He was released on licence in 2017 after serving nearly three years. Following his conviction, he was stripped of many of the honours that he had been awarded during his career, including the AO and CBE. One count, that Harris indecently assaulted an eight-year-old girl in Portsmouth, was overturned as unsafe in 2017. Harris had also applied for permission to appeal against his convictions concerning the three remaining girls, but permission was refused.
Entertainment career edit
Harris was born in Perth in 1930. At first it seemed he might be bound for glory in the water only, placing in 1946 as the Australian junior backstroke champion. Three years later, his musical talents began to be recognized when he won an amateur talent competition on one of the national radio stations. In the early '50s, Harris headed for London to study art. In 1956, he had his first exhibit of paintings at the Royal Academy of Art in London, the year before he wrote "Tie Me Kangaroo Down" and began building an audience of homesick Australians and other loony birds at the Down Under Club. At the end of the decade, he went back to Australia and began working in children's television. This venture was the first of many well-received television series including Hey Presto, It's Rolf in 1966 and the more normally titled Rolf Harris Show the following year.
Besides his playing on regular instruments, Harris began making use of aboriginal Australian sound-making devices and in 1967 came up with one of the strangest musical devices ever, the stylophone. This axe looks a bit like a kiddie board game and is played with something akin to an electronic pencil. (It has surfaced as a noise-maker at the hands of avant-garde musicians, but the definitive word on the stylophone is found on the Harris series of recordings, including one devoted to the swing music of bandleader Glenn Miller.)
In 1969, Harris filmed Rolf's Walkabout, a combination of scenery and absurdity that also came out in book form. He won an award in 1970 for best television personality from the Radio Industries Club, and in 1973 reached a career milestone with his first public performance at the grandiose Sydney Opera House. It was only a few years more before it was necessary to call him Sir Rolf Harris; he received the Order of the British Empire in 1977, a nice way to kick off a new television series entitled Rolf on Saturday -- OK?, which viewers thought was indeed okay enough to stay on the air three years. His career continued to develop in depth, including a film role in The Little Convict in 1979 and a series of pantomime performances in the '80s.
Rolf's Here -- OK? was the 1980 concept for a television show, followed by the extremely popular Cartoon Time, which Harris hosted through 1987. The new wave era was not one in which Harris was at all forgotten, and there were instances where younger artists brought him into the studio for touches of authenticity. This includes some tasty didgeridoo playing on Kate Bush's sleepy entitled album Dreaming. Meanwhile, Rolf's Cartoon Club took over as his television outlet, continuing until 1993.
Harris entered the new millennium continuing a series of television travel specials, charity work for animals and the handicapped, and performances such as a pair of appearances at the British Glastonbury Festival. He released the 70/30 recording in 2000 and crowned himself King Rolf in 2001, at least on compact disc.
Operation Yewtree edit
In March 2013, Harris was one of twelve people arrested during Operation Yewtree, for questioning regarding historical allegations of sexual offences. The allegations were not linked to those made against media personality Jimmy Savile, and Harris denied any wrongdoing. He was bailed without charge, did not comment publicly on the allegations, and was understood to have denied them strongly. When returning to the stage in May 2013 for the first time since his arrest, he thanked the audience for their support.
Charges edit
In August 2013, Harris was again arrested by Operation Yewtree officers and charged with nine counts of indecent assault dating to the 1980s, involving two girls between fourteen and sixteen years, and four counts alleging production of indecent child images in 2012. The Crown Prosecution Service's Alison Saunders explained to the media: "Having completed our review, we have concluded there is sufficient evidence and it is in the public interest for Mr Harris to be charged ... The decision has been taken in accordance with the code for crown prosecutors and the Director of Public Prosecutions's interim guidelines on prosecuting cases of child sexual abuse. We have determined that there is sufficient evidence for a realistic prospect of conviction and that a prosecution is in the public interest."
Harris appeared at Westminster Magistrates' Court on 23 September 2013, charged with nine counts of indecent assault and four counts of making indecent images of children. His lawyer indicated that Harris would plead not guilty and he was subsequently bailed. In December 2013, the Crown Prosecution Service confirmed that Harris was facing three further counts of sexual assault. The CPS said that the new charges were of alleged assault against females aged nineteen in 1984, aged seven or eight in 1968 or 1969, and aged fourteen in 1975. At a further hearing at Southwark Crown Court on 14 January 2014, Harris pleaded not guilty to all of the charges.
The four counts of making indecent images were related to the Protection of Children Act 1978, which interprets viewing images on a computer as making images. The charges were brought after detectives examined Harris's computer and found 33 images of possibly underage models amongst thousands of adult pornographic images. Harris never entered a plea on the charges, as his lawyers argued successfully that the charges should be severed from the twelve sexual assault charges and tried separately. In the aftermath of Harris's conviction, it was reported that his legal team had obtained the identity documents of the models involved, confirming they were adults over eighteen. The websites Harris had visited, according to the Internet Watch Foundation, are not known for illegal images of children. The prosecution informed the court that they would not be proceeding with the indecent images charges.
Trial edit
The trial of Harris began on 6 May 2014 at Southwark Crown Court. Seven of the twelve charges involved allegations of a sexual relationship between Harris and one of his daughter's friends. Six charges related to when she was between the ages of 13 and 15, and one when she was 19. Harris denied that he had entered into a sexual relationship with the girl until she was 18. During the trial, a letter Harris had written to the girl's father in 1997 after the end of the relationship was shown in court, saying: "I fondly imagined that everything that had taken place had progressed from a feeling of love and friendship—there was no rape, no physical forcing, brutality or beating that took place."
Three charges related to the assault of a 15-year-old Australian girl visiting the UK in 1986. One charge was that he sexually assaulted an eight-year-old girl who asked for his autograph at a community centre in Hampshire in 1968 or 1969. When questioned by police about this allegation, Harris replied "I would simply never touch a child inappropriately." Harris was also accused of groping the bottom of a 14-year-old girl at a celebrity It's a Knockout event in Cambridge in 1975. He denied that he had visited Cambridge until four years before the trial, but television archive material was produced in court showing that he had taken part in an episode of the ITV show Star Games, which had been filmed in Cambridge in 1978. Harris denied that he had told a deliberate lie and said that his failure to remember the show was "a lapse of memory." Additional witnesses who claimed to have been assaulted in Malta, New Zealand, and Australia were called to testify against Harris, although these charges could not be pursued in the British courts.
Conviction and imprisonment edit
After several delays in the trial, in which the judge's summing-up took three days, the jury retired to consider its verdict on 19 June 2014. On 30 June, Harris was found guilty of all 12 counts of indecent assault.
At Southwark Crown Court on 4 July 2014, Mr Justice Sweeney sentenced Harris to a total of five years and nine months in prison. When passing sentence, the judge said to Harris: "You have shown no remorse for your crimes at all. Your reputation now lies in ruins, you have been stripped of your honours but you have no one to blame but yourself." Some sentences were expected to run consecutively, and Harris was expected to serve half of his sentence in prison. He was told he must pay prosecution costs, though not compensation to the victims. The sentence was referred to the Attorney General Dominic Grieve after complaints that it was too lenient. On 30 July 2014, the new Attorney General, Jeremy Wright, announced that he would not be referring the sentence to the Court of Appeal for review "as he did not think they would find it to be unduly lenient and increase it. The sentencing judge was bound by the maximum sentence in force at the time of the offending."
On 1 August 2014, the Judicial Office said that Harris had applied to appeal against his conviction and that his lawyers had lodged papers at the Court of Appeal. In October 2014, Harris was refused permission to appeal, and could apply again before three judges. Harris did not lodge an appeal within the required 28 days, or ask for an extension.
Following his conviction, it was reported in July 2014, October 2014 and February 2015 that he was being investigated by police over other alleged sexual offences.
On 14 June 2015, The Mail on Sunday published a letter, claimed to have been written by Harris in HM Prison Stafford and sent to one of his friends. It contained song lyrics that were highly abusive towards his female accusers. Harris was accused by Liz Dux, lawyer for the women who gave evidence, of victim blaming. In response to the lyrics one of the victims said, "What he did was damage young women's self-worth, their confidence and, for some of those women, he affected them deeply for the rest of their lives." The publication of the letter led Dux to question whether Harris should get parole:
It should certainly affect the way he’s treated when he applies for early release – he hasn’t understood the severity of his crimes. (...) This letter was clearly written by a man who has contempt for his victims and is utterly unrepentant. Far from being reformed by his time in prison, it seems to have fed his perverse sense of indignation and his arrogance is undiminished. If it is the case that a parole board can't take this into account it is totally wrong. Harris has caused those he abused great harm, and by writing this letter, he continues to cause them harm.
Vanessa Feltz has alleged that he sexually assaulted her while she interviewed him live on the bed during an edition of Channel 4 morning programme The Big Breakfast. Linda Nolan has alleged that he groped her when she was only 15, when the Nolan sisters were his support act.
Harris served his sentence at HM Prison Stafford. He was released on 19 May 2017, after serving three years of his sentence of five years and nine months.
Further charges edit
On 12 February 2016, the Crown Prosecution Service announced that Harris would face seven further indecent assault charges. The offences allegedly occurred between 1971 and 2004 and involve seven complainants who were aged between 12 and 27 at the time. Harris pleaded not guilty to all of the charges via videolink at Westminster Magistrates' Court on 17 March and was told to appear at Southwark Crown Court on 14 April. On 14 April, he pleaded not guilty to seven charges of indecent assault and one charge of sexual assault.
Harris's trial began on 9 January 2017, with him appearing and watching by videolink from Stafford Prison. Harris did not have to attend in person because of his age and poor health. The prosecution started its case on 11 January; the allegations involved unwanted groping. Unlike at the previous trial, Harris did not give any evidence. His defence said that the jury in the first trial "got it wrong" and that the ensuing media frenzy "made him vulnerable to people making accusations against him". On 8 February, Harris was acquitted of three charges. Judge Alistair McCreath discharged the jury from deliberating on the further four counts of which he was accused.
The prosecution team asked for one week to decide if it would apply for a retrial. On 15 February, it was announced he would face a retrial for three offences, and one new charge (to which he pleaded not guilty). His retrial began on 15 May. On 30 May, the jury were unable to reach verdicts and the prosecution announced that they would not pursue another retrial.
Overturning of one conviction edit
On 16 November 2017, Harris's conviction on the charge that he had indecently assaulted an eight-year-old girl at a community centre in Portsmouth in 1969 was overturned on the grounds that it was unsafe. The Court of Appealdismissed applications to challenge the other eleven convictions from the 2014 trial.
Gallery edit
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Rolf in a Santa suit with kids, this also appears in Sad Satan.
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