DJ Neil Fox admits 'squeezing' but insists he's not a 'sexual bully'
Mr Fox is accused of eight counts of indecent assault and two sexual assaults between 1988 and 2014
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The DJ Neil Fox admitted making “saucy” Carry On-style remarks and taking part in “piggybacks, tickling and squeezing” while at work – but insisted he was not a “sexual bully” as he took the stand during his trial for a string of sexual offences.
Mr Fox is accused of eight counts of indecent assault and two sexual assaults between 1988 and 2014, including forcibly kissing two underage girls at radio roadshows, sexual touching of a 15-year-old fan at Capital Radio’s studio and grabbing a female colleague’s breasts and bending her over a desk to simulate sex. He denies all the allegations.
The 54-year-old, who was arrested minutes after coming off air at Magic FM in September last year, told Westminster Magistrates Court that he “got myself going” before radio shows by listening to loud music, dancing, and doing things like setting up a makeshift obstacle course in the office.
“The team would join in very much as well. They would be part of that,” he added.
Asked if comments made during this time had ever been “edgy or sexual”, Mr Fox replied: “Of course they could. Like any office. Some of it could be saucy, cheeky, over the top.”
He also said there might be “piggybacks, tickling and squeezing” during what he described as “horseplay”. But he stressed he would not have done anything without the other participants’ consent.
“There was a lot of Carry On-style, Benny Hill humour in that... building,” he said. “It does sound daft in the cold light of a December day.”
Mr Fox said he did not have any memory of putting his hands on a colleague’s breasts while working at Capital Radio. “That would be wholly wrong, totally disrespectful, and it’s not something I would do,” he added, suggesting the incident might have been a hug that had been misunderstood.
John Price QC, prosecuting, told him the woman involved had not consented to the act and he asked if Mr Fox was “in a position to dispute that”.
“I can’t get in (her) head,” the DJ replied, admitting he had not asked her if it would be all right beforehand but saying she had seemed open to “hijinks”.
Mr Price put it to Mr Fox that he was a “sexual bully”.
“No, I wasn’t,” he replied. “I really wanted to get along with (her).”
Mr Fox said the workplace culture had changed over the past 25 years. “Laws have changed. HR has changed. Political correctness has changed. But … I’m the same guy now, with the same morals, as I was then.”
On the alleged sexual offences against children, Mr Fox said he could not explain why three separate women were accusing him of similar actions towards them when they were teenagers in the 1980s and 1990s.
One of the women has alleged that she and the DJ had a relationship when she was a teenager. The woman, who cannot be named for legal reasons, alleged that in the station’s library he put his hand down her underpants and sexually guided her while she touched his genitals.
Under questioning from his defence counsel Jonathan Caplan QC, Mr Fox said: “It never happened.”
He also told the court the girl was “a little bit obsessed” with him. The case continues.