Princess Diana’s brother, Charles Spencer, who was shown forged bank statements by Martin Bashir suggesting her staff were betraying her and falsely told Charles had got William and Harry’s nanny pregnant, has directly linked her famous BBC Panorama interview to her death. Spencer has also called for a police investigation into the BBC and Bashir, who he says “groomed” him to get access to his sister.
The police have previously said there was not enough evidence to open a criminal investigation into Bashir, but, writing in the Mail on Sunday, Spencer urged them to reconsider.
His fresh intervention came days after the BBC apologised to Tiggy Legge-Bourke over “false and malicious” allegations made by Bashir to Spencer that she got pregnant by Prince Charles and had an abortion. She received around $240,000 in damages.
Spencer writes in Sunday’s paper: “I feel that I was groomed... shown forged bank statements; I was told of underhand payments, of spying, and of appalling deception. But, all along I was the one being deceived in order for Mr Bashir to get to my late sister.”
He added that Diana was “extremely vulnerable” when at the time because secret information was appearing in the press. He speculated that she may have been an early victim of phone hacking.
He then directly linked the interview to her death.
He added: “The agonizing lies that she was told by the BBC before their cameras finally rolled ensured that she came into that Panorama interview with a very skewed and false view of the situation she was in, having been lied to repeatedly.
“This led to her speaking in a way that set her on a course where she was without due protection when she needed it most. All those responsible must be held to account.”
He added: “I hope the police will reconsider their responsibilities in this matter. Only they have the power to get to the bottom of this terrible scandal, which led Diana to feel even more exposed and alone, and deceived her into forgoing those who cared for her and would have protected her.”
Diana ditched the U.K. police protection she was entitled to in favor of her boyfriend Dodi Fayed’s private security team after the interview.
There is also coverage of the interview in The Times, which reports that Prince William is “frustrated” at the BBC’s refusal to completely disavow the interview. Although the BBC has pledged to not show the interview in full again, it said “short extracts for journalistic purposes” were still on the cards. The Times said that William still feels “a lot of hurt and pain” over the scandal.
In a video-taped statement last year, William described his “indescribable sadness” that “the BBC’s failures contributed significantly to the fear, paranoia and isolation that I remember from those final years with her.”
The Mail said the BBC had declined to comment on Earl Spencer’s article, but did not say if it had contacted the police for comment on his appeal for a criminal investigation. The Daily Beast has reached out to Bashir’s representatives for comment.
Earlier this week, former royal nanny Tiggy Legge-Bourke accepted a damages payment of £200,000 ($238,000) from the BBC over “false and malicious claims” Bashir made to Diana that Prince Charles had had an affair with her.
BBC director general, Tim Davie, said in a statement: “I would like to take this opportunity to apologize publicly to her, to The Prince of Wales, and to the Dukes of Cambridge and Sussex, for the way in which Princess Diana was deceived and the subsequent impact on all their lives. It is a matter of great regret that the BBC did not get to the facts in the immediate aftermath of the program when there were warning signs that the interview might have been obtained improperly.”
