Rolf Harris trial: Entertainer denies 'ludicrous' assault claims

TV entertainer Rolf Harris has denied a string of allegations that he indecently assaulted four girls, including a friend of his daughter.

Mr Harris told Southwark Crown Court he was a "touchy feely sort of person" but said a claim he performed a sex act on his daughter's friend when she was 13 was "ludicrous".

He also denied even being at the scene for some of the other allegations.

The 84-year-old denies 12 indecent assaults between 1968 and 1986.

One woman alleges she was assaulted during an appearance by Mr Harris at the Lea Park Community Centre in Havant, Hampshire, in 1969.

But Mr Harris said he had never been to the centre, and said he "remembered very clearly" he had been filming a TV series, "Rolf's Walkabout" in the Australian outback at the time.

The alleged victim also said in evidence that Mr Harris had hairy hands, but Mr Harris showed his hands to the jury and denied they were hairy.

'Bare legs'

Mr Harris told Southwark Crown Court he also denied having visited Cambridge - where he is accused of attacking a 14-year old-girl in 1975 - until three years ago.

And the jury was shown several copies of Canadian newspapers which stated he was playing a concert in Toronto around the time of the alleged attack.

Asked about an allegation he assaulted his daughter's friend after she came out of the shower while on holiday in 1978 when she was 13, Mr Harris said: "Nope, didn't happen."

Mr Harris told the jury how on a later occasion when the alleged victim was an adult, during another visit to his family home, he had taken a cup of tea to her in the morning.

He said she "kicked the duvet off the bed" revealing her bare legs.

Mr Harris said she became "flirtatious" with him, saying: "It was a very flattering feeling for this young lady to be showing an interest in me."

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Sarah Falkland, BBC News

The huge theatricality of Rolf Harris is dominating courtroom number two at Southwark Crown Court.

The veteran entertainer has only been on the witness stand for about an hour but already he has tried to lighten the tone of his own trial, even bringing a smile to the lips of some of the jurors.

The man the prosecution say groped a string of girls has been in the witness box to demonstrate how he invented his famous wobble board and slapped paint on to a canvas.

The 84-year-old entertainer, dressed in a pinstripe suit and purple tie, performed something of a dramatic monologue for the court - as he recalled what he remembered was a "disastrous" audition for the BBC back in the 1960s.

He told the court that the producer auditioning him was dictating a letter to his secretary simultaneously - and mimicked his clipped upper class accent.

Mr Harris told the jury he touched the outside of her leg, saying: "I can remember my heart was thumping away like mad. I didn't know what to do, I left the room."

Asked if he would have touched her leg if he had not been invited to do so, Mr Harris said: "No. I find it very hard to discuss this. It's very embarrassing.

"It's just a married man, a much younger girl, I shouldn't have been doing it."

He said that on a subsequent visit to her home he had performed a sex act on her, but said it was consensual.

Asked how he felt when he started the relationship, Mr Harris said: "Illicit and a guilty feeling."

Mr Harris said there were "further" sexual encounters" between them, but added: "She seemed to be welcoming the whole business and enjoying it."

He said the relationship later "ground to a halt" and "ended in a very acrimonious way".

Mr Harris said he had at one stage met the alleged victim at a pub in Norfolk, and that she had asked for £25,000 for an animal sanctuary and threatened to go to the newspapers about their affair when he refused.

"It was like the sword of Damocles hanging over me, I kept waiting each weekend for a newspaper to destroy me," he said.

Mr Harris said during the same visit the woman - while discussing the issue of the £25,000 - had become very "irate", and at one point, while they were both in a car, she had got out of her seat and started beating him with clenched fists in the face.

He also said he had received a letter from the woman's father

"I burned the letter almost immediately. He was saying I was disgusting, he didn't want to see me or hear from me ever again," Mr Harris said.

The alleged victim is the subject of seven of the 12 charges Mr Harris faces, including six alleged assaults when she was aged 16 or under.

Jake the Peg

At the start of his evidence, Mr Harris outlined his early life in Australia, saying he had been a talented swimmer as a teenager.

He said he then started teaching but became unwell after picking up an infection while swimming in a river and became "totally paralysed".

After arriving in London in March 1952, aged 22, the entertainer said he got his break in television in 1953, despite an "appalling" audition, and was signed up by the BBC a year later.

He was asked about his musical background, telling the jury he had invented the wobble board instrument in 1959 while coating a portrait painted on a piece of hardboard with turpentine.

Mr Harris also gave details of his musical recordings, singing a section of his song Jake the Peg to the jury and demonstrating the sounds made by a didgeridoo and wobble board.