Convicted paedophile Rolf Harris has died aged 93.
The news was revealed today by three neighbours on the estate where Harris lived in Bray, Berks, who told our sister paper, The Mirror, he had died either Wednesday morning or Tuesday evening.
A fourth resident from the area said he had seen a sudden influx of carers into Harris' mansion around a week ago.
A residents’ WhatsApp group for members of the estate’s Fisheries Residents’ Association, seen by the Mirror, wished Rolf “RIP” in messages.
One neighbour told the Mirror: “People around here were very conscious of what happened last time (when the Mirror revealed Rolf had walked into a local schoolyard) so they wanted it to remain quiet until all the members of his family and close friends learned about it.”
Last year, it was reported that Harris was ill with neck cancer and was unable to talk but the neighbour, a friend of Harris, said she last spoke to him about six months ago and he was able to speak.
She said: “I know he has been ill for some time. He used to be out in his garden from time to time.”
She then added that he was the “life and soul” of residents’ street parties.
Harris was said to be "gravely ill" and receiving round-the-clock care from nurses and carers on a daily basis before his death.
In 2014, he was convicted and sentenced to five years and nine months in jail for 12 indecent assaults on four underage girls between 1968 and 1986.
He was released from prison in 2017 – part-way through a re-trial on four accusations of indecent assault.
In November 2017, he appeared at the Court of Appeal in London to try and overturn his convictions and had one overturned. However, the other 11 convictions remain.
Rolf reportedly hired a private investigator, who was said to be gathering "dirt" to discredit his victims. But, in 2019, it was reported the disgraced TV personality had decided to abandon the bid to clear his name.
Harris had not spoken out publicly since his release from jail. But In a statement for Merritt’s 2022 book Rolf Harris: The Defence Team’s Special Investigator Reveals the Truth Behind the Trials, Harris said: “I understand we live in the post truth era and know few will want to know what really happened during the three criminal trials I faced – it’s easier to condemn me and liken me to people like Saville and Glitter.
“I was convicted of offences I did not commit in my first trial. That is not just my view but the view of the Court of Appeal who overturned one of my convictions. I had already served the prison sentence by the time of the appeal. I changed my legal team after the first trial, and I was told that if the truth was out there, William (Merritt) would find it and he did.
“The evidence he found proved my innocence to two subsequent juries. I’d be in prison serving a sentence for crimes I did not commit if it were not for William’s investigation. It is difficult to put into words the injustice that I feel.”
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