Revealed: How Mohamed Al Fayed faked dementia to dodge intercourse abuse probe, says his son – as police examine Harrods proprietor’s ‘enablers’

Mohamed Al Fayed evaded prosecution by tricking police into believing he had dementia, one of his sons reveals today.

Omar Fayed, 37, said the deception allowed his billionaire father to escape justice over his alleged sexual crimes, now thought to involve dozens of women.

‘He got off the hook on the grounds he was mentally incapacitated,’ Omar tells The Mail on Sunday today. But the tycoon didn’t have dementia and was really ‘as sharp as a tack’.

Sources have told this newspaper that Scotland Yard, which has faced criticism for failing to bring the Harrods owner to justice, is examining the astonishing claim as part of its investigation into those suspected of assisting him in his alleged crimes.

Lawyers for the victims describe Al Fayed as a predator on the scale of Jimmy Savile, Jeffrey Epstein and Harvey Weinstein.

His youngest son, a tech entrepreneur once set to inherit Harrods, makes the dementia claim in a wide-ranging interview in which he casts light on his father’s motives.

Omar, who was ‘horrified’ by the abuse claims, said he wished the ‘investigation had been able to take its course when he was still alive’ and suggests police missed an opportunity to prosecute when allegations emerged in 2017 and 2018, when his father was in his late 80s.

One woman – who claimed she was abused by Al Fayed and made a video statement to police in 2018 – was told that Al Fayed was too old to be prosecuted and that he was not in the right state of mind because of dementia.

In 2017 Al Fayed was the subject of an exposé by Dispatches, the Channel 4 programme. In it, he was accused of sexually harassing young employees, including a 17-year-old he recruited.

At the time, there was an unsuccessful attempt to prevent broadcast on the grounds that Al Fayed was mentally incapacitated.

Last night the documentary’s executive producer Tom Porter said: ‘We had our suspicions about whether the claim about illness was genuine but were unable to verify either way.’

Bravely waiving her right to anonymity, Cheska Hill-Wood, now 50, told the programme she was a 17-year-old aspiring actress who had recently completed a photoshoot as a debutante when she was approached ‘out of the blue’ to become Al Fayed’s junior personal assistant in 1993.

Al Fayed promptly told her that his eldest son Dodi, a film producer who died with Princess Diana in Paris four years later, might be able to help her acting career.

Ms Hill-Wood went to Al Fayed’s flat where he asked her to change into a swimming costume before he filmed her, allegedly so that his son could see her ‘shape’.

He then kissed her and, after she pushed him off, barked: ‘If you don’t sleep with me, I can’t help you.’ She then fled the flat and did not return to work for Al Fayed.

Ms Hill-Wood said yesterday: ‘Hearing that he faked illness to escape justice is appalling, but totally consistent with the behaviour of this despicable individual who believed he could act with impunity. It is deeply sad for the sake of so many women that he didn’t face justice when alive.’

She said the attempt to block the programme was a ‘disgrace’ adding: ‘The legal letter said he had dementia and that we should consider his grandchildren as they’re at school. But I remember thinking at the time that I wasn’t long out of school myself when he did what he did to me.’

She said the Dispatches programme pulled no punches in its portrayal of Al Fayed but did not ignite the scandal in the same way as BBC documentary Al Fayed: Predator at Harrods did this September. ‘No doubt because by then Al Fayed was dead,’ she said. The tycoon died last year aged 94.

‘But women did come forward to the police after Dispatches, which was fantastic.’

Detectives launched a new criminal investigation last month after identifying more than five suspects who allegedly assisted the Harrods boss in carrying out ‘horrendous abuse’. It follows a surge of sex attack claims from a total of 111 victims, with the youngest said to be aged just 13.

Al Fayed was arrested in 2013 over a rape allegation, but never charged.

TV producer Keaton Stone, whose six-year investigation led to the BBC documentary, is among those who have publicly criticised the Met.

He was angry that officers declined to pursue his wife Sophia’s sexual assault case against Al Fayed in June 2021. Officers cited ill health as the reason Al Fayed was unfit to face charges.

Detectives are now investigating accusations of rape, sexual assault and trafficking spanning almost four decades, from 1977 to 2014.

An internal Met Police review is also being carried out into how the force handled claims about Al Fayed while he was alive, amid allegations of corruption and reports that officers were taking bribes to allow him to continue preying on Harrods staff.

Scotland Yard approached the Crown Prosecution Service on five occasions between 2005 and 2023 about Al Fayed, but in each case no charges were brought despite mounting concerns about predatory behaviour.

The Met declined to comment on the dementia claim but has said in a statement: ‘No criminal charges were brought against Al Fayed while he was alive and we recognise the impact this has had on many victims.

‘From the review so far, it is apparent that past investigations were extensive and conducted by specialist teams who sought charging decisions from the CPS on two occasions.

‘However, we know that contact with and support for some victims at the time could have been improved.

‘Only after completing this comprehensive review will we fully understand what could have been done differently.’