British police arrested top publicist Max Clifford on suspicion of sexual offences Thursday, his lawyer said, adding that the man best known for helping scandal-hit celebrities would cooperate with detectives. Clifford was arrested as part of a wider investigation into sex offences sparked by allegations that late BBC presenter Jimmy Savile was a serial paedophile, although police would not specify what Clifford is accused of.
"Max Clifford is being interviewed by police. Mr Clifford will assist the police as best he can with their enquiries," his lawyer Charlotte Harris said in a statement. "When we are in a position to provide further information, we will." Clifford, 69, is one of the most influential publicity agents in Britain who has represented everyone from OJ Simpson to Mohamed Al Fayed, working closely with the press to manage, break and stop stories about his clients.
He left school with no qualifications but after a brief stint as a press officer for EMI records in the 1960s, built up his company, Max Clifford Associates, to become one of the most powerful forces in British media. Clifford becomes the latest in a string of celebrities to be arrested under a Scotland Yard investigation codenamed Operation Yewtree, after former glam rocker and convicted paedophile Gary Glitter, comedian Freddie Starr and radio presenter Dave Lee Travis.
All three have protested their innocence and Travis made clear that the allegations against him, unlike those against Savile, did not concern children. Police gave no details of the specific allegations against Clifford, saying only that he had been arrested under the strand of their investigation into suspects who had no involvement with Savile.
"Officers working on Operation Yewtree have this morning, Thursday 6 December, arrested a man in his 60s in connection with the investigation," Scotland Yard said in a statement. "The man from Surrey (near London) was arrested at 07:40 hrs on suspicion of sexual offences and has been taken into a central London police station." Police launched Operation Yewtree in October after a television documentary alleged that Savile, who died in 2011, was a predatory paedophile.