When Mohamed Fayed, the billionaire owner of, variously, a shop, a football club, a hotel and a satirical magazine, died last year at the age of 94, he had twice been interviewed under police caution on suspicion of sexual assault. No charges were pressed, either in 2009, the year before he sold Harrods (he was 80 and the alleged victim was 15), or in 2013, the year he sold Fulham FC.

Having gone to his grave denying all charges, the businessman’s already-controversial reputation was forever sullied by the shocking claims of at least 150 more victims. One of their lawyers compared Fayed’s “constant and repetitive” sexual abuse with that of Jeffrey Epstein, Jimmy Savile and Harvey Weinstein, given the institutional silence that protected a powerful man for a quarter of a century.

The Telegraph London