Lucy Osborne, one of the two Guardian reporters involved in the investigation and writing of articles about Noel Clarke’s alleged conduct, has told the High Court libel trial against the paper that producer Gina Powell said she was afraid Clarke would “turn up on her doorstep”.
Clarke is suing The Guardian’s publisher Guardian News and Media over seven articles and a podcast, including the April 2021 article – co-authored by Osborne, with Sirin Kale – that said 20 women who knew him professionally had come forward with allegations of misconduct. Clarke denies the allegations.
“She [Powell] presented as vulnerable and softly spoken. It appeared to me that she was still scared of Clarke and what he could do to her,” said Osborne in her witness statement about her interaction with Powell.
“She told me that she was worried that Mr Clarke would turn up on her doorstep and noted that she was scared of going to Soho in case she bumped into him. She also told me that she was concerned about the impact that speaking out publicly could have on her career.”
Osborne said Powell told her that much of her work as producer at Clarke’s production company Unstoppable had gone unpaid, and that she had been told her pay would be reduced.
Philip Williams, representing Clarke, said the grievance was about money and not an alleged sexual assault. “We did know there was a dispute about money – I had numerous conversations with her about it,” responded Osborne, who is now a special projects correspondent at the paper. “I was convinced that wasn’t her motivation for coming forward.
“Almost groomed”
The court was shown friendly messages exchanged between Powell and Clarke in 2016, including an image sent by her of their faces overlaid on one another.
“My reading of Gina was that she felt that she had been almost groomed by Clarke and felt that she had to participate in his banter and be friendly with him,” said Osborne, addressing the messages. Osborne added that Powell had been transparent that her relationship with Clarke had continued until she left Unstoppable in 2017, and that she had “kept up appearances with him as a form of self-protection.”
Asked by Williams if she should have asked for the messages and if they would have changed her mind about publishing the allegations, Osborne said, “I would not have changed my mind.” She also told the court she went over the allegations made by Powell against Clarke “again and again to check their consistency.”
Osborne said Powell – who gave evidence to the court last week – had told her Clarke exposed his penis to her while driving in Los Angeles in 2015 and “encouraged her to ‘go on, touch it’”, while in a separate incident he is alleged to have cornered her in a lift and “grabbed her vulva”.
A friend of Powell’s later told Osborne that Clarke had grabbed Powell’s breasts or crotch. In court, Williams asked Osborne if it troubled her that the accounts were “somewhat different”, to which Osborne responded “the confusion she had was only around the location that it happened.”
According to The Guardian’s own reporting of the trial, Osborne also said in her witness statement she was “taken aback by the number of possible leads we received following the first article.”
“By way of example, at least 25 new sources came forward between publication of the first article and the fourth article – a 24-hour period,” said Osborne.
”Our sources were also connecting us with people who had reached out to them. This volume of leads was far larger than I have experienced on any investigation before or since, including articles I have written about individuals more well-known than Clarke.”
Speaking to the court on Tuesday, April 1, Osborne said the investigation received “so many leads that it was impossible to follow up all of them”.
In her witness statement, Osborne also said several sources who did not know each other said Clarke had used the same language in his communications with them, including saying that he wanted to “climb them like a tree”. Osborne described this as ”a term that I felt was so specific it was unlikely to be a coincidence.”
Paul Lewis, The Guardian’s head of investigations, gave further evidence on Tuesday, and objected to Williams’ suggestion that the paper’s confidential sources were “conspirators” in a smear campaign against Clarke.
“There were people in the group who had strong views about Mr Clarke,” said Lewis. “As [with] any cross-section of society, there are different types of personalities.
“I don’t think there was anyone in the group who had motives towards Mr Clarke that were untoward or couldn’t be explained by their personal connection to the allegations. All of our sources behaved in a manner that I think spoke to their credibility.”
Lewis said he did not believe there were problems with the investigation into the allegations.
The hearing before Justice Steyn is due to conclude later this month, with a decision expected in writing at a later date.
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