Surviving Al Fayed brother accused of Harrods sexual assaults

Ali Fayed, now 82, denies allegations made against him by three former employees. Mohammed Al Fayed’s only surviving brother has been accused of sexual assault by three former Harrods employees, who claim the incidents took place while they worked for the department store. The alleged assaults are said to have taken place in London, Switzerland, Scotland and the United States during the 1990s. Ali Fayed, 82, has denied the accusations, with a spokesperson saying he will “not be scapegoated” and that he “unequivocally denies any and all the allegations of wrongdoing”.

All three of the women have said that prior to the alleged assaults by Ali Fayed, they had also been sexually attacked by his older brother. Speaking publicly for the first time, one of the women, who had previously worked as an interior designer for the luxury store, said she was assaulted on a work trip while staying at his sprawling estate in Connecticut. Frances, who has waived her anonymity to speak to the BBC, said she began working for the Fayeds in 1989 and was soon subjected to harassment from Mohamed Al Fayed, who would grope her in work.

She was tasked with renovating his home in Scotland, which included a farmhouse belonging to his brother Ali, who she hoped would be “kinder”. While at Ali’s private office in 60 Park Lane in central London, he allegedly began his sexual abuse by “groping” and “molesting” her, before giving her jewellery and clothes. “It would be a see-saw between abusive behaviour then praise for my work and these lavish items,” she said.

She claimed that in 1992 when she flew to Connecticut to assist his wife in decorating his house, she was allegedly assaulted in the guest bedroom after Ali accosted her when she came out of the bathroom. She said that he tried to get on top of her on the bed and placed his hands “inside my bra, inside my pants” and that the attack only stopped when one of his children called out for him. When she returned to London, she claimed that Mohamed Al Fayed became verbally abusive and accused her of sleeping with his brother, telling her: “I’m done with you, go be with my brother”.

"Now I was in fear of two of the owners and I knew if I spoke out it would get worse. I could be threatened, I could be fired. I just felt I had to keep on going and, at some point, this horror would pass,” she said. She claimed that Ali Fayed sexually assaulted her again on a trip to Balnagown and recalled him “laughing” while she tried to escape his room. The following year she was fired for being in a relationship with another employee which was forbidden, with Harrods later settling a case for unfair dismissal.

Mohamed Al Fayed, who died in August 2023, has been accused of sexual assault by 111 women, which is being investigated by the Metropolitan Police. The store, under new ownership since 2010, said it hoped survivors were looking at “every appropriate avenue to them in their pursuit of justice”. The three women to come forward with allegations against his brother have said they believe he should also be investigated by police.

One of his alleged victims, Amy, had worked as a personal assistant to Mohamed Al Fayed for almost three years and said that he sexually abused her regularly, which included trying to rape her in her room during a work trip to Paris. She told the BBC that she recalled Ali Fayed coming into his brother’s office and said that he would “giggle” when speaking to her on the phone. However, around a year into the job she was told to travel with him to Switzerland as a personal assistant on his private jet, where she was driven to the family’s ski chalet.

She was left alone with him and when he suggested they go to the local swimming pool, at which point she said his demeanour changed and he became “giddy”. "He pulled me in under the water, and groped and fondled me, making me feel very, very uncomfortable - very much trapped. I was terrified thinking how am I going to get out of this,” she said. She spent the rest of the evening alone and didn’t tell anyone about the alleged assault as a “coping technique” and eventually resigned from her job.

As a result, she moved to work abroad and said: "To this day, in certain social situations, I don't want to be noticed, I try to stay invisible.". The third woman claimed that Mohamed Al Fayed’s sexual harassment had been commonplace while she was working directly for him in the Harrods’ HR department. She alleged that she was sent to Ali Fayed’s apartment, where he was waiting with a bottle of wine from the year she was born and a necklace, before he ordered her to the bedroom and allegedly subjected her to a sexual assault.