The first of 32 scheduled witnesses for Guardian News and Media (GNM) have begun giving evidence in Noel Clarke’s libel claim against the publisher, with multiple women claiming they did not speak out about his alleged behaviour over fears of ramifications for their careers.
GNM witnesses took the stand at London’s High Court for the first time on Tuesday, March 18, the eighth day of the trial.
One actress known as Imogen (name changed for legal reasons) told the court that Clarke invited her to dinner in 2014, when she was 20. She said Clarke propositioned her for sex and offered to take photos, talked about going to brothels and tried to kiss her on the street after the meal.
In a witness statement, she described Clarke as being “sexually threatening” which made her “frozen” and “scared”. In describing why she never spoke out about the incident, she said: “I was just starting to experience success and I was terrified it would be taken from me.
“I would have liked to speak up, but I was afraid of what could happen if I did, so I accepted that as a young woman in the industry, I would have to sit down and stay quiet.”
Clarke denies ever having been to a brothel and said Imogen was flirting with him by putting on his glasses and suggesting to be his secretary. “What I meant was, ‘I could work for you, I could get involved and help’,” Imogen told the court.
Clarke offering to take pictures of them having sex “was the most frightening part,” said Imogen. “The idea of someone not only wanting to have sex with me – he wanted to take photos and film it. I remember thinking: how do I get out of this situation?”
She added that she lied about being a teenager in the hope that “it might deter him”; and that after she mentioned Clarke’s wife and children, the actor-filmmaker banged his fist on the table while “his face showed a lot of anger”.
Joanne Hayes worked alongside Clarke as a costume assistant on Doctor Who. Hayes told the court that Clarke made sexual comments to her while they were alone in his trailer on the set of the BBC show in 2004.
“I asked Noel if he had his costume. He invited me into the trailer and I thought nothing of it. Then there was a complete flip of tone and from nowhere Noel remarked on my having long hair,” said Hayes in a witness statement.
“He said something like: ‘I like girls with long hair. It’s nice to have something to hold on to when I do them from behind.’ This wasn’t in a jokey or cheeky tone. It was clearly sexual and I understood it as being a sexual advance to me.”
Philip Williams, representing Clarke, asked Hayes why she had not said anything to others about the incident at the time. “I was making my way up the industry,” replied Hayes.
“You are only ever as good as your last job, as they say, and I didn’t want this to be part of my experience as far as anyone was concerned wanting to employ me in the future.”
“Keep her mouth shut”
Witnesses for Clarke finished giving evidence on Monday, March 17. Philip Dore, a childhood friend of Clarke’s who worked for Clarke’s production company Unstoppable in 2014 and 2015, said in his witness statement that he saw Gina Powell touch Clarke “in a friendly way on his buttocks”, according to the Guardian’s reporting of the trial.
Powell is one of the women who have made allegations against Clarke, and is set to give evidence for GNM. At the time of the incident Dore referred to, she was a producer at Clarke’s company Unstoppable.
Under cross-examination by Gavin Millar KC for GNM, Dore denied saying to Powell on a separate occasion that she was “asking for it” by wearing a short skirt and that she “shouldn’t wear short skirts around Noel”.
He also denied that when he met Powell in 2017 and heard that she had left Unstoppable, he had advised her “to leave quietly and keep her mouth shut”. Dore said: “I categorically did not tell Gina to keep her mouth shut.”
Dore told the court that Clarke had been “very protective” of Powell, treating her like “a little sister” because she was a woman working in the film industry, he knew one of her family and “wanted her to be treated with respect”.
The Guardian has also reported that at least five of the 15 people who were supposed to give oral evidence in support of Clarke’s claim will no longer be doing so.
They include former EastEnders actor Nabil Elouahabi, who was due to be cross-examined on Monday; while a summons has been sent to actor Arnold Oceng, who appeared in Clarke’s films Brotherhood and Adulthood. Millar said Oceng was not living at his given address and had not responded to a WhatsApp message. The reasons for witnesses not appearing have not been disclosed in court.
An application for GNM to add another witness, Anita (not her real name), was rejected by the judge, Mrs Justice Steyn, on Monday after Clarke’s legal team opposed it. Millar said that Anita had come forward in response to media coverage of the trial, and that her proposed evidence included that Clarke put pressure on her to allow him to take an explicit photograph of her in a public place in Soho House, central London.
Steyn said that while Anita’s evidence was “of some importance”, it was not critical given the other evidence available and could delay the trial.
Clarke is suing GNM over seven articles and a podcast, including an article in April 2021 that said 20 women who knew him professionally had come forward with allegations of misconduct.
The hearing is due to conclude in April, with a decision in writing expected at a later date. GNM is defending its reporting as being both true and in the public interest.
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