From celebrity criminal to criminal celebrity: concerning the 'celebrification' of sex crime in the UK

Introduction Our concern in this article is to explore aspects of the recent 'celebrification' of sex crime in the UK (Gamson, 1994; Harper & Treadwell, 2013). Sex crime is not a new phenomenon but recent incidents in the UK whereby various celebrities have faced allegations of sexual offending have catapulted the issue afresh into the public imagination. Whilst figures like Billy the Kid in the USA and Dick Turpin in the UK illustrate that the celebrity criminal has been around for some time, the criminal celebrity, and especially the celebrity sex offender, is a rarer more recent object of interest (Greer, 2003). In the USA, Fatty Arbuckle was tried in the 1920s over the death of a fellow actress but more recently in 2002 Michael Jackson was charged with sexual offences against children. In the UK, Paul Gadd (aka the singer Gary Glitter) and Pete Townsend (guitarist with the rock band The Who) appeared in court in 2005 and 2007 respectively for offences relating to possessing indecent images of children. In the main, however, these have figured as isolated and episodic cases of alleged celebrity sexual offending which Iyengar (1991) has suggested tend to have little social impact. More recently, in the UK, a significant number of high profile celebrities have been accused and/or arrested for sex crimes. This article explores whether the high profile and thematic, as opposed to episodic, framing of sex crimes that arises antecedent to the arrest of so many celebrities can presage any significant changes in how that form of crime, victim and offender are understood (Iyengar, 1991). Though focused on events in the UK we intend the paper to make a contribution to understanding how discourses about sex crimes may be foregrounded and reproduced in other contexts where a number of celebrity offenders may emerge and capture the public imagination. We begin by discussing some of the events leading up to a number of celebrities being accused of sex crimes in the UK. Next we explore some of the ways of understanding and conceptualising the emergence of criminal celebrities, locating this discussion in the broader context of late modernity and the risk society. From there, we explore dominant discourses about sex offenders and the implications of the celebrification of sex crime for how sex offenders and their victims are viewed. Rise of the Criminal Celebrity It is apposite to note that 'celebrity' and 'celebrity status' is the epitome of inauthenticity or constructedness (Franklin, 1999), so that defining the field of interest of this paper is not a straightforward task. It is possible to draw distinctions between celebrities (A, B C-list), people who are well-known, people who are notorious and those who are famous. Whilst noting this, here 'celebrity' is used as an all-inclusive term for those who work in the media and thereby attract public attention. The paper focuses on the recent concern with 'celebrity' sex offending in the UK arising from the death and subsequent exposure of Jimmy Savile--a BBC TV presenter and DJ, as a predatory sex offender. In October 2012, twelve months after his death, a television documentary carried allegations that not only had Savile been a predatory sex offender, but that this had been widely known and tolerated by many within the entertainment industry (Exposure: The Other Side of Jimmy Savile, 2012). The 'revelations' prompted a number of Savile's victims to come forward and for allegations to emerge and prosecutions to be instigated against other celebrities. In many instances, as in the case of Savile, some of the allegations were historical, with some dating back to the 1960s, and it was suggested they had not been thoroughly investigated or prosecuted by the authorities with any vigour at the time. In response the London Metropolitan Police launched Operation Yewtree, an investigation with three strands--into Savile himself, into Savile 'and others' he may have offended with, and into unrelated claims made against other celebrities. …