Paul Gambaccini, Jimmy Saville’s former BBC colleague, has voiced some of the most shocking claims yet surrounding the depraved presenter, suggesting that in addition to being attracted to underage girls Savile was also a necrophiliac.
Describing Savile’s sexual preferences as ‘under-age subnormals’ Gambaccini said lurid rumours first swirling around Savile first came to his attention in the eighties – but professed shock that neither the authorities nor media had acted upon them.
Gambaccini’s co-presenter Nicky Campbell was caught off guard by the remarks, saying: “'That particularly lurid accusation that you have just brought to people's attention is one that has not been in the public domain.”
The presenter then clarified: “The expression I came to associate with Savile's sexual partners was either one used by production assistants or one I made up to summarise their reports ... "under-age subnormals".
“He targeted the institutionalised, the hospitalised - and this was known. Why did Jimmy go to hospitals? That's where the patients were.”
A spokesman for Stoke Mandeville hospital, where Saville worked delivering corpses for a while, said: “We are not launching an investigation into claims that Savile was a necrophiliac. We have never received any complaints as to that nature.
“During our time, to the best of our knowledge, Jimmy was not given free access around our clinical areas and whenever he attended the hospital he would give advance notice and usually be in attendance with his fundraising team.”