Brave Australian woman who helped lock Rolf Harris behind bars goes public: "Bad day with a dirty old man"
An Australian woman has bravely unveiled her mask of anonymity to tell the harrowing story of her own molestation by disgraced entertainer, Rolf Harris.
Suzi Dent was an anonymous character witness who testified in Harris’ trial in the UK.
She aided in putting him behind bars after he was charged with 12 counts of indecent assault of girls and a young woman between 1968 and 1986.
Ms Dent told ABC’s 7.30 she was just 24 when she met Rolf as a make-up artist after being offered the opportunity to work at a Channel 7 studio.
While she said she was “very excited” to meet the TV star back in 1986, she now looks back at that “bad day with a dirty old man,” with no fondness.
“I had an all-day groping experience with a man who couldn't keep his hands off me,” she said.
“As soon as he sat in my make-up chair - I was wearing baggy pants at the time, baggy shorts - he'd run both hands up my legs all the way up my shorts right up to my thighs.
“He would grab the leather belt and pull me towards him so he could crotch-grind, which never quite happened, but he certainly tried.”
The situation caused her to freeze up.
“I didn't jump or move or anything like that, because it's my job as a make-up artist to not upset the talent,” she explained.
“So if I had said something to him or, you know, slapped his hand away - which I might add is not what we did in 1986 - it was not acceptable behaviour for women to stand up for themselves like that, they had to cop it on the chin and grin and bear it and be polite.”
Ms Dent further explained the actor had made “disgusting” comments about her legs and body, making her feel like a “piece of meat.”
“I had a rip in my shorts, and he was trying to stick his fingers in there. I'd slap his hand away like he was a naughty boy,” she said.
“No one did anything to stop him, and I couldn't fight back because the number one rule back then – and now - was you never upset the talent.
“I had to be a good little girl, and it was the mentality that boys will be boys.”
Ms Dent as a young woman
Despite confiding in a colleague for comfort and support, the former makeup artist was shocked by their response.
“She said to me, much to my surprise, ''Oh, I thought you knew that - his nickname's The Octopus'',” Ms Dent recalled.
“He does that sort of thing all the time to make-up artists and he doesn't keep his hands to himself. He's like an octopus but because he puts his hands everywhere.”
Ms Dent says that when the day of horror was over for her, it was her job to remove all makeup from Harris’ face.
“There was absolutely no way I was going back into the makeup room by myself. I felt unsafe. I knew I was putting myself at physical risk if I went into the room alone with him,” she said.
“If he was going to behave like that in a room full of people, who knows what he would have done in a room with me alone. I was not stupid.
“I decided to hide in a broom cupboard. I could see up the hallway, and I saw him standing there waiting for me.
“Eventually the bosses came down and assumed I'd already left, so he was escorted out the door.'
When Harris was charged for his crimes, it came as little to surprise to Ms. Dent, and immediately contacted British authorities to see how she could help to prosecute during the trial in the following year.
“I didn't need to come forward for me, because it wasn't about me. I came forward to support the women who were little girls,” Ms Dent said.
“'I came forward for the women who were little girls when they were molested by Rolf Harris.
“All I had to do was tell the truth about a man who couldn't keep his hands off me, and what it was like and how he behaved.”
“They were little girls and there were other things that he did that he shouldn't have done, physical things, invasive things, that is just line crossing.”
Thanks to Ms Dent and other women’s accounts with similar experiences, Harris was found guilty on 12 counts of indecent assault, and was sentenced to five years and nine months in jail in 2014.
“There are women from, I think, four or five different countries around the world who say that it did [happen] and we all had very similar stories,” she said.
“I was thrilled. I was thrilled for the process. I was happy for his victims, that maybe they would get a little bit of closure now. And be happy that they came forward to tell their story.”
Harris, now 89, was released on parole in May 2017 after three years behind bars.
He now lives life as a recluse in Berkshire looking after his wife of 61 years, who has Alzheimer’s disease.