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BBC to pay 'significant' damages to nanny over false Charles pregnancy claims to secure interview

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Martin Bashir interviews Princess Diana in Kensington Palace for the television program Panorama in 1995.
Martin Bashir interviews Princess Diana in Kensington Palace for the television program Panorama in 1995.
Photo: Pool Photograph/Corbis/Corbis via Getty Ima
  • The BBC will reportedly pay Tiggy Legge-Bourke damages totalling over R2 million.
  • Journalist Martin Bashir allegedly convinced Princess Diana that Tiggy had become pregnant by Prince Charles to secure his explosive interview with the royal.
  • In the 90s, Tiggy Legge-Bourke was the royal nanny to Princes William and Harry and personal assistant to Prince Charles.


Earlier this year an investigation into Princess Diana's explosive interview with the BBC confirmed journalist Martin Bashir had indeed tricked the royal, thereby securing the tell-all.

Judge John Dyson said Bashir commissioned faked bank statements then showed them to the princess' brother to persuade her to appear.

Prince William said at the time, the interview "contributed significantly to [Diana's] fear, paranoia and isolation" in her final years, while Harry added: "The ripple effect of a culture of exploitation and unethical practices ultimately took her life."

Now, Tiggy Legge-Bourke, royal nanny to the princes and believed by Diana to have had an affair with Charles, will get payed over Martin Bashir's false claims implicating her.

Hoping to get the interview, Bashir allegedly convinced Diana that Tiggy had become pregnant by Prince Charles and produced a faked abortion "receipt" as proof.

"Tiggy Legge-Bourke was right at the centre of Bashir's manipulation and it is right that the damage caused to her is recognised by the BBC," a source tells The Telegraph who reports the former nanny was offered "significant" damages by the BBC, to be "in excess of £100,000" - over R2 million.

The BBC reports, however, though Martin Bashir had tricked Diana, the Metropolitan Police said they had "not identified evidence of activity that constituted a criminal offence".

He has since left his post at the BBC and said he is "deeply sorry" for the pain he has caused. 

  

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