Two former kitchen assistants testified in U.K. court that chef Nigella Lawson used several different drugs, including prescription pills, cannabis and cocaine "daily" for over a decade.
The two assistants, Francesca and Elisabetta Grillo, testified on Tuesday in pre-trial to the celebrity chef's drug habit, E! News reports.
The Grillo sisters are currently about to go on trial for allegedly defrauding Lawson and her ex-husband Charles Saatchi for $484,000 during their employment. Their defense is that Lawson told them to use her ex-husband's company credit card if they stayed quiet about her drug use.
Elisabetta Grillo's lawyer told Isleworth Crown court, "In a nutshell, we submit that she had a guilty secret from her husband, her then husband. She did not want him to know of her use of cocaine and that is highly relevant to the defense case."
According to Reuters, the prosecuting attorney said that the Grillo sisters' claims are "totally scurrilous" and false.
Mark Hutchinson, Lawson's publicist, said, "As proceedings are live we can't comment at the moment." Their unwillingness to speak is due to British law, which puts one at legal risk if they were to publicly comment on criminal court proceedings.
image: Wikimedia Commons
