Over a year after the late BBC children’s show host Jimmy Savile was named the suspect in nearly 200 cases of sexual abuse of children, it has been revealed that the number was much higher. A new report has found that there are at last 500 reports of sexual abuse against Savile.
Back in December 2012, U.K. police conducted their own investigation, naming Savile the suspect in 199 cases and 450 people in total had come forward with sexual abuse allegations against Savile, who was one of the BBC’s top stars in the 1960s. But a new report from the children’s charity NSPCC shows that it is much worse than previously thought, notes the BBC.
Most of the reported incidents happened when the victims were between the ages of 13 and 14. However, one case involved a two-year-old child. In addition, the earliest incidents bate back to the 1940s and the last came in 2007. Savile died in 2011.
NSPCC director Peter Watt told the BBC that Savile believed he was “immune,” adding, “Behind these statistics are individual children whose lives were ruined by a man who was an opportunistic sexual predator.”
As the New York Daily News notes, many of the incidents happened on BBC premises, although he also attacked victims in schools and even in hospitals.
Savile was never charged with a crime before his death. A report from the Department of Health and another from the BBC on Savile are due later in 2014.