PAEDO'S WIFE DEAD
Rolf Harris’ wife Alwen Hughes dies aged 93 one year after paedo husband’s death from neck cancer
Hughes backed her disgraced husband after he was jailed
THE wife of disgraced paedophile TV star Rolf Harris has died, aged 93 - one year after her husband.
Alwen Hughes stood by Harris when he was jailed in 2014 for 12 indecent assaults on four underage girls between 1968 and 1986.
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Her death certificate says she passed away due to a "stroke, frailty of old age, vascular dementia".
They were married for 65 years prior to Harris' death from neck cancer in May 2023.
Best known for hits Tie Me Kangaroo Down Sport and Jake The Peg, as well as a string of children's TV shows, Harris also painted the 80th birthday portrait of the late Queen Elizabeth II.
Hughes has previously been pictured in a wheelchair and was reportedly suffering from Alzheimer’s disease in her final years.
She stuck by her disgraced husband through the court proceedings and his subsequent jail term.
She attended every day of Harris' initial trial alongside their daughter Bindi - though the latter was later reported to have changed her name to Ava Reeves in a bid to distance herself from her father.
The paedophile served nearly three years in prison before being released on licence in 2017, and lived a reclusive life afterwards.
HARRIS' CONVICTIONS
Harris was convicted of 12 sex attacks on girls as young as seven and was handed a jail sentence of just under six years.
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After a jury failed to reach a verdict on further charges at a 2017 hearing, Harris' solicitor read a statement from him saying: "Whilst I am pleased that this is finally over, I feel no sense of victory - just relief.
"I am 87 years old, my wife is in ill-health and we simply want to spend our remaining time together."
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Speaking shortly after Harris’ conviction in 2014, singer Vince Hill said: “Alwen is very poorly. We’re all very worried about her.
“I don’t know if she will survive his prison term. She’s quite fragile. She suffers from arthritis and she’s had hip replacements and God knows what.”
Harris was accompanied only by his wife and their carers during his final years at his home prior to his death.
A family friend told that daughter Bindi had had "nothing to say about him for years".
It's understood Harris' health took a turn for the worse after the sudden death of his poodle earlier in 2022.
WHO WAS ROLF HARRIS?
ROLF HARRIS died in May 2023, almost a decade after he was jailed for a a string of sex attacks on children.
Prior to his crimes becoming public knowledge, the disgraced star was known for being a TV presenter, musician and artist.
Harris was born on March 30, 1930, in Perth, Australia.
His parents, Agnes and Cromwell, had emigrated there from their previous home in Cardiff, Wales.
Harris showed an interest in art from a young age and was just 16 when a self-portrait he painted was exhibited in the Art Gallery of New South Wales.
He was also a keen swimmer as a youngster.
In 1953 Harris, then aged 22, left Australia to move to England and a year later he landed a role presenting a children's art show on the BBC.
Harris married Alwen Hughes, a Welsh sculptress and jeweller, while they were both art students in March 1958.
He then returned to Australia to take on more TV work and start his music career.
It was during this stint Down Under that he first began using his famous catchphrase - "Can you tell what it is yet?" - while on a promotional tour of Australia for Dulux.
Harris returned to the UK in 1962 and re-recorded his hit Tie Me Kangaroo Down, Sport.
Tie Me Kangaroo Down, Sport was a Top 10 hit in Australia, the UK, and the United States, and Harris even performed it with The Beatles.
He went on to land a UK No1 with Two Little Boys in 1969 and a No7 hit with Stairway to Heaven in 1993.
As well as becoming famous for his music, Harris became a popular television personality in the UK in the 1960s and 1970s thanks to his roles on The Rolf Harris Show, Rolf's Cartoon Club and Animal Hospital.
In 2005 Harris, who lived in Bray in Berkshire for more than six decades before his death, painted an official portrait of Queen Elizabeth II.
Harris had one child, a daughter called Bindi, with his wife.
In 2023 it was reported that she had changed her name to Ava Reeves in an attempt to distance herself from her dead father.
At the time, private investigator and former police officer William Merritt, who authored the book Rolf Harris: The Truth behind the Trials, said of Hughes: "She's very frail."
Hughes was a jeweller and sculptress, born in North London.
She married Harris in March 1958 at St Saviour's Church in Paddington.
The pair met in art school.
Hughes grew up in Wales and is known for her eccentric clothing, as well as her decision to have a poodle as a bridesmaid.
FAMILY TORN APART
Documentary Rolf Harris: Hiding In Plain Sight, which aired on ITV in October last year, re-examined how the disgraced star was caught.
It also delved into how while some members of Harris' family cut all ties, many stuck by him, including his wife.
Daughter Bindi's initial defence of her father following his convictions came at its own price.
Notably the end of her four-year relationship with Malcolm Cox, with whom she had a son, Marlon.
In the 2023 documentary Chris Brosnan – Harris' former bandmate and 'surrogate son' – suggested his marriage was troubled long before his crimes came to light.
He claims the TV entertainer was consistently “pushing a boundary”, alleging he'd cheated on Alwen on countless occasions.
"When it came to women, it was impossible for Rolf to think about his wife and his daughter," he said.
"In front of Alwen he’d take a woman’s hand, hold their hand and pull them in closer... then he would start kissing them all the way up their arm and he’d get up to their neck and then he'd be kissing their neck."
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Chris claimed Alwen was “devastated” by his affairs and was "left suicidal" due to him constantly working away.
When Harris had an extension built on his house, Alwen was said to have “moved into the new wing” so that she was “as far away from him as she could get”.
WHY DID HARRIS GO TO PRISON?
Rolf Harris was convicted of 12 counts of indecent assault in June 2014 and was subsequently jailed for five years and nine months.
When sentencing, Judge Mr Justice Sweeney said: "Your reputation now lies in ruins, but you have no one to blame but yourself."
The disgraced star was released from prison in May 2017 part-way through a re-trial on four accusations of indecent assault, but was rarely seen in public in the period between then and his death.
The last photo of the former presenter before his death aged 93 showed him in a wheelchair after neck cancer left him needing 24-hour care.
Harris appeared at the Court of Appeal in London to try and overturn his 2014 convictions in November 2017, claiming jurors in the case were "poisoned" against him.
One conviction was overturned following his appeal, but the other 11 remain.
Harris stood trial for a second time in 2017, accused of four counts of indecent assault against three teenage girls, the youngest of who was 13, at public events between 1971 and 1983.
The retrial heard from the three women who claimed Harris molested them when they were young.
They included a woman who alleged he groped her at a music event in London when she was 14 in 1971, and a 16-year-old who told jurors he touched her inappropriately during filming of ITV show Star Games in 1978.
The 13-year-old alleged he molested her after an episode of BBC children’s programme Saturday Superstore in 1983.
Harris did not give evidence, with his lawyers saying he did not remember any of the events.
His lawyers claimed that the women were motivated by greed, coming forward after he was convicted in June 2014 of 12 counts of indecent assault.
After deliberating for just under five hours at Southwark Crown Court in London, the jury said they were unable to reach verdicts on any of the four charges and were discharged by Judge Deborah Taylor.
Harris had denied all four counts against him.
Harris was found guilty of carrying out a number of indecent assaults against children at the height of his fame.
He committed 12 indecent acts against children in a period between the 70s and 80s, where he regularly appeared on TV.
The crimes were committed against four girls - one of who was aged just seven or eight.
His trial heard that one of the victims was a childhood friend of his daughter and another a young autograph hunter.
One count of indecent assault was overturned due to an unsafe conviction in 2017.
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