George Galloway, the controversial Scottish politician and TV personality, has said he was “relentlessly” and “physically” stalked by the real-life Martha from Baby Reindeer.
In a clip from a Piers Morgan Uncensored interview, Galloway said the stalking took place in the late 1980s and involved Fiona Harvey calling him “hundreds of times” and “showing up probably hundreds of times at the most inappropriate places.”
“At my office, wherever she discovered that we were, me and my staff and my inner circle, she would breeze in,” he added, saying it began when he was first elected MP for Glasgow Hillhead.
Asked by Morgan if Harvey had ever threatened him, he replied, “No,” but acknowledged he was afraid at times she would harm him. “Yeah, I think when someone’s obsessive, you’re always afraid that obsession might take a sudden twist and potentially a dangerous twist but she never did harm me or threaten to harm me,” he added. “She was just in my life when I didn’t want her to be… The last time I saw her would be around early 1990s. And I hadn’t seen her again until I saw her on the show.”
Galloway said he knew lawyer Laura Wray and her husband Jimmy Wray, another former Labour MP, both of whom have also alleged they were stalked by Harvey. The Scot, who recently launched a political party, is running in next week’s general election and has appeared on the likes of Celebrity Big Brother, said Harvey’s behavior took place “when stalking was up close and personal because there was no emails, there was no texting.” “You had to either phone someone on their landline or turn up at the door,” he added. “That’s real stalking and that’s what she did to me.”
Harvey, who has been identified as the inspiration for the character played by Jessica Gunning in Richard Gadd‘s Baby Reindeer, is suing Netflix for $170M over defamation and negligence. She has also appeared on Morgan’s show to argue her case. Netflix has said it will defend the case vigorously.
Rather than backing Netflix, Galloway said he “wishes her the best” in the legal action, adding: “It turns out that Netflix said she had done them [certain things] … and been certain places that she hadn’t.”