London - A former Dragon’s Den star met around 100 young women from a ‘sugar daddy’ website for Fifty Shades of Grey experiences, he told his trial on Wednesday.
Doug Richard, 57, who is accused of paying a 13-year-old girl for sex, said he was addicted to ‘dominance and submission’ roleplay.
The former business adviser to David Cameron told the court he chatted to hundreds of young women almost every day for more than four years about his sexual fantasies on a website called Seeking Arrangements.
Richard, a father of three who called himself a sugar daddy, met about two women, known as sugar babies, every month to see ‘if they wanted to take it further’. One of those he met was the 13-year-old, who the businessman spanked and had sex with as her 15-year-old friend waited in the next room.
Richard, who accompanied the Prime Minister on a trade mission to Africa in 2011, was on Wednesday asked what his ‘arrangement’ was with the teenager. The millionaire replied: ‘Lots of sexy texting and me being dominant and a Christian Grey figure and her being submissive.’
Christian Grey is the fictional wealthy entrepreneur from Fifty Shades of Grey book.
Richard told the Old Bailey that he had been attending counselling sessions for his addiction.
‘As mortifying as it is to say, I was looking for roleplay and fantasy relationships involving dominance and submission,’ he said. ‘It was a Fifty Shades of Grey type of stuff.
‘It was secret, it was infidelity. I was cheating on my wife. It bothered me but I was also quite addicted to this.’ Richard, who has two daughters and a son, had sex with the 13-year-old girl last year after exchanging a string of sexually graphic messages with her on the internet.
In one conversation, the technology entrepreneur, who used the nickname ‘Dominant’ on the website, asked her: ‘Are you free to come to London after school?’
Richard claims he thought the girl, who is 5ft and weighs less than six stone, was 17 – despite her sending a naked picture – and says he was mortified to learn that she was 13.
However, prosecutor Gino Connor said: ‘A man of your experience must have appreciated either when you saw the picture or when you first met her that she was not 17 years old.’
Richard replied: ‘I absolutely thought she was 17. We had long, elaborate sex chats. She sent me a photo of her naked.
‘None of these raised the alarm and had they raised the alarm I would have been horrified. I’m horrified now.’ Mr Connor suggested his addiction to the sugar daddy website had been ‘out of control’. The defendant replied: ‘I cannot say.’
Richard denied paying the girl for sex, adding: ‘I was trying to be a sugar daddy type of guy. I was trying to be nice so gave her money to go shopping.’
In an unusual move, the jury passed the judge a series of questions as Richard gave evidence.
One question, which was read out by judge Richard Marks QC, said: ‘If this was your daughter would you blame the man and think what he did was wrong and that he was using the legal age, and 16 being the very youngest while still being legal, to get himself out of trouble?’
Judge Marks told Richard that he did not have to answer the question.
The entrepreneur, who received an award from the Queen for services to enterprise in 2006 and appeared in the first two series of the BBC’s Dragons’ Den, said his has ‘reputation has been shattered’.
He told the court that his company School for Startups is near bankruptcy and he has had to lay off 99 per cent of staff since his arrest 12 months ago.
The entrepreneur, who is originally from California but lives in Islington, North London, denies three charges of sexual activity with a child, one of causing or inciting a child to engage in sexual activity and a charge of paying for sexual services.
Richard admits having sexual activity with the 13-year-old but says it was consensual and said he thought she was 16 or older.
The trial continues.
Daily Mail