Hearing transcripts

18 December 2007 - Morning session
 
1 Tuesday, 18th December 2007
2 (10.00 am)
3 (Proceedings delayed)
4 (10.17 am)
5 (Jury present)
6 LORD JUSTICE SCOTT BAKER: Sorry about the delay, members of
7 the jury. We had a witness problem, but I think it has
8 been overcome now anyway.
9 Mr Croxford, on Thursday, we are expecting
10 Mr Willaumez to give evidence. He is a barman at
11 the Ritz Hotel.
12 MR CROXFORD: Yes.
13 LORD JUSTICE SCOTT BAKER: I understand that there may be
14 issues of privacy over his personnel file and
15 I understand that the position is that arrangements are
16 being made to have the file brought to this court so
17 that any issues can be resolved and we are not going to
18 find ourselves with no file when we need it.
19 MR CROXFORD: You are entirely right, sir. I raised it this
20 morning with your counsel. The issues are, as far as we
21 are concerned, not contentious, but we have to comply
22 with French law.
23 LORD JUSTICE SCOTT BAKER: We need not go into them now
24 anyway. They may or may not be resolved. The main
25 thing is to have the file here.

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1 MR CROXFORD: We hope they can be resolved and we will have
2 the file here.
3 LORD JUSTICE SCOTT BAKER: Thank you.
4 Yes, I call Sergeant Stoneham.
5 SERGEANT PHILIP STONEHAM (affirmed)
6 Questions from MR HILLIARD
7 MR HILLIARD: Is your name Philip Stoneham?
8 A. Yes.
9 Q. Mr Stoneham, I am going to ask you questions first of
10 all on behalf of the Coroner. Are you a detective
11 sergeant in the Metropolitan Police?
12 A. That is correct, sir, yes.
13 Q. I think you were present at the post-mortem examinations
14 that took place on 31st August 1997 at the Fulham
15 Mortuary; is that right?
16 A. Yes, I was.
17 Q. As far as documentation is concerned, did you actually
18 make any notes at the time?
19 A. No, sir.
20 Q. Shortly thereafter, did you make some notes in a pocket
21 book?
22 A. I had a -- the time that I spent as a crime scene
23 coordinator/laboratory liaison sergeant, I always had
24 a notebook of what I did day-to-day. Very much of my
25 work was from a pager, to make contact with whoever

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1 paged me, so I made the note when I received a pager
2 message and the time that that came through and what
3 the instructions were. That is the note that I have
4 made.
5 Q. So you have that original note. When would that have
6 been made?
7 A. The note in the book, I only have a copy. I do not have
8 the original note anymore. I do not know where it has
9 gone. That would have been -- the pager message would
10 have been at 2.30 on that day, to make contact with
11 the Metropolitan Police contact desk who would have
12 passed the message to me, and the instructions were to
13 attend a room at New Scotland Yard at 4.15 on that day.
14 Q. So those notes would have been made obviously some time
15 after 2.30 on the 31st?
16 A. Yes.
17 Q. All right. Are those the only notes that you have that
18 you made that day?
19 A. Those are the only notes that I have.
20 Q. Then, moving a long way on, 1st November 2004, do you
21 remember you were seen by two police officers -- is that
22 right -- who were just asking for your account of these
23 events on that day?
24 A. Yes, that is right.
25 Q. One of those officers took notes at the time and those

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1 notes have been typed up?
2 A. They have been transcribed.
3 Q. Do you have a copy of those with you there?
4 A. Yes.
5 Q. You have made two witness statements, is this right?
6 A. Yes.
7 Q. The first was on 31st March 2005.
8 A. That is correct.
9 Q. The second was on 21st March 2006.
10 A. Yes.
11 Q. You have copies of all of those with you?
12 A. I have.
13 Q. On 31st August 1997, you were at that time -- is this
14 right -- a detective sergeant with the Metropolitan
15 Police?
16 A. Yes.
17 Q. What was your particular role with the Metropolitan
18 Police?
19 A. I was a crime scene coordinator attached to a department
20 based at the forensic science laboratory at Lambeth. My
21 job was to coordinate scenes of -- crime scenes
22 involving murder, attempted murder, suspicious and
23 unexplained deaths, to attend post mortems involving
24 confidential inquiries and high-profile cases, fatal
25 fires, potentially fatal fires, and one or two other --

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1 within the remit, one or two other matters; to attend
2 all scenes and post mortems to do with those cases.
3 Q. You have told us that at half past 2 or so -- is this
4 right -- on the afternoon of 31st August, you had a call
5 telling you to go to New Scotland Yard?
6 A. Yes, I did.
7 Q. Were you actually on call at that time?
8 A. Yes, I was on call that weekend, yes.
9 Q. Did you go to New Scotland Yard?
10 A. I did.
11 Q. Now as far as the call is concerned -- I am looking
12 at the notes of the meeting with you on
13 1st November 2004 -- that says that you received a call
14 from Superintendent Rees. Do you see that, third
15 paragraph on the first page?
16 A. Yes, indeed.
17 Q. Is that as you remember it?
18 A. I actually don't remember who called me or who I spoke
19 to. What I do know is that whoever had called me,
20 I would have received the pager message because that is
21 how the on-call system worked for out of hours and
22 weekends.
23 Q. But it looks as if, doesn't it, at 1st November 2004,
24 you thought that the contact was from Mr Rees?
25 A. It may well have been. It also may well have been from

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1 him via a contact desk at New Scotland Yard. I am not
2 really sure. I really don't remember.
3 Q. Right. Who was present at the meeting at
4 New Scotland Yard?
5 A. I believe that certainly Inspector Sharp and
6 Sergeant Wall. I know that my notes of the -- the notes
7 of the meeting and 1st November suggest that
8 Superintendent Rees was there. I am really not sure
9 whether he was or he was not or whether I saw him at
10 the mortuary.
11 Q. But it looks as if, as at 1st November 2004, your
12 recollection was that he was there.
13 A. My recollection was that he was there, yes.
14 Q. What was discussed at that meeting?
15 A. Again, my memory is a little hazy, but it -- from
16 the statements that I have made, I think that it was no
17 more than to tell me that we were going to go to Fulham
18 Mortuary to deal with two post mortems.
19 Q. Looking again towards the bottom of the first page of
20 the notes of the meeting with you on 1st November of
21 2004, there is reference there to a "special post
22 mortem". Do you see that?
23 A. Yes.
24 Q. What did you understand by a "special post-mortem
25 examination"?

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1 A. Special post mortems, for the time that I spent doing
2 this work, was that police personnel would be present
3 and a forensic pathologist would conduct the post
4 mortem, as against a routine post mortem where no police
5 personnel were present, and they would have been
6 conducted by the mortuary technician and a pathologist,
7 not necessarily a forensic pathologist. Those are
8 the two distinct differences and those are the only two
9 that I know of.
10 Q. Was a decision made at that meeting, the 4.15 one at
11 New Scotland Yard, about the post mortems to be special
12 ones?
13 A. I have no idea.
14 Q. If you look towards the bottom of that page, there is
15 a passage that says this, in the last paragraph, at the
16 beginning of it:
17 "It was decided that a special post mortem was to be
18 carried out on both bodies. I do not know who actually
19 made the decision and I played no part in this myself,
20 but it was decided that they would be specials because
21 there was a police investigation into their deaths and
22 also because of the sensitivity surrounding the
23 examinations. A special post mortem is carried out by
24 a forensic pathologist and usually takes place where
25 the death is a suspicious one."

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1 Do you see that?
2 A. Yes, that is right.
3 Q. If you turn over the page, you will see the next
4 paragraph says:
5 "We all arrived at Fulham Mortuary at around
6 5.30 pm."
7 So, forgive me, it looks as if you are saying in
8 these notes that a decision has been made before you all
9 get to Fulham Mortuary.
10 A. Indeed it may well have been as I took no part in that
11 decision before I even arrived at New Scotland Yard.
12 Q. So that was not a decision that was made in the meeting
13 at which you were present?
14 A. Again, memory is hazy, but not that I recall.
15 Q. All right. Were you present then at the mortuary when
16 both examinations took place, the one on
17 Mr Dodi Al Fayed and the one on the Princess of Wales?
18 A. Yes.
19 Q. Samples were taken, is this right, in each of those
20 examinations?
21 A. I believe so, yes.
22 Q. Now as far as what kind of samples were taken at the
23 post-mortem examinations, do you remember anything said
24 to you about that by anyone?
25 A. From the 1st November notes, I have made mention that

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1 Superintendent Rees said that samples would be taken
2 relating to road traffic accident. I actually have no
3 recollection now of any of that conversation.
4 Q. No, but it looks as if you must have done on
5 1st November 2004.
6 A. Yes, indeed.
7 Q. The passage in the note there reads:
8 "Superintendent Rees told us that he had been given
9 a directive that the only samples to be taken at the
10 post-mortem examinations of both Diana,
11 Princess of Wales and Dodi Al Fayed would be those taken
12 at any routine road traffic accident post mortem."
13 A. Yes, that is correct.
14 Q. As I say, that is plainly what you must have recollected
15 at the November 2004 meeting, but have you any
16 recollection of that conversation now?
17 A. No.
18 Q. Can you help us with this? The pathologist presumably
19 would be able to take whatever samples he wanted?
20 A. Yes.
21 Q. Do you remember the coroners being present during
22 the examinations?
23 A. I think Dr Burton, the Fulham coroner, was present at
24 both post mortems, and my notes show that -- or
25 the meeting I have and the statements I have made show

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1 that Mr Burgess, the Surrey coroner, was present
2 certainly for Mr Al Fayed's post mortem, but I do not
3 have any memory of that now.
4 MR HILLIARD: Right. Yes, thank you very much.
5 LORD JUSTICE SCOTT BAKER: Mr Mansfield?
6 MR MANSFIELD: Yes, thank you.
7 Questions from MR MANSFIELD
8 MR MANSFIELD: Good morning. My name is Michael Mansfield
9 and I represent Mohamed Al Fayed.
10 I am sorry to tax your memory over matters. I will
11 try to do it as little as possible. I think you have
12 the materials before you.
13 Your job in 1997 primarily was to coordinate crime
14 scenes for all suspicious deaths in London. That was
15 primarily your --
16 A. Primarily. There were other criteria for which I would
17 be required to either attend a scene or a post mortem
18 for, yes.
19 Q. That included your attendance -- that is coordinating
20 crime scenes -- at post-mortem examinations where
21 the person had died in suspicious circumstances?
22 A. Usually, in suspicious circumstances.
23 Q. Yes.
24 A. But there was, as I say, another criteria for which
25 I would be asked to attend, and indeed would attend on

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1 a direction on --
2 Q. Yes, I follow that. Really, so that you know, I do not
3 want you to be wondering why I am asking the questions.
4 The reason I am asking the questions is if you can help
5 us about the policy background to your attendance on
6 this occasion, both at New Scotland Yard and at
7 the post mortem. Appreciating that you get a call, you
8 now don't remember whether it was directly from
9 Superintendent Rees or indirectly, via the call desk, as
10 it were?
11 A. Well, my -- the papers I have in front of me, there is
12 the transcription saying that Superintendent Rees called
13 me. My notebook, for which I have a copy, shows that on
14 31st August at 2.30, I received a call from contact
15 desk, and I would say that -- and it was normal for an
16 officer to call the contact desk, to call the lab
17 sergeant --
18 Q. To get you there?
19 A. To get me there or to get me to call them. So it would
20 have been the contact desk that would have called me,
21 and whether or not I rang Superintendent Rees or rang
22 them back, I cannot remember.
23 Q. No, I understand. It is a long time ago. However,
24 it is the next stage: you go to New Scotland Yard and
25 Superintendent Rees is there.

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1 A. He may have been. He may not have been.
2 Q. Why do you have a question mark over his presence?
3 A. Simply because I do not remember whether I met three
4 people or two people. It is as simple as that.
5 Q. When the notes were taken of an interview with you by
6 the Paget officers in November 2004, did you have your
7 notes with you, the ones you have there?
8 A. These notes? No. It was purely from memory.
9 Q. But it would be fair to say from the notes that
10 the officers took of the interview with you then, that
11 there was in fact, according to the notes, no question
12 from you about whether there were two or three people,
13 was there? If you read it, it says:
14 "Present at that briefing were Graham Sharpe,
15 Dick Wall [then there is in brackets that the officers
16 wanted to know the ranks of those two] and
17 Superintendent Rees."
18 Then somebody says "Anyone else present?"
19 A. That was my recollection in 2004, yes.
20 Q. Has anyone told you before coming here today that, in
21 fact, Superintendent Rees does not admit that he went to
22 New Scotland Yard first?
23 A. No.
24 Q. So, you are unaware of that difference of recollection?
25 A. I am.

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1 Q. All right. Then a meeting such as this about a case as
2 important in one sense as this because, if for no other
3 reason, of the people involved, some sort of record
4 would have to be kept at New Scotland Yard, wouldn't it?
5 A. Not necessarily. If I had attended at 4.15 to be told
6 that I was to go to Fulham Mortuary for whatever time,
7 I do not think that that is necessarily a note to say
8 that that is where we were going. That decision would
9 already have been made.
10 Q. Exactly. Yes, I understand that. What I am suggesting
11 is, just for a moment, that if any decisions had been
12 taken before you got there, the decision-making process
13 at New Scotland Yard would have to be recorded, wouldn't
14 it?
15 A. I do not know. I do not know. I do not know what
16 the -- I was not attached to the department that dealt
17 with this on Sunday 31st August.
18 Q. Which department was dealing with it on Sunday
19 31st August as far as you understood it?
20 A. As far as I recall, it was the specialist operations
21 major incident team where these two or three people that
22 I met were attached to. I was not part of that
23 department.
24 Q. No, I do not suggest you were.
25 A. So, I do not know what -- I do not know what notes they

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1 would have made or had not made. I have no idea.
2 Q. All right. We have not been shown any notes of
3 a decision log in relation to this. We have now
4 a policy document, but it does not start until the next
5 day.
6 So just continuing -- and I am sorry to press you
7 a little on this -- because when you came to make
8 a statement -- you have it in front of you -- a proper
9 statement a year later on 31st March -- do you have that
10 in front of you?
11 A. Yes, I have.
12 Q. If you kindly look at the first page -- it is only
13 a very short statement anyway. If you look at that
14 statement, is there any mention there of any meeting at
15 New Scotland Yard at all?
16 A. No, there is not.
17 Q. No.
18 A. But --
19 Q. Don't worry. I am going to take it in stages.
20 A. Okay.
21 Q. In other words, what it says, so that it is clear, is
22 that you got a call to attend, but --
23 A. Yes, I received a call to attend New Scotland Yard.
24 Yes, it does say that, and having met at
25 New Scotland Yard.

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1 Q. "I was advised of two post mortems later that day at
2 Fulham Mortuary."
3 A. Yes.
4 Q. That is all it says.
5 LORD JUSTICE SCOTT BAKER: Well it says:
6 "I received a call to attend New Scotland Yard and
7 meet Detective Inspector Sharp. Having met Mr Sharp,
8 I was advised of two post mortems later that day."
9 A. My notes that I made after the pager message and before
10 I went to New Scotland Yard says that that is where
11 I was bid to go.
12 MR MANSFIELD: Yes, I appreciate that. The question is: in
13 that one, there is no reference to what decisions were
14 taken about the nature of the post mortem or
15 the presence of Mr Rees, is there?
16 A. No. There is no mention of either.
17 Q. Then if you look at your next statement in March 2006,
18 there is a mention of the briefing in a little more
19 detail. This is 2006, March, so. Your first, as it
20 were, interview, 2004; then a statement in 2005; then
21 another statement in 2006.
22 A. Yes.
23 Q. Just the two paragraphs:
24 "In my time as a lab sergeant, I was only ever
25 called upon to attend post-mortem examinations when

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1 the examination to be conducted was a 'special' one."
2 Is that right?
3 A. That is right.
4 Q. "In this particular case, I attended New Scotland Yard
5 for a briefing at approximately 4.15 ... and was
6 instructed to attend Fulham Mortuary in my role as
7 laboratory sergeant."
8 It says here:
9 "At no time did anybody tell me that I was going to
10 be attending two 'special' post mortems. It was purely
11 an assumption on my part, bearing in mind my previous
12 involvement ..."
13 Then the sentence:
14 "The only people present at this briefing were
15 Dennis Sharp, Dick Wall and myself."
16 The one name that is omitted from this one is Rees
17 again. Do you see that?
18 A. Yes.
19 Q. Not "I am not sure how many", but it was a very
20 categoric statement omitting Rees; "The only people
21 present ..."
22 A. Yes.
23 Q. But Mr Rees, you think, probably was present?
24 A. Well, the second -- the 21st March statement was
25 18 months on from the meeting I had on

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1 1st November 2004. I did not have the benefit of these
2 notes, I was never given a copy of these notes, and both
3 were purely from memory.
4 Q. I accept that.
5 A. In fact, almost two years on from that, I actually could
6 not tell you who was or who was not there.
7 Q. I just want to ask you about the one in 2006. Do you
8 remember who came to see you about the one in 2006 and
9 why they were taking another statement from you? Did
10 they say why they wanted another one?
11 A. I remember who came to see me. I have no idea why they
12 came to see me.
13 Q. Who was it who came to see you in March 2006?
14 A. I think it was a Sergeant Head and a Sergeant Grater,
15 I think.
16 Q. Right. Now, just going back to the notes in 2006. If
17 you look at the document to your left there where you
18 deal with -- having dealt with who was present:
19 "There was not a great deal of time to have an
20 in-depth briefing, so really it was just to inform us
21 that Diana, Princess of Wales and Dodi Al Fayed had been
22 killed in a road accident in France, that their bodies
23 were being flown into Northolt Airport and that they
24 would be going to Fulham Mortuary where the post mortems
25 would take place. To [your] knowledge, nothing was

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1 recorded regarding this briefing."
2 That is that paragraph. Then it begins as was read
3 out. I do not want to keep repeating what was read out
4 except this:
5 "It was decided that a special post mortem was to be
6 carried out."
7 Do you see that?
8 A. Which paragraph?
9 Q. The bottom paragraph, "It was decided ..."
10 A. Yes.
11 Q. So the impression that you are giving in November 2004,
12 would you agree, is that a decision either had been
13 taken or was taken while you were there and that is how
14 you knew that it was a special post mortem? Do you
15 follow?
16 A. I follow what you are saying.
17 Q. In other words, quite different to the statement in
18 March 2006, where it says "at no time did anybody tell
19 me that I was going to be attending ..." Do you follow?
20 A. Yes, I do indeed follow.
21 Q. I am wondering how this difference came about.
22 A. As I tried to explain, there is a gap of 18 months.
23 I did not have the benefit of the transcribed notes of
24 the meeting on 1st November until after I made this
25 statement and I do not recall, now, which one it is.

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1 Q. The one in 2004, albeit still a little time afterwards,
2 is your first time you have been asked, unless there is
3 an earlier time -- was November 2004 the first time that
4 you had been asked to recollect?
5 A. Yes.
6 Q. So the chances are that that is more likely to be
7 a better recollection than ones that come two years
8 later.
9 A. It would -- I could not disagree with you.
10 Q. No. One other aspect, looking at that bottom paragraph,
11 that was in your recollection in 2004:
12 "It was decided that they would be specials [that is
13 special post mortems] because there was a police
14 investigation into their deaths."
15 That was your understanding?
16 A. That would have been my recollection at the time --
17 Q. And of course --
18 A. -- but I would not have known what kind of police
19 investigation that was going to be.
20 Q. Of course. I appreciate that and please understand I am
21 not being critical of your position at all.
22 So it looks as though, from this note of your
23 recollection, that you either were informed or were
24 present when a decision was taken that they would be
25 specials because of a police investigation?

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1 A. And, indeed, a special post mortem with police personnel
2 present would have made it a police investigation,
3 regardless of any other investigation that would have
4 been before or after.
5 Q. Exactly.
6 A. The fact that police personnel were going to be at
7 the post mortem is in itself, however small, an
8 investigation. So it may have been that to which I was
9 referring. I have no idea.
10 LORD JUSTICE SCOTT BAKER: So by your definition of
11 "special", once you are at the post mortem, you are
12 a police presence and therefore it is special?
13 A. Yes.
14 MR MANSFIELD: And the officers who asked you to go would
15 realise that, wouldn't they?
16 A. If I did not play any part in taking that decision, one
17 assumes they had made that decision before I arrived.
18 Q. I appreciate that. I am going to broaden it just
19 slightly. At this briefing, were you led to believe by
20 anyone present that in fact the death was regarded as
21 suspicious and that is why you were there?
22 A. No.
23 Q. Well, is it the case that it is "no" or you cannot
24 remember? Do you follow? There is a difference,
25 obviously.

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1 A. I do, but what I would reply is had there been any
2 suggestion that this was going to be suspicious, I would
3 have been much more involved in a coordinating role and
4 would have made notes for evidence for some later time.
5 Q. I appreciate. But then you were told at the mortuary,
6 is this right, that this -- by the time you had got
7 there, Mr Rees was saying, "Well, actually we are going
8 to treat it as road traffic"?
9 A. These notes and statements suggest that, yes.
10 Q. Now if you go back to your statement in 2005, is there
11 any reference there to being told, by Rees, about any
12 directive?
13 A. No, I do not think there is, no.
14 Q. So it is only in the later statement in 2006 that it
15 reappears, it having been in the notes in 2004, that
16 "Rees told me that he had received a directive that
17 the only samples to be taken ..."
18 Now, can you help about this? The sampling that in
19 fact took place, was it ordinary sampling or special
20 sampling? Do you appreciate the difference I am putting
21 to you? Do you remember in fact what happened?
22 A. I do not remember what happened. I do not remember what
23 samples were taken.
24 Q. What would be the samples that would normally be taken
25 on a special?

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1 A. The standard post mortem samples for a special post
2 mortem start from the head and really go from head to
3 toe.
4 Q. Head to toe. I appreciate again there is a time lapse.
5 If you need to look at the notes -- you were asked this
6 question in November 2004. I am afraid the pages are
7 not numbered but it is the third page, bottom paragraph.
8 A. Yes, I see.
9 Q. Do you see, it says:
10 "In a normal special post mortem, the standard
11 samples are head hair, mouth swabs, pubic hair,
12 finger nails, blood for DNA, blood for toxicology, urine
13 or vitreous humour if no urine is present, liver and
14 stomach contents."
15 A. That is right, yes.
16 Q. Did that happen in this case or you can't ... ?
17 A. I do not know. I do not know.
18 Q. Those are the samples that have to be taken if it is the
19 normal special post mortem. Where do the samples in
20 a normal special post mortem go?
21 A. Forensic science laboratory.
22 Q. Forensic science. Not a hospital?
23 A. No.
24 Q. Did you play any part in the decision-making about where
25 the samples would go in this particular case? If you

22

 
1 cannot remember, I will leave it.
2 A. I really cannot remember. I mean I have read my
3 statements so I know there is reference to the samples,
4 whatever they were, went to Charing Cross Hospital, but
5 I do not know what part I played.
6 MR MANSFIELD: No, I understand. Thank you very much.
7 LORD JUSTICE SCOTT BAKER: Mr Keen?
8 MR KEEN: No questions, sir.
9 LORD JUSTICE SCOTT BAKER: Mr Croxford?
10 MR CROXFORD: Nor for me, sir.
11 LORD JUSTICE SCOTT BAKER: Mr Horwell?
12 Questions from MR HORWELL
13 MR HORWELL: Mr Stoneham, my name is Richard Horwell and
14 I appear on behalf of the Commissioner of London Police.
15 In August of 1997, you were obviously highly
16 experienced and extremely well placed to assist in these
17 post-mortem examinations.
18 A. I had been a laboratory liaison sergeant since
19 February 1996. I would like to think that I had some
20 experience.
21 Q. I hope so, Mr Stoneham. Therefore, nothing unusual in
22 your being requested to assist in these post-mortem
23 examinations?
24 A. Nothing unusual. Indeed, I think it is outlined in at
25 least one statement how the on-call rota system worked,

23

 
1 and it was me that was on call for that particular part
2 of London on that day. It could have been any one of
3 twelve of us.
4 Q. The only contemporaneous note that you have -- now
5 a copy only, not the original -- are the very few
6 references you made in your notebook at the time,
7 setting out when you were paged, when you had to go to
8 New Scotland Yard and the barest of details imaginable
9 for the post-mortem examinations themselves?
10 A. Yes, that is right.
11 Q. Who was present and when they took place?
12 A. Yes.
13 Q. That is all you have ever had to refresh your memory as
14 to the detail of what happened?
15 A. Yes.
16 Q. Now no doubt the detail cannot be easy to remember at
17 any stage when you have been asked by the police.
18 The first time was November 2004.
19 A. Yes, that is right.
20 Q. But can we assume that you obviously remember this
21 Sunday afternoon extremely well; the generality?
22 A. Its generality, yes.
23 Q. Now in terms of the briefing that you had at
24 New Scotland Yard, you have described it in your
25 interview of November 2004 in this way:

24

 
1 "It was just to inform us that Diana,
2 Princess of Wales and Dodi Al Fayed had been killed in
3 a road accident in France, that their bodies were being
4 flown into Northolt Airport and that they would be going
5 to Fulham Mortuary where the post mortems would take
6 place. To my knowledge, nothing was recorded regarding
7 this briefing."
8 A. That is correct.
9 Q. Anything unusual about that?
10 A. No.
11 Q. And time must have been pressing, Mr Stoneham, at this
12 briefing at New Scotland Yard?
13 A. Yes.
14 Q. You had to get to Fulham Mortuary?
15 A. That is right.
16 Q. Did it seem important to you at the time, or even today,
17 as to precisely who was present? You have done your
18 best to recollect --
19 A. I have done my best to recollect who it was who was and
20 who was not there.
21 Q. But either then or today, has it ever appeared to you to
22 be important as to who was present at this briefing?
23 A. No.
24 Q. Now many descriptions have been given of these events
25 generally, but in particular at Fulham Mortuary that

25

 
1 afternoon; words such as "unique", "unprecedented" and
2 "the eyes of the world on us".
3 Is that something that you agree with?
4 A. I do.
5 Q. From what happened at Fulham Mortuary that afternoon, do
6 you agree that everyone wanted to do their professional
7 best in these extremely unusual circumstances?
8 A. Yes, I do.
9 Q. There was no precedent for what was taking place?
10 A. Absolutely.
11 Q. Was this in fact something of a hybrid? No one was
12 suggesting that their deaths had been suspicious, but
13 a very formal post-mortem examination was taking place?
14 A. I think that is exactly right.
15 Q. Ordinarily two passengers in a motor car who died in
16 a road traffic accident would not have had a post-mortem
17 examination of this type?
18 A. No.
19 Q. It was purely, was it, Mr Stoneham, the fact that one of
20 those who died was the Princess of Wales that brought
21 this about?
22 A. Very high profile, very much in the public domain, yes.
23 Q. Would you agree that everyone present was extremely
24 cautious as to what was taking place?
25 A. Yes.

26

 
1 Q. We have heard from Mr Rees that, in fact, more samples
2 were taken than would normally be expected from a road
3 traffic accident, in particular, in the case of Diana,
4 stomach contents and hair.
5 Now, Mr Stoneham, it may well be that in fact you
6 have had no experience of a standard road traffic
7 accident post mortem.
8 A. No, I do not.
9 Q. You have only been concerned with special post mortems?
10 A. That is right.
11 Q. You have used the word "directive". You are not
12 suggesting that actual word was used by Mr Rees at any
13 time, are you?
14 A. No, I do not think so. I think it was my choice of word
15 rather than sort of a diktat, if you like.
16 Q. What we have heard is evidence that there came a stage
17 in these post-mortem examinations when there was
18 a discussion as to where the samples should go. If this
19 had been a suspicious death post mortem, the samples
20 would have been kept under the control of the
21 Metropolitan Police?
22 A. Indeed.
23 Q. But because this was not a suspicious death post mortem,
24 because it was a road traffic accident post mortem, the
25 contrary view was also expressed, that in such cases the

27

 
1 samples are kept under the control of the pathologist.
2 Do you remember a discussion of this nature?
3 A. I am sorry, I do not remember. I really do not
4 remember.
5 Q. The evidence that we have heard is that it was decided
6 eventually that, because this was a road traffic
7 accident, the samples would not be kept under
8 the control of the Metropolitan Police, but would be
9 kept under the control of the pathologist and would be
10 sent to a hospital. Do you remember any of that?
11 A. I do not remember. I have to take your word for it.
12 Q. May it be that it is that discussion that you have
13 remembered over all of these years, rather than any
14 other about how this post mortem was to be treated?
15 A. That may well be right, too, yes. That may well be
16 the case, yes.
17 Q. In terms of what happened, although a police officer,
18 Mr Stoneham, were you relatively independent in
19 the sense that you did not know Mr Rees?
20 A. That is absolutely true.
21 Q. Did anything unusual or untoward occur at any stage
22 during these two post-mortem examinations --
23 A. None that I recall.
24 Q. -- to cause you concern?
25 A. None.

28

 
1 Q. Did anyone at any stage suggest that their deaths had
2 been suspicious?
3 A. I do not remember that at all.
4 Q. And you have been asked about a reference in your note,
5 "It was decided that they would be specials because
6 there was a police investigation ...", there was of
7 course, at that very moment, a police investigation in
8 France into their deaths.
9 A. Indeed, yes.
10 MR HORWELL: Thank you. That is all I ask.
11 LORD JUSTICE SCOTT BAKER: Mr Hilliard?
12 MR HILLIARD: No, thank you. No questions.
13 LORD JUSTICE SCOTT BAKER: Thank you very much indeed,
14 Sergeant. That is all we require and we very grateful
15 to you for coming.
16 I think the next witness is Myriah Daniels and it
17 will just take a moment or two for her to be brought to
18 court. (Pause)
19 THE WITNESS: Good morning. Is this like being on the
20 witness stand or what? Okay.
21 MS MYRIAH DANIELS (affirmed)
22 Questions from MR HOUGH
23 MR HOUGH: Are you Myriah Daniels?
24 A. Yes, I am. Who are you, sir, please?
25 Q. My name is Jonathan Hough and I ask questions first on

29

 
1 behalf of the Coroner. After I have finished, some
2 other lawyers may have some questions for you.
3 A. Hello, Jonathan. I would like to confirm that I will be
4 given the right to make a statement.
5 Q. We will see how your evidence goes and then we will deal
6 with anything you have to say at the end with
7 the Coroner, if we may.
8 A. Right, and you are the Coroner?
9 LORD JUSTICE SCOTT BAKER: Yes, that is right.
10 A. Lord Justice Scott Baker?
11 LORD JUSTICE SCOTT BAKER: That is it.
12 A. Good morning.
13 LORD JUSTICE SCOTT BAKER: That is the jury over here. And
14 if you want anybody else to identify themselves, I am
15 sure they will.
16 A. Forgive me, I have had a difficult flight. It has been
17 a few days getting here with plane drama and I am little
18 bit punchy from jetlag and what-not and this is kind of
19 frightening any way you look at it. I am just glad to
20 be here.
21 Q. If you listen to my questions, I will try to lead you
22 through things.
23 A. Right.
24 Q. I think you are, by profession, a holistic healer?
25 A. I am a holistic healer, yes.

30

 
1 Q. We will go into what that signifies in a few moments.
2 A. Wonderful.
3 Q. In August 1997, is this right, you accompanied
4 Dodi Al Fayed and the Princess of Wales on their final
5 trip on the Jonikal and returned with them to Paris?
6 A. Yes.
7 Q. I think you made a statement to officers of
8 the Metropolitan Police in 2005. Now, can I very
9 briefly deal with a couple of media interviews just
10 because we have asked others --
11 A. Do you mind -- with your original thing about
12 the statement I gave, may I please submit to the court
13 my original statement because I have been informed that
14 something has been provided that did not have my
15 signature on it and something that included things that
16 were not quite accurate.
17 The English turn things into English-English. I am
18 an American, with a cold. But the bottom line is
19 I would love to submit this to the court because this is
20 what I can approve to both the interested party as well
21 as to the court. These are exact copies of what
22 I signed when I was interrogated by Scotland Yard and
23 whatever else has been submitted to the court or the
24 interested parties, I am not sure.
25 Q. Is this the statement dated 13th November 2005,

31

 
1 a one-page statement?
2 A. No, this is 14th November 2005.
3 Q. 13th November 2005 or the 14th?
4 A. 14th November 2005. This is my original statement and
5 I have done a copy. I brought a copy myself because
6 there are things I am not sure -- and I would prefer
7 that all parties interested only refer to this --
8 LORD JUSTICE SCOTT BAKER: Well, at the moment, the evidence
9 that you give is what you tell us in the witness box.
10 So the statements may or may not be referred to at some
11 point.
12 A. Right, okay.
13 LORD JUSTICE SCOTT BAKER: If and when they are referred to,
14 you can make sure that what is being referred to is what
15 your saying is correct.
16 A. That is important to me. Thank you, sir.
17 MR HOUGH: Now, because we have asked others about
18 interviews they have given to the media, can I confirm
19 a couple of media interviews you have given? I think
20 you gave an interview to a gentleman called
21 David Gardner, which was featured in the Sunday Express
22 in an article in August 2001, and I think you received
23 no payment to that.
24 A. It was not so much that I gave it as he tracked me down
25 in the mountains and got it out of me. I had never

32

 
1 intended to ever say anything, but he did get it and
2 I have never received payment for anything to do with
3 this event ever.
4 Q. You pre-empted one of my further questions. You also
5 participated in a Channel 5 programme called "Diana,
6 last days of a Princess", which was screened in July of
7 this year, and I think you also gave a very brief
8 interview to CNN at the end of August this year.
9 A. With Larry King Live.
10 Q. Other than those, have you given any other interviews to
11 anybody, official or unofficial?
12 A. Yes, and I would like for you to be aware of the fact
13 that what I did with Channel 5, "Last days of
14 a Princess" -- after Scotland Yard identified me in
15 their report as having been there, because nobody knew
16 I was there, and I started getting lots of calls, people
17 tracking me down, and people were offering money to me
18 right, left and sideways, and the bottom line was -- as
19 I asked "Who are you and what are you doing?"
20 Channel 5 was the only one -- it was Discovery
21 Channel, the Learning Channel, they were the only ones
22 who did not offer me money, but they offered me
23 something that they did on a documentary on World War II
24 and on 911 and I actually was impressed with what they
25 did in their re-animation of an event and I went there

33

 
1 and I did that. I was not paid for it. Matter of fact,
2 everything to do with this has cost me money. I have
3 never made money and I have been cost a lot of money and
4 I am way in the red over this. So, yes.
5 The Larry King Live thing was -- also I was called
6 to speak in Scotland at the television festival, and
7 it was not about Diana and that is why I agreed to it.
8 It was not about talking about them. It was making
9 a drama out of a crisis and it was a really wonderful
10 format and I was very proud to --
11 LORD JUSTICE SCOTT BAKER: We have a lot of ground to cover
12 today, Miss Daniels, and I think you are going to have
13 to keep to the point. It may be very tempting to talk
14 around the subject, but we have to keep on the straight
15 and narrow.
16 MR HOUGH: Can you just quickly try to answer the question
17 of whether you have given any other media interviews
18 about these events?
19 A. There was one that I did in the interest of trying to
20 make sure that what I have to say got out and I have
21 never been paid for it.
22 Q. Okay. Can I just ask you to whom that was given?
23 A. It was a company in Los Angeles who may or may not have
24 sold it. I do not know. I do know that there are
25 things out there that I never said that people have said

34

 
1 I have. I do not know.
2 Q. You have said you have not been paid for your account of
3 events. Am I right to assume that you are not expecting
4 any payment in future?
5 A. No, sir.
6 Q. Can I turn to a bit of background? The nature of your
7 discipline, your therapy, without explaining it in
8 enormous detail, is physical therapy, treating the whole
9 body, including things like massage therapy?
10 A. Physical therapy but better because I use my hands
11 instead of machines. I do not make people do it, I do
12 it for them. I have a natural gift for being able to
13 fix the human body, and one thing in that, I do treat
14 the whole person.
15 Q. Yes, okay.
16 We just needed an idea of broadly what your therapy
17 involved. I think you have been doing that for about
18 30 years.
19 A. Yes, sir.
20 Q. I think you met Dodi Al Fayed in the late 1980s and he
21 became a regular client of yours when he was in
22 Los Angeles?
23 A. Correct.
24 Q. I think you worked with him regularly, about three or
25 four times a week when he was there?

35

 
1 A. At least. It varied. Sometimes I would see him darn
2 near every day. Sometimes I would stay there. He
3 always had extra rooms in a hotel. Sometimes I would
4 stay in an extra room. So it was more than just working
5 on him for a few hours; it would be taking care of
6 people that he -- you know, his guests, a girlfriend,
7 whatever he had in his life, or sometimes it was just
8 being there to be a supportive human being and looking
9 after him, to be honest with you.
10 Q. I think he also took you occasionally on trips around
11 the world --
12 A. Yeah.
13 Q. -- including, for the summer season, on the French
14 Riviera?
15 A. Yes, sir.
16 Q. Just so that everybody is clear about this, you were not
17 a permanent employee; you would be called upon as and
18 when required by his assistant, Melissa?
19 A. Yes.
20 Q. It is apparent from what you have been saying that you
21 got to know Dodi Al Fayed over the years. In your
22 witness statement -- this is page 2 of your statement --
23 you describe him as a "caring and generous person".
24 A. Which statement is that, sir? Is that the one that is
25 in front of me here?

36

 
1 Q. We don't need to refer to it unless you disagree with
2 what is being discussed.
3 A. Okay. Which statement are you speaking about? Is that
4 my original witness statement there?
5 Q. Yes.
6 A. Okay. Go on.
7 Q. You have described him in that as a "caring and generous
8 person". Is that an accurate description?
9 A. Oh yes. He was one of the nicest people in the world.
10 I tell you what, all of you in this courtroom would have
11 like the guy if you had met him. I am telling you, that
12 is the truth. He was a nice guy and he is really
13 getting lambasted in this situation and that is not
14 fair. He was a good guy. He really was. He was a very
15 nice, caring person and he treated his employees very
16 well. Very well. He was good. He was a kind man. He
17 really was.
18 Q. You also say this in your statement, that although he
19 had "little ambition for himself, he would give women
20 what they wanted".
21 A. Okay, you need to refer to my original witness
22 statement, sir, because you are reading from one that
23 I did not write. You know, that is not quite what
24 I said and what you are reading from is not -- so I want
25 you to be aware of that. That is not the one that

37

 
1 I gave. Okay.
2 He was very giving to women and tried to take care
3 of them and do the things that they wanted, but -- yes,
4 he was a giving and caring man but you are reading from
5 the wrong one.
6 Q. Let's hear it from your own mouth. I think the picture
7 you are giving is of somebody who was very generous and
8 giving with any girlfriend he happened to have. Is that
9 fair?
10 A. Oh, yes. Yes, yes. He would, like, dote upon them, but
11 he would always withdraw and give them their space when
12 they needed it. Okay? He was giving, but respectful at
13 the same time.
14 Q. We know that Dodi Al Fayed spent quite a lot of his time
15 in Paris as a base in the time before he died. Do you
16 know what his long-term plans were in terms of where he
17 might choose to live?
18 A. Yes.
19 Q. Can you give us those?
20 A. You guys, look, he had the advantage of money. He could
21 go wherever the heck he wanted. He was in London, he
22 was in Paris and he really enjoyed America. But if you
23 could go to all of these places, do you really think you
24 are going to go just live in one place? Come on. He
25 enjoyed -- I say, "enjoyed" as in he had the ability to

38

 
1 live wherever he wanted. He would always have continued
2 to travel around the world to everywhere he could go.
3 It was generally kind of like what he had access to:
4 London, Paris. America was a place where he could be on
5 his own with full autonomy, that is a fact, and it was
6 a nice experience for him to be in America because he
7 had complete autonomy there, by and large.
8 However, he is not somebody that would live in one
9 place, somewhere like me. I would love to come and live
10 in London, but --
11 Q. Okay. Can I hold you up there and ask you something
12 specific? There have been discussions, evidence, about
13 the fact that he was looking into buying a property
14 which had formerly been owned by various famous people
15 in California. Were you aware of that plan?
16 A. They had been looking for a place to buy for years and
17 this was one that they had settled on, and I --
18 Q. You say "they" --
19 A. I happen to know the former owners of that property,
20 interestingly enough. Life is a curious experience,
21 okay? I am clear his father was buying it, not him.
22 But they had been looking for a place in America for
23 a long time. Dodi had rented many houses. He usually
24 stayed in hotels when he was there, but they had been
25 looking for it for years; just like they had looked for

39

 
1 the Jonikal for years. I mean it was years before they
2 bought it, but they looked at it years before they did.
3 Q. We have also heard some evidence about how Dodi Al Fayed
4 was when he was being driven in a car, and I think you
5 have some information that you can give us about that.
6 First of all, would he normally wear a seat-belt?
7 A. Yes, and one thing that I would like to point out, in
8 LA, it was "Dodi Fayed"; he never said "Al Fayed". It
9 was Dodi Fayed and that is how I will refer to him
10 because we never did the rest.
11 But in a car -- when Dodi, you know, told someone
12 anything about how to drive -- I mean the first thing he
13 would always say when you would get into a car, plane,
14 train, anything, it was always "Myriah, buckle your
15 seat-belt". Always. He would do the same -- and he
16 always had safety things around him. Always, he was
17 concerned about these things.
18 If he told someone in an instruction to drive here
19 or there, it was about how he was getting there, but he
20 always relied on the capacity and capability of
21 a driver. I mean, insofar as he said, well -- I really
22 did not hear him say things like "speed up", but
23 anything within that context, it was like "Let's try to
24 get somewhere", but he really relied on the driver to be
25 competent. He really did.

40

 
1 Q. It is recorded in your statement -- and I want to check
2 whether this is right -- that Dodi would issue
3 instructions to his drivers and, on some occasions, he
4 would do this in a direct way, but he always remained
5 polite to his staff. Is that something that you would
6 adhere to --
7 A. Yes, he was always polite to people. I never heard him
8 be mean to anybody ever in my entire life. You have
9 people taking care of you. They are there to take care
10 of you. They are earning a living and you give an
11 instruction. I always heard him say "please" or "thank
12 you", or if he did not even say that -- but it was just
13 his manner in which he asked for something. But he was
14 never rude or inconsiderate of an employee. He was
15 always very kind towards people and this court needs to
16 know that. He was a nice man. I worked for him for so
17 many years.
18 Q. Can I pause you a second?
19 A. Right.
20 Q. First of all, we have transcribers working on taking
21 down your evidence.
22 A. Slow down.
23 Q. Can you try to take it slowly and break it down. I know
24 that it is a nerve-racking experience.
25 A. Sorry, girls.

41

 
1 Q. You dealt with Mr Al Fayed in a car and you have said
2 that he would issue his instructions directly but
3 politely. Can I now deal with security?
4 First of all, was Dodi Al Fayed used to press
5 attention?
6 A. Not at all. I travelled with him for years. We never
7 had press attention and we never had bodyguards at all.
8 If anything, I knew the street, he knew five star,
9 we balanced.
10 Q. Is it right that being with the Princess of Wales gave
11 rise to entirely new security issues?
12 A. Yes, sir.
13 Q. Can I now turn to the relationship between Mr Al Fayed
14 and Mr Delorm, his butler?
15 Now I think you met Rene Delorm on quite a number of
16 occasions, didn't you?
17 A. Yes, over the years. He was there -- I do not know when
18 he was first employed, but I met him within a fairly
19 reasonable amount of time after I first met Dodi.
20 Q. Would you describe him as Dodi's confidant, somebody who
21 Dodi would tell his secrets to?
22 A. No.
23 Q. We will consider some of his more specific claims a bit
24 later --
25 A. He was a butler, sir. He was a butler. Okay? He was

42

 
1 a butler.
2 Q. In general terms, do you now regard him as an honest and
3 reliable person?
4 A. No.
5 Q. We don't need you to go any further than that unless you
6 want to.
7 A. I would not mind it, but you have asked me not to say
8 too much.
9 No. Do you want me to develop? I would like to say
10 something to that if I may. When we got back from their
11 death, I met with him in Los Angeles, and there is more
12 to it than this -- and I am not going to get into
13 the whole thing -- but the bottom line is that we were
14 in a public venue to deal with some personal belongings
15 from that trip, and he was going out of his way in this
16 restaurant to make sure everyone knew that he was with
17 Dodi and Diana, he was with Dodi and Diana. I kept
18 like, "Can you please keep your voice down? This is
19 inappropriate and people don't need to hear this".
20 Shortly thereafter -- there is a lot of things that
21 I know after that -- how much you want to know is up to
22 you -- and things he has said and what-not, but the
23 bottom line is he has said things -- I did end up seeing
24 his book and he said things that were inaccurate and
25 they were even inaccurate from that day shortly after

43

 
1 we got back from Paris. He said things differently
2 there than he did in his book.
3 So, no, I do not -- he was a butler, he was not
4 a confidant, and I do not have a lot of respect for
5 the way he has sought to make money off this and
6 embellish himself in life.
7 Q. Can I ask you about Dodi Al Fayed's relationship with
8 his father? How would you describe that relationship?
9 A. I did not spend a lot of time with him and his father
10 together at all and I spent time pretty much only
11 separately. I do not know that I ever saw them
12 together, to be honest with you. Anything I know is
13 secondhand and whatever he has told me.
14 What is their relationship? I do know for a fact
15 that Dodi got to enjoy life and live the life of
16 a privileged person who was raised, you know,
17 wonderfully and had the accommodations of life, but
18 I really cannot tell you what their relationship was.
19 I did not see them together.
20 Q. When Dodi was on the Jonikal, was he in regular contact
21 with his father?
22 A. Usually. I mean his father definitely was pretty much
23 always in contact with him. When we were in America,
24 I am sure he did not speak with him as much, but you
25 should know that any time that Mohamed called, Diana

44

 
1 would say "God is calling" and they would both have
2 a giggle and they would move forward with it.
3 Q. That was evidently something of a joke.
4 Can we move on now to Kelly Fisher? I think you met
5 her on a number of occasions as well, when she was
6 Dodi's girlfriend.
7 A. Yes.
8 Q. Now you, I think, first met her in 1996, didn't you?
9 A. Right. I do not have all these timeline dates in front
10 of me so I hope that what you are saying is accurate
11 because it has been ten years or more, but I met her
12 approximately -- if I recall correctly, I think it was
13 like maybe the summer of 1996 when he first started
14 dating her because I knew him a lot longer than she did,
15 yes.
16 Q. She, I think, lived with Dodi Al Fayed in Paris for some
17 time, did she not, or did you not know that?
18 A. She visited him.
19 Q. You don't know if she actually lived in the apartment
20 with him or --
21 A. She visited him there. She didn't live with him.
22 Q. You don't know if she left her things there for long
23 periods of time?
24 A. I left things there. I have stuff I haven't seen again
25 that I left in the green -- in his apartment, there was

45

 
1 one guest bedroom and I stayed there. I know it is
2 the room Diana had when she was there on the night that
3 she died. If that is the room that Kelly was put in --
4 yes, it was, because I worked on her in that room in
5 Christmas of 1996, because I will never forget that
6 I went to work with her and she shows me a ring and --
7 you know what, go on, ask questions, because I have
8 something to say there. If you will give me
9 the latitude to do so, please do.
10 Q. If I can ask one thing before I get onto the ring.
11 Rene Delorm has said that he only met Kelly Fisher on
12 a couple of occasions in total. Are you aware whether
13 that is right or wrong?
14 A. That is probably right because Rene was not usually with
15 us in America at all.
16 Q. Do you know whether he would have met her that amount of
17 times in Paris or more?
18 A. That is probably correct because Rene was usually kind
19 of relegated to being in Paris, and if somebody came to
20 visit in Paris, that is where he would be.
21 Q. Now you were going to say that Kelly Fisher showed you
22 a ring. Was that a ring that Dodi had given her?
23 A. Yes. That was Christmas of 1996.
24 Q. Was that a ring with a large blue stone on it?
25 A. Right. First off I want to make it clear, I really

46

 
1 would have preferred not to have to talk about things
2 like this. Okay? This is just ... this is.
3 My stance in life has always been to respect
4 the privacy of people and I would rather not say this,
5 but the fact of life is this: Christmas of 1996 I was
6 there with them in Paris -- and I am sorry, but this is
7 a fact -- and this is said with, like, kind of a whining
8 negative attitude. I go into work on her in a room that
9 I had stayed in before that she was now staying in on
10 this trip and she shows me this ring. It had a bunch of
11 diamonds -- I do not remember if it was a blue or
12 a green stone in the middle. It was quite ornate and
13 beautiful. She said with this really -- I am sorry,
14 I hate to say this, Kelly, but it is the truth and you
15 know it -- "Myriah, this does not look like a wedding
16 ring to me. Does this look like one to you?"
17 She sat there, the whole time I worked on her, like
18 on the phone with her mother, bitching and moaning about
19 how she doesn't think it looks like a wedding ring, and
20 after I finished working on her like an hour, hour and
21 a half later, I backed out of the room, I went and found
22 Dodi in his room, and I said "Dodi, I understand you are
23 engaged", and I looked at him and he goes, "Myriah, I am
24 not getting married". He just was a little perturbed
25 that even I said it.

47

 
1 So was she engaged to him? Honest to God, I do not
2 know. But in Christmas of 1996 -- if I loved somebody
3 and they gave me a wedding ring, I do not care if it was
4 made of plastic, out of a Cracker Jacks box. If I loved
5 him, I am not going to complain about it. Come on.
6 Q. I think we get the picture.
7 Can we move to various points of background?
8 The second cruise on the Jonikal, the one you were
9 on, began on 22nd August 1997. I think you were first
10 contacted by Mr Al Fayed's assistant to go on that
11 cruise some time around the week before 17th August, is
12 that right?
13 A. I am going to have to go by your timelines. I do not
14 have that in front of me. Would it be possible, when
15 you say "Mr Al Fayed" -- because it is either "Dodi" or,
16 "Dodi Fayed", but "Mr Al Fayed" would be Mohamed
17 Al Fayed to me. Is it possible to make that
18 differentiation?
19 Q. I am prepared to refer to him as "Dodi", but he has
20 generally been referred to, at the wish of his family,
21 as "Mr Al Fayed" throughout these proceedings. That is
22 why I perhaps naturally refer to him as that.
23 A. So if you can let me know who is who that you are
24 referring to.
25 Q. I see that his representatives are happy with that, so

48

 
1 I will call him "Mr Fayed" from now on.
2 A. Thank you.
3 Q. You, I think, were based in New Orleans at the time.
4 A. Yes.
5 Q. You first of all flew to Dodi Al Fayed's house in Malibu
6 and that was around 17th August, certainly according to
7 accounts you have previously given, and then I think you
8 flew out to the South of France via London and Paris
9 a couple of days later. Is that right?
10 A. No. I flew to Malibu, and from there I went to Paris,
11 and from Paris I went to catch the boat in, if I recall,
12 it was Nice.
13 Q. While you were in the Malibu house, you have told
14 the British police about an incident with a photographer
15 in a helicopter. Can you briefly describe that
16 incident?
17 A. Right. I got there and it is Steve the bodyguard that
18 was there. He was English. When I got there, he said
19 "The press just buggered off", which was a good thing
20 for me because I have not really dealt with -- I have
21 dealt with press, but not like this before. So I went
22 up and sat in the upper property and I was reading
23 a book about ... I was reading a biography on
24 a well-known Southern singer, musician, and I am sitting
25 there, I am looking at the expanse of Malibu off this

49

 
1 cliff, in this part of Malibu that is the furthest north
2 point where you are up on a bluff really high off of
3 the ocean, right?
4 I am sitting there, I am reading, sun, beautiful
5 day, and suddenly, right in front of me -- I
6 mean literally -- not even -- from myself to
7 Lord Scott Baker, that far away, suddenly in front of my
8 face, a helicopter suddenly comes up from below
9 the bluff, and it was right there in my face. It was
10 pretty clear that there was a camera doing something and
11 these people had snuck down in a helicopter, below the
12 bluffs, along the shoreline, and thinking they were
13 going to get some kind of a picture apparently. They
14 snuck up right in front of the property. Pretty much
15 all they got was me, but as soon as I saw it, I put my
16 book in my face and I got up.
17 It was panicking and it was frightening because
18 it was like being in a war zone. It scared the hell out
19 of me at first, okay. But that is when I realised that
20 we were going to be up against something really
21 frightening and disturbing because that was
22 unacceptable.
23 Q. Can we now move on to the Jonikal which you joined, as
24 we heard, around 19th August.
25 So that the jury and everybody is aware, I think

50

 
1 the people on the Jonikal were the captain and four
2 crew, the chef and three staff, two stewardesses -- that
3 is Debbie Gribble and Maria -- the two bodyguards and
4 then yourself, Rene Delorm, Dodi Fayed and the
5 Princess of Wales.
6 Now I think that this was a new crew for
7 the Jonikal. Is that right?
8 A. That is what I was told. So the only ones that
9 I knew -- Rene was there and myself that I knew were
10 usual, Dodi -- I understand that Trev and Kes were part
11 of the staff of his father. The rest of the people
12 I was told were new, but I did not know who exactly was
13 new. However one person came on during the course of
14 the cruise and that was 'mon capitan', Stefano, from
15 the Cujo, from all the trips that we had done before
16 from Dodi's boat in the Mediterranean.
17 Q. While you were on the Jonikal, I think you performed
18 holistic therapy regularly on both Dodi Al Fayed and the
19 Princess of Wales?
20 A. Yes, mostly on Diana, to be honest with you. I was
21 brought there to take care of her.
22 Q. In the course of that, I think you spoke to both of them
23 and of course you would also have spoken to the other
24 staff and the bodyguards?
25 A. Correct.

51

 
1 Q. I think that you witnessed their developing
2 relationship, albeit from the point of view of somebody
3 who was an employee effectively?
4 A. Sure, of course.
5 Q. How would you describe that relationship?
6 A. They were having fun. They were people who had -- has
7 anybody here ever had a new relationship where you meet
8 somebody and it is, like, so exciting? You think all
9 the hope in the world and it is exciting.
10 One thing I did -- it is the first time I had met
11 her and it was clear to me that she seemed to be
12 a person who was very strong. She came right up to me
13 and she gave me a good strong handshake and she seemed
14 like a very strong person. I do not read tabloids,
15 I did not really know who she was and I did not know the
16 names of her children. I mean I really did not know
17 much about her. Who does not know she exists?
18 She was a person who -- the way she spoke and what
19 she did was definitely somebody who is getting on with
20 her life, and the things that she said clearly, she was
21 making a new start in life and she seemed strong to me.
22 Dodi is Dodi and he was excited and happy to be around
23 her.
24 The thing is that with Diana, they were like two
25 people who were in that whole new thing where, you know,

52

 
1 "This is exciting and fun and gee, let's see what is
2 going to happen". You have that sense of like
3 invincibility. You are smitten with somebody. So that
4 is what I saw, two people smitten with one another.
5 Q. Can we now turn to the bodyguards and the question of
6 security? We know that there were two bodyguards on the
7 Jonikal. As far as you were aware, did they regard
8 their number, two of them, as sufficient for the job?
9 A. I would have said that, only two. In America we have
10 something called "OSHA", which kind of relegates how
11 long you can work and how much pressure you can put upon
12 an employee. I do not know what you guys have here in
13 England or in Europe. But the fact of life is when I
14 got onto the boat, the two lads -- they called
15 themselves "the lads" -- I was introduced to them when I
16 got on the boat and they very kindly stopped what they
17 were doing -- they were both very nice men, by the way,
18 from day one, and always were, especially Trevor. You
19 cannot meet a nicer human being, my God.
20 They said "hello" to me, introduced themselves,
21 I introduced myself and they immediately turned back
22 around to the telephone. The two of them were
23 completely harassed or just anguished by trying to reach
24 London to ask for more lads because there was not enough
25 security.

53

 
1 I sat there, you know, I mean (indistinct) "Go right
2 now", somebody took my luggage on. I sat there waiting
3 to see how am I going to fit into this, what I can do to
4 support people and take care of people. They worked for
5 days calling London, asking for more security. More
6 security never came, and after -- I do not remember how
7 many days -- three or four or five days -- I think
8 it was after about three days though -- they finally
9 realised there was going to be no more help and they
10 finally tossed in the towel and realised they were on
11 their own.
12 In America we have something called OSHA, in which
13 working two people 24 hours a day for almost two
14 weeks -- when do you sleep? When do you pee? When do
15 you eat? When can you breathe? That is not acceptable
16 in America. We make exclusions for things like
17 bodyguards and what-not, but I myself will be the first
18 to say that was a bit overburdening for two human
19 beings.
20 Q. Did Dodi Fayed always cooperate with his bodyguards,
21 with their requests and needs and instructions?
22 A. That is a good question because, you know what, Dodi was
23 not used to having bodyguards. He was not familiar with
24 this. I will tell you one thing, that whatever their
25 experience was with him, neither Dodi nor Diana was

54

 
1 listening to their advice. Okay? He was even mad at
2 her for a while about this because she knew her security
3 needs better than we did. They even took off at one
4 point -- and I forget which port it was because it was
5 boat time, but they took off without the bodyguards and
6 the bodyguards were somewhere else in the boat.
7 By the time they said "Gee, we are going", the guys
8 did not have enough time to get from one end of the boat
9 to the tender to go with them. They took off on their
10 own without the bodyguards, and the guys were livid,
11 understandably so, and concerned and worried, et cetera,
12 about people's safety and they were just like, you know,
13 freaking out. It was about the safety of these people.
14 I did speak to Dodi because the lads spoke to me and
15 mentioned -- we talked about what had happened and
16 the next time I saw Dodi, I sort of reemed him. I am
17 like, "Dodi, you cannot take off without your
18 bodyguards. They are here to take care of Diana and you
19 at this point, clearly, but you need to listen to them".
20 So help me God, he looked at me and he smiled, and
21 I think to him it was like he did not understand that
22 there could be any danger. It was like, you know, "Yes,
23 Myriah, okay, whatever". I did always speak very
24 frankly with Dodi and I kind of harangued him about that
25 a bit, for sure.

55

 
1 Q. On the trip, how intrusive was the attention that you
2 got from press photographers?
3 A. Have you ever been raped?
4 Q. Not personally, but perhaps you could describe the
5 attention, perhaps in the best terms you can.
6 A. Offensive, unacceptable, abusive, extraordinarily
7 humiliating. You cannot even lay in the sun. What
8 woman here wants to lay in the sun in your bathing suit
9 with cameras like hovering over you. It was horrible.
10 It was horrible. But it was not just the press; there
11 was also people in their own boats.
12 There was one boat in Italy that sat there circling
13 around us for like two hours, and somebody on that boat
14 had some little girl who kept calling -- this is
15 twisted -- she kept saying -- maybe she did not speak
16 English, that was pretty clear, and I do not know who
17 taught her whatever to say, but she kept saying "Bye-bye
18 Princess, bye-bye Princess", and they circled us for
19 two hours with her screaming that up at the boat because
20 they knew which our boat was. So it was not only
21 the press, but it was all the people that were around
22 there that had no decency to respect privacy.
23 Q. How did Dodi Al Fayed and the Princess react to that
24 attention?
25 A. Pull up anchor in the middle of the night and try to get

56

 
1 the heck out of there. But it is the Mediterranean.
2 I mean like nobody was going to find their boat? It was
3 one of the biggest boats there. Come on.
4 Q. Can I move to a different topic?
5 LORD JUSTICE SCOTT BAKER: I think if we are moving on to
6 another topic, we had better have a break for the
7 shorthand writers because it is very hard work.
8 A. Would you like me to massage your hands for you?
9 LORD JUSTICE SCOTT BAKER: We will take a break of about ten
10 minutes.
11 Thank you, sir.
12 (11.47 am)
13 (A short break)
14 (11.56 am)
15 (Jury present)
16 MR HOUGH: Ms Daniels, I am going to deal with the next
17 subject as sensitively as I can. I think you are aware
18 that there have been suggestions in the media that
19 the Princess of Wales may have been pregnant at the time
20 of her death. Did you have any conversation with her
21 which sheds any light on this question?
22 A. Yes, and if I may, please, the fact of life is I respect
23 the privacy of people I work with. If you think about
24 it, this has been over ten years. I know people -- all
25 of you have heard of in the media, everywhere --

57

 
1 I respect people's privacy and this kills me to have to
2 speak about her publicly in any manner that has to do
3 with something personal and physical. It really,
4 honestly, pisses me off that I have been pushed into
5 this position to have to speak about this woman whose
6 respect and privacy should have been respected, okay.
7 She was not pregnant. Period. You can ask me how
8 I know that and push me into whatever direction you
9 want.
10 Q. The question I asked is whether you had any conversation
11 with her which might shed light on this and if you can
12 tell us what that conversation was.
13 A. The exact dates, I do not know, but on our cruise, one
14 of the first things -- most women know, when you go
15 travelling, what is the first thing that happens?
16 Girls, what is the first thing that happens? You boys
17 don't know that one. It is called a "period", you know,
18 and it makes life difficult. And there is, when you are
19 travelling, obviously a secondary thing, which maybe
20 boys might know, constipation, again. God forgive me
21 for saying this, because nobody has the right to -- but
22 I have no choice. It is wrong to have to say this in
23 public. It is wrong.
24 So she -- yes, she was like, "Wouldn't you know it?"
25 So the first two things, there you have it. Then there

58

 
1 was one day in which it came out in a newspaper, and
2 I really wish I knew which newspaper it was because that
3 might make some difference, although all of your
4 newspapers here in England all look like tabloids so
5 I cannot really tell the difference, but the fact being
6 that one of them that came out was saying, "Yes, she was
7 pregnant". It is like ...
8 They say we are all cowboys in America and we all
9 run around with guns. Who is the guy who put that in
10 the newspaper? I would love to shoot him with my 38.
11 That is wrong. To speculate on a woman's reproductive
12 body is inappropriate. But she said, when that article
13 came out, "Now they have me pregnant". She was
14 irritated and she was ticked off, and trust me, she was
15 not pregnant. Okay? I know for a fact.
16 I do very intimate work with people and there were
17 a lot of tell-tale signs that I knew for a fact that she
18 was not pregnant, from the fact that -- you know, what
19 is the first thing that happens when you travel, beside
20 constipation, is the girl thing.
21 Q. Can I just stop you a second? After she said, "Now they
22 have me pregnant", did she actually then add anything
23 about whether she was in fact pregnant?
24 A. We talked about it for a while, and it was mostly her
25 irritation about how the press continuously had been

59

 
1 making things up about her. She was not pregnant. I do
2 not want to try to quote her because she is not here to
3 defend herself one way or another as to what she
4 actually said and American-English and English-English
5 are two different things. I would say she had cramps
6 and I worked on her for cramps, but in England you call
7 it -- women here call it something like "period pains"
8 or something. But I do not even remember that. I do
9 not want to put words into her mouth. Okay?
10 Q. You have been quoted in your witness statement as saying
11 that after she had said, "Now they have me pregnant",
12 she had actually added the words "I am not pregnant".
13 Do you now remember her saying that or not?
14 A. That was not my statement, sir.
15 Q. Do you recall her saying that?
16 A. You are quoting from something I did not say and I said
17 that before. If you would like a copy of what I really
18 said, I have one here for you.
19 Q. Can we stick to what you are saying now? Can you recall
20 whether she added that comment or not?
21 A. That -- what you are reading from is incorrect. Those
22 are not my words. I need you to understand that. Okay?
23 We sat there and talked about it, "Now they have me
24 pregnant", the press. I am working on her for cramps,
25 she is bleeding while I am working on her. Okay?

60

 
1 Q. Okay.
2 A. I do not really need to go any further about what we
3 discussed because that is really inappropriate. Can
4 we give her a little bit of respect and privacy please?
5 Q. Okay. I will stop there. I will stop there.
6 Now I think the cruise ended on 30th August. How
7 long in advance of it ending did you know when it would
8 be ending and where you would be going?
9 A. The mistral winds kicked in, so for like a day -- there
10 is nothing you can do on a boat when the mistrals are
11 carrying on. That is always the sign during
12 the Mediterranean season that it is time to call it
13 a day in the Mediterranean, get off your boat and go on
14 to Paris, which is usually what we always did.
15 It was normal with Dodi, you never knew when you
16 were leaving, when you were going. He never caught
17 a plane on time in his life and any of us should be
18 lucky to have that advantage, especially considering
19 the flight that I just took in wanting to be able to
20 have different options. He had the ability, if
21 something did not work out for him, to change his flight
22 time. Fine, we should all be so lucky.
23 Everything with him was always last minute. It
24 always was, especially travel plans. He never knew for
25 himself when he was going or coming from one minute to

61

 
1 the next, and, you know, with regard to the bodyguards,
2 the fact of life is they did not know him as well as
3 I did at all, I am sure. I travelled with him a lot and
4 perhaps their perception of it may have been more than
5 a bit different for me because he thought, you know, he
6 will tell us what he was going to do. Dodi did not know
7 for himself what he was going to do from moment to
8 moment or day to day.
9 Okay, he just got to live a fun life. I woke up one
10 morning, we had no idea -- I had no idea -- there had
11 been nothing said about when we were leaving, but the
12 mistrals had kicked in the day before. At this point
13 it is like "What is the point of being on a boat. It is
14 not going to work anymore. It is time to go home".
15 Diana had said to me at some point that she was looking
16 forward to celebrating getting home the following week,
17 to celebrate her son's birthday, and so I knew that
18 we would be home by like the following week.
19 Q. If you need to pause --
20 A. But we did not know when we were leaving, and it was
21 only that morning when I woke up that I discovered
22 that -- you know, I came out of my cabin, I went to get
23 some breakfast and I said something to them about, you
24 know, dreams from the night before and whatever, and
25 they said, "Yes, yes, Myriah, go pack your bags, we are

62

 
1 leaving". That is kind of how it happens with him, but
2 it was normal when travelling with Dodi.
3 Q. I think just to follow the trip through, you moored in
4 Sardinia and then flew from Olbia Airport to Le Bourget.
5 You went on the plane with Mr Fayed, the
6 Princess of Wales, the bodyguards, Rene Delorm and
7 Debbie Gribble?
8 A. Correct.
9 Q. And when you arrived at Le Bourget, the Princess of
10 Wales and Mr Fayed and Mr Rees-Jones were driven away by
11 Philippe Dourneau while you went in a Range Rover --
12 A. Behind them.
13 Q. -- with Rene Delorm, Debbie Gribble and Kes Wingfield,
14 and that I think was driven by Henri Paul.
15 A. Yes.
16 Q. I think on the drive from Le Bourget towards Paris, your
17 convoy was followed by paparazzi on motorcycles. Is
18 that right?
19 A. There was not as much paparazzi as has been said.
20 It was at the airport, but they were all carrying on,
21 all the paparazzi, and I sat there -- I did not have
22 a seat-belt on because there were not enough seat-belts
23 with all the luggage and us in the back seat. I was
24 directly behind Henri Paul on the left-hand side, and
25 you guys here drive on the wrong side of the street

63

 
1 so -- whichever that is. Wait a minute. The point
2 being that whichever side you guys drive on, I was on
3 the far left of the car in the back seat and he kept
4 talking about people on motorcycles and I sat there and
5 I did not have a seat-belt on because there were not
6 enough, and I sat there and I turned around and I looked
7 and looked and I did not see any motorcycles at all.
8 Now, we have also been relatively separated from
9 Diana and Dodi's car. They were well ahead of us. But
10 I honest to God did not see these motorcycles at all and
11 I looked for them and I did not see them. I really
12 think it was just the whole 'caught up in the moment' of
13 trying to do what the heck-ever.
14 Q. Can you describe the way Henri Paul drove on the way
15 into Paris?
16 A. Am I alive or am I like dead? I should be dead. I was
17 positive we were going to get killed on that drive.
18 Look, I have driven with Philippe over the years. He
19 drove fast, but I drive fast, but you drive fast safely.
20 You don't tailgate, you watch cornering and stuff like
21 that. Philippe was a good driver. My God, that man
22 took me for drives like you wouldn't believe. But
23 Henri Paul, he almost killed us, honest to God.
24 We were sitting there and he was driving way too
25 fast and recklessly, and I kept saying, "Can we slow

64

 
1 down, can we slow down?" and nobody is listening and
2 nobody is doing anything, but everybody else is in their
3 own state of "Oh shit, we are going to die". If
4 everybody else didn't understand that, they were in
5 their own mindset, but I know for sure for myself, I am
6 like, "Great, we are going to get killed and this is
7 going to be really great, you know, Dodi's people all
8 get killed on this trip".
9 We went from the freeway, and I am looking around,
10 I do not see any motorcycle people behind us at all, and
11 I am looking around and he is still driving crazy and
12 I do not understand what we are trying to outrun. He is
13 in the far-left lane of the freeway in Paris on the way
14 home from the Sardinia Airport to Paris and now to
15 the apartment on the Champs-Elysees, and we are in
16 the far-left lane and he is driving like a maniac
17 through traffic, and then he cuts from the number one
18 lane, which in America is the far-left lane, all the way
19 across the whole freeway to the off-ramp. Where
20 the off-ramp is in the freeway, there is a thing called
21 a "median" that separates it and you are supposed to get
22 off on the off-ramp. He cut across that and the
23 Range Rover almost tipped over and I was sure we were
24 all going to die.
25 So, okay, the bottom line is, earlier that day,

65

 
1 it is a fact -- with all due respect to him, he is
2 probably a really nice man and all of this, but he was
3 a shit for a driver and that is a fact. I am sorry,
4 your Honour. I am American, I am sorry.
5 Q. Moving on there, you got to the apartment, and we have
6 heard that the Princess of Wales and Mr Fayed arrived
7 there shortly after 7 o'clock. We have also heard about
8 an altercation between a security guard who was at
9 the apartment and some of the paparazzi. Did you see
10 that altercation?
11 A. Yes.
12 Q. You I think saw it from the balcony; is that right?
13 A. I was up in, yes, my room. Debs and I were up in the
14 balcony. We were hanging -- just kind of getting a
15 breath -- we were off the boat finally -- we were
16 getting a breath or having a cigarette, take your pick.
17 We were sitting on the balcony and just, you know -- and
18 they came in, and when they pulled in -- it is like
19 definitely the paparazzi were following them. These
20 people were not there right before they got there. They
21 had been there waiting. They definitely were following
22 their car. There is no question of that. They followed
23 in behind them. I could have walked out one second
24 before they got there and there would have been no press
25 there. They were following them, okay.

66

 
1 They tried to get out of the car, and the paparazzi
2 starts getting in their face and trying to take pictures
3 and whatever the hell they are trying to do, and
4 Gerauld -- he is this very large French man who is there
5 at the apartment at the Champs-Elysees -- tried to help
6 protect them to get into the house, make a way for them,
7 and these guys started getting in his way and trying to
8 push in, and Gerauld tried to hold them back and
9 Gerauld -- really, he tried to just allow them to get
10 from the car into the apartment and a bit of an
11 altercation did transpire.
12 However, as soon as they got into the apartment
13 door, then -- Gerauld was clearly, you know, just trying
14 to stop these people, but once they got in, then it was
15 over.
16 Q. Now shortly after they arrived at the apartment, I think
17 you and Debbie Gribble, who had the evening off, went
18 out for a meal.
19 A. Yes.
20 Q. I think that later in the evening you were both together
21 crossing the Champs-Elysees near the apartment -- this
22 would have been at about half past 12 -- when you saw
23 Kes Wingfield. Is that right?
24 A. Yes.
25 Q. What did Kes Wingfield say when you saw him?

67

 
1 A. "Have you seen them?", "them" of course meaning Dodi and
2 Diana. "Have you seen them? Are they here? Where are
3 they?"
4 Q. If you need a break, please.
5 A. No, no. Just go on. Come on, this is ten years of my
6 life. I am used to this.
7 Q. In any event, you returned to the apartment shortly
8 afterward and then you were woken later in the night by
9 Kes Wingfield who told you about the crash?
10 A. Not quite that long. No, no. He was looking for them
11 and at first we were like, "We have not seen them", and
12 Kes has gone crazy, "What happened to them? Have you
13 heard about any changes?" He was trying to figure it
14 out. Debs and I were like "No" and we did not quite, at
15 the moment, understand what was going on.
16 We crossed the street, and as we were crossing
17 the street, starting to go back down the Champs-Elysees
18 for a night-cap, we heard sirens, and it brought a dread
19 into my heart because it was like, "Wait a minute, this
20 is what Kes is saying". We were hearing sirens and it
21 was like -- I started -- there was something in me that
22 did panic, but I was trying to keep it cool. It was
23 like, you know, it's Paris, you hear that siren.
24 We kept it really short and we came right back and
25 we got back to the apartment and we were trying to still

68

 
1 stay cool, and whatever fear was in me from the sounds
2 of whatever is going on -- the second we stepped back
3 into the apartment, everything was just completely in
4 a nightmare.
5 There was something wrong, but nobody was saying
6 anything to us. I do not speak enough French, nor does
7 Debs, to know what was going on, and nobody let us look
8 at the TV. We went up to our flat that we were sharing
9 with Trevor and Kes, and we just, you know, hung out for
10 a little while and went to bed. It was shortly
11 thereafter that Kes came up and made us both get out of
12 bed and said "Come" and sat us in the living room in our
13 flat. We didn't go anywhere else. This was in our
14 flat. He knocked on our doors and said "Come out of
15 your beds. Sit down, I need to talk to you", and then
16 he told us that Dodi was killed. He said that Diana was
17 not as bad off as the press was saying, but we had not
18 watched TV so what did we know?
19 MR HOUGH: Thank you very much for your evidence. I am not
20 going to go into the events after the crash unless
21 others do so. Others will have some questions for you.
22 LORD JUSTICE SCOTT BAKER: Can I ask you one question? Have
23 you had any contact with Kes Wingfield since
24 the collision?
25 A. In -- approximately one year later, I was not settled in

69

 
1 my heart and I came back to England to visit everybody.
2 LORD JUSTICE SCOTT BAKER: Yes.
3 A. Mr Al Fayed, Mohamed --
4 LORD JUSTICE SCOTT BAKER: It is only Kes Wingfield I am
5 interested in. What I am particularly interested in is
6 have you any idea as to where we could now contact him
7 because we have had difficulty in getting hold of him.
8 A. Have you tried CNN? I can -- when I get back to
9 America, I will try with my resources, but I do not
10 know. I have not been in direct contact with any of
11 these people since 1999.
12 LORD JUSTICE SCOTT BAKER: Very well. Thank you.
13 Mr Mansfield?
14 MR MANSFIELD: Thank you.
15 Questions from MR MANSFIELD
16 MR MANSFIELD: Good morning. I represent
17 Mr Mohamed Al Fayed, whose son you knew very well.
18 Very few questions indeed. It appears, is this
19 right, that you got to know Dodi -- I am going to call
20 him "Dodi" -- all right?
21 A. Thank you.
22 Q. It makes it easier. You got to know Dodi very well over
23 the best part of ten years before the crash?
24 A. Probably. I would have to sit down and look at
25 notebooks, but that sounds about right.

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1 Q. Would it be fair to say that you knew him very well?
2 A. Yes, I did, yes.
3 Q. You have given a description. I do not ask you to
4 repeat that, but the general description. I have
5 a specific area which has been touched on: over those
6 years -- first of all, did he ever drive a car himself
7 or was he nearly always driven by someone else?
8 A. Any time I was in a car with him, he was driven by
9 someone else. But I do recollect on at least one
10 occasion that he had rented a really cool sports car in
11 Beverley Hills that he was driving and considering
12 buying and I knew he had driven that himself, but I was
13 not in the car with him.
14 Q. Now, on the occasions when he was driven, which appears
15 to be most of time, there would be occasions when you
16 would be a passenger in the same car?
17 A. Oh, right.
18 Q. So that you know why I am asking it: Kelly Fisher has
19 described how he treated staff generally, but in
20 particular what she is saying about his activities in
21 a car is that he was dictatorial, he was abusive and he
22 threatened staff with being sacked if they did not do
23 exactly what he said and so on. In other words, did you
24 ever see that happen on any occasion over ten years?
25 A. I think she was describing her own behaviour, sir. Dodi

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1 was -- he never behaved that way. He was a cool guy.
2 You ask Philippe. Dodi was cool. Okay? He did not
3 treat people that way. You might want to look at how
4 her behaviour was towards people though.
5 Q. In 1996 -- I am shooting forward really. It is the last
6 year roughly, 1996 through to 1997, when he had met
7 Kelly Fisher, did he at any time, as far as you are
8 concerned, indicate any intention of marrying
9 Kelly Fisher?
10 A. He told me specifically, as I said earlier. She sat
11 there carrying on about how she had a ring in Christmas
12 of 1996, that she was engaged to him, showing me this
13 ring that had like all these diamonds, and it was either
14 a blue or a green stone in the centre, carrying on that
15 she did not think it looked like a wedding ring and did
16 I and whined -- literally whined about it. I am sorry,
17 Kelly, but you did and you know it.
18 I left her room after working on her that day in
19 Paris and I said, "Dodi, I hear you are engaged", and
20 Dodi said to me, "Myriah, I am not getting married". So
21 whatever happened on that account between them, this is
22 all I know first-hand.
23 She was saying that she was getting married in
24 Christmas of 1996 with this wedding ring and he looked
25 at me and said "Myriah, I am not getting married". But

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1 what that has to do with them dying, I do not
2 understand.
3 Q. I am not asking any more on that.
4 In relation to the relationship with Diana which you
5 were watching and you were there in the summer of 1997,
6 and you have described the developing relationship, is
7 it right to say that from your observations of the two
8 of them, you thought that Dodi in fact would have
9 provided very good support for Diana in her work and so
10 on and her various commitments and also emotionally as
11 well? Did you feel that?
12 A. Yes, I mean -- I do know for a fact that he did not like
13 it if a girlfriend had to go for work and blow him out
14 for the holiday. He would have like to have kept
15 somebody with him and shared a life with them. But he
16 was very supportive and tried to be as giving and
17 sensitive to the needs of the woman in his life as
18 possible.
19 Yes, I mean if this had worked out -- and we will
20 never know, we will never know -- but if it had worked
21 out, sure he would have been really good. He was
22 a wonderful man. He would have been very supportive of
23 a woman's needs.
24 Q. Just to pick up on a couple of words that I think you
25 have used. In fact you took the view, didn't you, that

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1 you thought in future "they might well hook up". Those
2 are the words I am suggesting that you may have used at
3 the time.
4 A. Would you like a copy of my actual statement for sure?
5 Q. No, I have it.
6 A. The one that is signed by me?
7 Q. I have the one that is signed by you as well.
8 A. Look, nobody will ever know if they would have hooked
9 up. It was too soon. They had just met. They were
10 having fun getting to know each other, and to this day
11 I cannot believe at all that Dodi would have been
12 premature in a situation like this to ask her to marry
13 him. I do not believe that.
14 Q. But, on the other hand, to ask for a continuing
15 relationship, that is different, beyond the holiday --
16 are you all right?
17 A. Does anybody have a cough drop?
18 Q. I will wait while you unwrap it.
19 A. That is what you get for flying American Airlines.
20 Q. Tell me when you are feeling comfortable.
21 A. Go ahead.
22 Q. The way it looked on the boat, they were getting on
23 extremely well.
24 A. They were having a lot of fun. They were like people in
25 a brand new relationship that were smitten with each

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1 other for sure.
2 Q. One other question. This is an individual and whether
3 you can help -- Dodi had a personal assistant in
4 America, didn't he?
5 A. Yes.
6 Q. Is the name of that person Melissa Henning?
7 A. Correct.
8 Q. Who worked as well in the film company Allied Stars that
9 he --
10 A. Yes, basically she ran the film company for him.
11 Q. So she would have a lot of contact with him as well?
12 A. Oh yes. She was his right-hand man/woman.
13 MR MANSFIELD: All right.
14 Sorry, one other individual: do you recall
15 a discussion, just before leaving for Paris on the boat,
16 where there was a discussion between yourself and Dodi
17 about the possibility of Gribble becoming a personal
18 assistant to Dodi and Diana? Do you remember anything
19 about that?
20 A. No.
21 MR MANSFIELD: All right.
22 A. No, Debbie was being brought to London. I do not know
23 if she was going to work for the family, but she had not
24 yet been put through the hiring procedures that
25 Mohamed Al Fayed required of employees. So she just

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1 happened to be travelling with us to come and be put
2 through the hiring procedures in London.
3 MR MANSFIELD: All right. I take it no further. Thank you.
4 A. Sir, I am sorry.
5 LORD JUSTICE SCOTT BAKER: Mr Keen?
6 Questions from MR KEEN
7 MR KEEN: Good afternoon, Miss Daniels. My name is
8 Richard Keen. I am counsel appearing for the parents of
9 the late Henri Paul.
10 A. I am sorry. Very sorry.
11 Q. If you would listen to my questions and then answer
12 them. Have you ever been accused of elaboration or
13 exaggeration?
14 A. Have I been accused? No.
15 Q. You produced a statement which you headed up "Statement
16 in my own words" dated 13th November 2005. It is not
17 the large one. It is a single sheet of paper that you
18 signed.
19 A. Oh right.
20 Q. Are you familiar with it?
21 A. May I have a copy of what you have there, sir?
22 Q. Well I will ask you some questions. Do you recall
23 having signed such a statement?
24 A. I wrote such a statement, sir.
25 Q. You wrote it.

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1 A. If I could please have a copy of what you have?
2 Q. If you just bear with me for a moment, Miss Daniels.
3 You signed this document off as the "Reverend Daniels".
4 A. Yes, sir.
5 Q. Who gave you the title "Reverend"?
6 A. Let me find my copy of this.
7 Q. Who gave you the title "Reverend", Miss Daniels?
8 A. Hang on, let me find my copy of this.
9 Q. You will not need a copy to recall who gave you
10 the title "Reverend", Miss Daniels.
11 A. No, I would like to refer to what you are referring to.
12 Do you not have a copy of this so I can refer to it?
13 Q. Could you listen to my question?
14 A. I am listening, but may I have a copy of it please?
15 Q. We will look at the statement in a moment. Who gave you
16 the title "Reverend"? It is a very simple question.
17 A. Okay. Well, I am a minister of natural spiritualism,
18 that which is of the real world. I do not believe in
19 things which are supernatural. I go by what is of
20 the natural world. I have utter and complete respect
21 for things of the scientific world -- (Handed). Thank
22 you, sir -- of what is in the real world, number one.
23 Number two --
24 Q. Can I ask you --
25 A. Please let me finish, sir.

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1 Q. No, no, wait, please --
2 A. No, please let me finish. You asked me a question.
3 I would like to answer it.
4 Q. Who gave you the title "Reverend"?
5 A. I am answering that, if you will please allow me to.
6 Okay?
7 I work with people from every religion, every
8 culture, in every frame of thought on the face of this
9 earth, and what has been really important to me --
10 because I do hands-on work and I touch people's bodies
11 and I fix them -- that I respect them utterly and
12 completely whatever their belief is. What I have found
13 in my own life at a very young age is that I prefer to
14 respect all people of all beliefs, ergo --
15 LORD JUSTICE SCOTT BAKER: Is the answer to Mr Keen's
16 question that you gave yourself the title of "Reverend"?
17 A. Well, you know -- I mean, according to all the people
18 I work with -- you want to say that God gave it to me,
19 fine. But yes, I became a minister -- a missionary of
20 natural spiritualism at a very young age because
21 I realised that I need to be open to all religions and
22 all people so that I can respect all people, no matter
23 what religion they are. Now I see you seem to be
24 smirking, here, sir, but --
25 MR KEEN: There is no need for you to make a comment with

78

 
1 regard to my demeanour. I am merely asking a simple
2 question. Can you pause for a moment because if we both
3 speak at the same time, I am afraid your words will not
4 be accurately recorded.
5 Am I right in understanding your response to
6 the Coroner to be that you gave yourself the title,
7 "Reverend"?
8 A. I think, basically, life gave me that, to be honest with
9 you. Okay? My experience with working with people from
10 so many different religions and my desire to respect
11 everybody, yes; rather than some man who has been
12 nominated by some man giving somebody a title, yes. But
13 in America, we have the freedom of religion, and it is
14 a constitutional right to respect my own religion and my
15 own belief system and I consider it to be a knowledge
16 system because -- rather than believing in made-up
17 things, I know what is of the natural world and
18 I respect people for who and what they are.
19 I am sorry if in the UK you don't get that, but
20 look, I just want to be able to be caring and kind
21 towards everybody, no matter who or what they are and
22 I cannot push my own religious beliefs on others. That
23 is really what it comes down to. Does that answer your
24 question, sir?
25 Q. I believe you did answer it in passing, but can I ask

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1 you this: is this a philosophy, a doctrine or a religion
2 that you are referring to?
3 A. Theology, philosophy and doctrine.
4 Q. I see. You were not in the Alma Tunnel, at the time of
5 the crash that killed Dodi and Princess Diana, were you?
6 A. No, sir. I was walking up the Champs-Elysees at the
7 time they died, back to the apartment.
8 Q. And yet in the statement that you prepared in your own
9 words, in two places you gave a description of
10 the accident and of the circumstances of the crash.
11 What you said is:
12 "It was just a horrible accident caused by
13 the events of being mercilessly chased by tabloid
14 press."
15 A. Is this the one that says "statement in my own words",
16 sir?
17 Q. That is right.
18 A. Whereabouts?
19 Q. Second line down.
20 A. Second line down?
21 Q. It is the second line down:
22 "It was just a horrible accident caused by
23 the events of being mercilessly chased by the tabloid
24 press."
25 A. That is a fact.

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1 Q. Right. That is a fact.
2 Then, if you go down to the next paragraph, you
3 said:
4 "It is a fact that the accident was simply just
5 a horrible accident caused by us trying to outrun
6 something that could never possibly be escaped from.
7 It was just how the day was going."
8 A. It was how the day was going.
9 Q. But you weren't there, so why the reference to "us"
10 trying to outrun something?
11 A. Sir, this was about two weeks' worth of trying to outrun
12 the press.
13 Q. I see.
14 A. Okay? This was two weeks' worth of this nightmare.
15 Then the day started that way. All the drivers that
16 day were completely insane.
17 LORD JUSTICE SCOTT BAKER: Mr Keen, I do not want to break
18 off your questions at a particularly inconvenient moment
19 for you, but we, as I think you are aware, have a longer
20 break for the midday adjournment today for the jury, and
21 we have a videolink arrangement with Brazil at
22 2 o'clock. So it rather looks as if we are going to
23 have to put this witness back until later this afternoon
24 when we break off in a few minutes time.
25 MR KEEN: So be it, sir.

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1 MR HOUGH: The link with Brazil opens at 2.15, if it helps
2 at all.
3 LORD JUSTICE SCOTT BAKER: Ah, well we might manage another
4 quarter of an hour at 2 o'