Princess Diana’s Death : Conspiracy News

LondonNet News Archive: Death of the Princess

Princess Diana’s Death : Conspiracy News

Following Diana’s sudden death in Paris, August 31, 1997 many doubts have surrounded the official story of the paparazzi chasing a drunk driver at speed toward an inevitable and tragic accident. Below you will find a catalogue of articles culled from LondonNet’s newsdesk that deal with the developing alternative theories of the crash, ranging from “no-accident” to “full blown conspiracy”.

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7/12/04
Bodyguard Was Diana’s ‘Greatest’ Love
– Princess considered running off with minder

PRINCESS DIANA’s greatest love was the bodyguard killed in a motorbike crash, a death the princess saw as murder, TV viewers in the USA learned last night.

“He was the greatest fellow I have ever had,” Diana said of Barry Mannakee, her one-time bodyguard. “I was quite happy to give it all up … just to go off and live with him.”

On the video recording screened last night by NBC in the US, Diana tells her voice coach, Peter Settelen, “I think he [Mannakee] was bumped off.” Settelen sold the video tape to NBC for UKP500,000.

Mannakee is thought to be one of Diana’s first extra-marital lovers. The pair’s affair didn’t last long – once it was discovered by royal aides, the burly policeman was relieved of his royal duties and perks.

“I should never have played with fire,” said Diana of her below-stairs fling. “But I did. And I got burned.”

Mannakee died in a motorbike crash not long after, in 1987. Diana said she visited his grave to exorcise nightmares she was having.


30/11/04
‘Hopeless’ Charles Wanted Sex Only Once Every Three Weeks
– Bizarre claims in Diana-tapes shown on US TV

AMERICAN TV viewers were last night shown tapes of the late Princess Diana in which the former wife of Prince Charles detailed elements of the couple’s sex life.

According to Diana, Charles liked to have sex with her once every three weeks, a schedule he had established with his mistress Camilla Parker Bowles.

“He used to see his lady once every three weeks before we got married,” Diana says on the tapes, which were sold to US TV station NBC by the Princess’s voice-coach Peter Settelen.

Diana also says Charles’s sexual advances towards her came to a halt after the arrival of the couple’s second child, Prince Harry and that Charles told her he refused “to be the only Prince of Wales who has never had a mistress,” when confronted about his affair with Parker-Bowles.

Perhaps more damaging for the Prince is the claim made by Diana that his mother, the Queen, called him “hopeless” when Diana complained about his extra-marital fling.


Diana: Wedding Was Worst Day of My Life04/03/04
Diana: Wedding Was Worst Day of My Life
– US TV plays tapes that reveal princess’s inner torment

‘THE WORST day of my life’ is how the late Princess Diana describes her wedding to Prince Charles on the audio tapes screened by US TV station NBC.

Diana also talks about her struggles with eating disorders, her efforts to kill herself and gives her opinion about other members of the royal family on tapes compiled as part of the research for Diana: Her True Story, the book penned by Andrew Morton that first broke the spell of her and Charles’s marriage.

“My wedding day, I think that was the worst day of my life,” Diana says. “If
I could write my own script I would have my husband go away with his woman
and never come back.”

‘His woman’ refers, of course, to Camilla Parker-Bowles, who has become the
Prince’s consort after Diana’s death.

Meanwhile, more of Diana’s inner secrets could come to light soon, after
letters the princess wrote to her personal reflexologist, Chryssie Fitzgerald, were sold at auction yesterday for UKP19,000.


15/01/04
Diana Murder Only Possible With ‘Invisible Men’
– No-one else involved, says key witness

PRINCESS DIANA could only have been killed by “invisible men” if her death was by murder, according to the only witness of the fateful Paris crash in 1997.

“The only way there could have been an assassination was if the tunnel was full of invisible men,” said Mohamed Medjahdi, 29, who was driving the car just in front of Diana’s speeding Mercedes.

Medjahdi is to give evidence at the inquiry into the crash currently being conducted by London police. His testimony was crucial in the investigation carried out by a Paris legal team in the wake of the crash which also killed Diana’s boyfriend Dodi Al Fayed.

“I got a complete picture from my side and rear-view mirrors of what was happening beside me,” Medjahdi explained. “There was no other vehicle in my field of vision. I saw no cars with the Mercedes, no photographers on motorbikes around the car. There was no one.

Did MI6 Kill Diana? We examine the evidence


07/01/04
Coroner: Diana Was Not Pregnant
– ‘I have seen into her womb,’ says royal doctor

FORMER Royal coroner Dr John Burton says Princess Diana was not pregnant at the time of her death, scotching rumours to the contrary.

“I was actually present when she was examined,” Burton said. “She wasn’t pregnant. I have seen into her womb.” .

“She had only met Dodi [al Fayed] six weeks before. Even if she got pregnant the first time she met him, that he shook hands and got her pregnant, the baby would only be six weeks old at most.

“It doesn’t stop everybody wanting to believe it.”

Before she had met Dodi Diana had apparently confided in friends that she was keen to have a child with lover Dr Hasnat Khan, a baby she planned to call Allegra if it had turned out to be a girl.

Such confidences have fuelled the rumour mill, hence Burton’s intervention today as an inquest into the crash that killed Diana and Dodi begins.

Even if Burton can prove Diana was not pregnant, however, the fact she wanted to have a baby with a Muslim man appears to bolster conspiracy theories based on the royal establishment’s supposed desire to avoid such an eventuality.


06/01/04
Diana: Charles Was Planning Car-Crash
– Princess named ex-husband as her likely killer, according to Burrell
– Official UK Inquest into deaths opens

PRINCESS DIANA believed Prince Charles planned to have her killed in a car-crash, according to ex-butler Paul Burrell.

Burrell, the man Diana called her ‘rock’, says he has a note written by the Princess which contains the killer line: “My husband is planning ‘an accident’ in my car, brake failure and serious head injury to make the path clear for him to marry.”

Burrell told of the existence of the murder-note in his book out last year, but has only today revealed that Prince Charles was the man Diana fingered.

Friends of Prince Charles have ridiculed the claim, pointing out that Diana had a multitude of bizarre theories about her life and its end.

Burrell says he changed his mind about naming Charles on the basis that the official inquest into Diana’s death opens today and that therefore the name would become public knowledge in due course.


22/12/03
‘Pregnant’ Diana Adds Weight to Al Fayed Claims
– French source backs Dodi’s father

MOHAMED AL FAYED has received important backing for his claims about the alleged conspiracy surrounding the deaths of his son Dodi and Diana, Princess of Wales in 1997 in Paris.

Al Fayed has long claimed that an official ‘cover-up’ embraced Diana being pregnant at the time of her death. Now a senior, though unnamed, French police officer has said the same thing.

“I can tell you that she was pregnant,” the officer told British newspaper, The Independent on Sunday. The source went on to say he had papers to substantiate his claim and said the pregnancy was not revealed at the time because it had nothing to do with the investigation into the cause of the deaths after a car-crash.

Al Fayed believes that the crash was part of a conspiracy by elements of the UK establishment who were unhappy at the relationship between his son and Diana. If a Diana pregnancy could be proved, it would give his opinions more weight.

However, Diana’s former butler Paul Burrell, who has himself fallen foul of the royal family, says his ex-boss was not pregnant. It is not yet known if this issue will form any part of the recently announced inquiry into the crash.


10/11/03
Charles: Matter Now Closed
– No TV appearance for Prince, despite aide’s gay query

PRINCE CHARLES is to keep quiet from now on over the feverish rumours surrounding his relationship with an ex-servant.

Last week, Charles made a long statement denying the rumours – claims we are not allowed to publish – and considered making a TV appearance to rubbish the allegations before the country, but has now decided to back away from the public eye.

“The Prince feels the matter is now closed. That, he feels, is an end to the matter,” said one royal insider.

It is doubtful if the media see it that way however, especially when it emerged that his current Private Secretary, Sir Michael Peat, asked former aide Mark Bolland if the latter thought Charles was gay or bisexual.

“I was astonished at Sir Michael’s question,” Bolland said. “I told him the Prince was emphatically not gay or bisexual.”

Better news or the Royal Family arrived at the weekend in the tiny shape of a baby daughter for Sophie, Countess of Wessex, who is the wife of Prince Edward, the Queen’s third son. Mother and baby, who was four months premature, are said to be doing well in St George’s Hospital, Tooting, south London.


07/11/03
I Didn’t Do It, Says Charles
Prince denies unmade allegations
The statement in full

IN A BIZARRE twist to the court battle to name a royal servant alleged to have to have been involved in an ‘incident’, Prince Charles has decided to deny any involvement on his part.

“The allegation was that the Prince of Wales was involved in the incident. This allegation is untrue,” said the Prince as part of an official statement from his Clarence House residence.

We are not allowed to say what the alleged incident was but we can now say that another former servant of Charles, Michael Fawcett, was the man who took out an injunction against the press to stop his name being revealed. That injunction has now been lifted.

Charles and Fawcett are now likely to face further rumour-mongering as the press look to fill in the holes of the story.

– The statement in full

Word for Word: the Clarence House statement:

“In recent days, there have been media reports concerning an allegation that a former Royal Household employee witnessed an incident some years ago involving a senior member of the Royal Family.

The speculation needs to be brought to an end.

The allegation was that the Prince of Wales was involved in the incident. This allegation is untrue. The incident which the former employee claims to have witnessed did not take place.

There is a particular sadness about this allegation because it was made by a former Royal Household employee who, unfortunately, has suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder and has previously suffered from alcoholism following active service in the Falklands.

He has, in the past, made other unrelated allegations, which the police have fully investigated and found to be unsubstantiated.
The newspaper group that sought to publish this allegation knew this and has described the former employee as ‘hardly a reliable witness’. This was why the newspaper concerned agreed to the injunction on Saturday afternoon.

The Prince of Wales has always tried to avoid becoming involved in disputes with the media, which he appreciates fulfils an important role. It is important, however, to state clearly that the allegation is entirely untrue.”


06/11/03
Charles’s Royal Servant Named
– Michael Fawcett sought Mail On Sunday gagging order

A HIGH COURT judge has lifted an order preventing the naming of the plaintiff who sought an injunction against the Mail On Sunday (MOS) last weekend.

The person has now been named as Michael Fawcett, a former royal aide to Prince Charles. Mr Justice Tugendhat, sitting in the High Court, ordered that the Guardian newspaper could name Fawcett as the aide this afternoon. He said his order did not lift the earlier injuction against the MOS.

The MOS returns to the High Court on Friday in an attempt to lift the original injunction. They are said to have a sworn affidavit from an ex-royal servant regarding a sexual act between a former royal aide and a senior royal.

The full story looks likely to come out soon. For now all we (can officially) know is that Fawcett, a former royal aide, was trying to prevent the MOS story from being published.


06/11/03
Courts Block Naming of Royal Servant
– ‘Extremely unsatisfactory,’ says paper

THE COURTS have rejected an attempt by the media to name a royal servant whose name was earlier blocked from appearing in an interview piece in the Mail on Sunday.

The Guardian was keen to name the individual concerned in terms of his or her legal proceedings, but High Court judge Mr Justice Tugenhat refused to grant the newspaper permission at a hearing on Wednesday and barred it and the rest of the media from parts of the hearing.

“This is a matter of enormous interest to the press and vitally affects what it may or may not report,” said Adrienne Page QC, for Guardian Newspapers Ltd.

“It’s extremely unsatisfactory in those circumstances that the press wanting to cover the argument and the issues weren’t present for an important part of that.”

Rumours of scandals involving various royal servants have been doing the rounds for years but were fuelled anew thanks to the publicity surrounding ex-Diana butler Paul Burrell.


05/11/03
Bryan Adams ‘Had an Affair with Diana’
Singer fails to deny claims made by his ex-girlfriend
Papers fight royal aide’s ‘gagging’ injunction

BRYAN ADAMS has refused to deny claims made by his former girlfriend that he had an affair with Princess Diana.

“Miss Thomsen doesn’t know anything about my friendship with Diana, nor does anyone else,” Adams said of Cecilie Thomsen’s claims that the pop singer bedded the Princess in 1996, in the aftermath of her divorce from Charles.

“I knew Diana had an affair with Bryan,” said Thomsen in an interview with a Danish magazine. “Ours was a stormy relationship and Bryan’s affair with Diana didn’t make it easier.”

– Papers fight royal aide’s ‘gagging’ injunction

Meanwhile, the fall-out from publication of the book by Diana’s ex-butler Paul Burrell continues. In the book, Burrell hinted at a secret scandal involving a member of the royal clan. It is thought the scandal lies behind the attempts of two British newspapers to remove an injunction preventing them from naming a royal servant. The case goes to court today.


03/11/03
Intimate Diana Videos Up for Grabs
– Court set to decide ownership of ten-year-old tapes

THE CONTENT of video tapes recorded by Princess Diana back in the early 1990s could be made public this week.

Diana recorded 21 hours as part of elocution lessons given by Peter Settelen. Police took charge of the tapes when they raided the house of Diana’s former butler Paul Burrell in 2001 but legal proceedings against Burrell collapsed. Settelen now wants the tapes in his possession, but Diana’s family insist the tapes belong to them. A court case is the result of the row.

It is thought on the tapes Diana talks intimately of her troubled marriage to Prince Charles and his mistress Camilla Parker Bowles.

Despite this information being worth millions in sell-on rights, Settelen says he will keep them confidential. However, in establishing ownership of the tapes, the court is likely to want to view them, probably bringing the content into the public realm.


29/10/03
‘Diana Tape’ Could Bring Down Monarchy
– Royal alleged to be implicated in ‘rape tape’ could be named within days

PRESSURE is mounting on the Royal Family this week as the fallout from Paul Burrell’s book ‘A Royal Duty’ continues to spread.

The London media is a-buzz with rumours as to the identity of a specific royal who is alleged to have committed a sex act with a member of staff. The rumour stems from the famous ‘rape tape’ that Diana claimed was part of her ‘crown jewels’ that were capable of bringing down the monarchy. The tape is said to be of a conversation between the Princess and former royal aide George Smith.

Smith claims that he was the victim of a male rape while in the employ of the palace and that his attacker was a royal aide. The tape is also thought to contain allegations by Smith that he witnessed a sex act committed by a royal on a member of staff.

To add to the air of confusion and duplicity, The Mirror says Burrell claims that the tape “disappeared” during his theft trial last autumn.

English law – yes the law conducted in the name and on behalf of the crown – prohibits us from telling you the name of the member of the royal family on the tape.

However it is now rumoured that the royal misdemeanour’s identity could be revealed within days by a foreign news outlet. Yesterday’s ‘Richard and Judy’ show on Channel Four suggested that the royal is soon to be named by the Italian press. It added that if known it could threaten the monarchy.

Little wonder that the royal family is worried. Following years of apparent cover ups and flawed prosecutions the legacy of Diana could finally be about to claim its ultimate prize: The end of the monarchy.


'A Royal Duty' by Paul Burrell - By Now27/10/03
Burrell: I Have Not Betrayed Diana
– Princess’s Butler defends new book as it goes on sale

PRINCESS DIANA’s former butler Paul Burrell has defended his new book as it goes on sale today.

The revelations contained in ‘A Royal Duty’ have already sent shockwaves through the royal family. Burrell also claims that he has not included Diana’s final secret, which for now is left to feverish speculation.

Over the weekend Princes William and Harry urged Burrell not to go ahead with the book’s release. Burrell has offered to meet the Princes to discuss the book. However he defends his right to publish his own experiences of palace life and details of letters between the Princess and himself. In one letter she warns of fears she has of being ‘taken out in a car crash’, just ten months before the Paris ‘accident’ that killed her.

Further controversy has surrounded the extracts from letters between the Princess and others such as Prince Philip and Earl Spencer.

Despite the Princes’s last minute plea it was always going to be unlikely that Burrell and the book’s publishers would pull the publication. Indeed 125,000 copies of the hardback have already been shipped worldwide. And so after a week of drip drip revelations finally we can now read his story for ourselves (see below for Amazon UK and USA ordering).

‘A Royal Duty’
by Paul Burrell
BUY now on:
Amazon.com Amazon.com : Rick Steves' London 2002
and
Amazon.co.uk Amazon.co.uk : Rick Steves' London 2002

LondonNet Diana Features:
Diana Conspiracy Theories
– our award winning feature. Regularly cited as the home of the Diana Conspiracy Theory.
Diana’s Lovers
In a unique LondonNet guide, we bring you the nine men, from bodyguard to rugby star, who may or may not have shared physical intimacies with Diana, one of the most apparently untouchable icons of them all.
click here


Princess had nine boyfriends, according to ex-butler....more24/10/03
Burrell: Diana Was ‘Desperate’ to Marry Khan
– Princess had nine boyfriends, according to ex-butler

PRINCESS DIANA wanted to marry heart surgeon Hasnat Khan, according to the latest revelation from the personal letters held by her ex-butler Paul Burrell.

Burrell is currently in the US publicising his book based on letters to and from Diana and makes the claim in an interview to be screened on American TV on Friday night.

Diana was “desperate” to marry Khan, according to Burrell, who also says the princess was not in love with Dodi Al Fayed, the lover who died alongside her.

Burrell also says in the interview that Diana had a stable of nine boyfriends, though he is not sure she slept with all of them. Khan and Al Fayed are two of the nine. The other seven remain unnamed but Burrell confirms they included a leading British sportsman, a top Hollywood actor and a politician.

It is believed Diana took courage in her attempts to woo Khan from the experiences of her friend Jemima Goldsmith who married former Pakistani cricket captain Imran Khan (no relation). However, it is thought Khan, also a Pakistani, refused to marry Diana.

Diana’s Lovers
In a unique LondonNet guide, we bring you the nine men, from bodyguard to rugby star, who may or may not have shared physical intimacies with Diana, one of the most apparently untouchable icons of them all.
click here


22/10/03
Diana Was a Lying Head-Case, said Spencer
– Letters reveal earlier thoughts of Princess’s funeral defender

THE DIANA-LETTERS affair found a new and unlikely target today in the form of the late princess’s brother.

Earl Spencer won international fame in the aftermath of Diana’s death when his funeral oration aimed both barrels at the royal family, all but claiming the ghost of the princess for the Spencer clan.

But, according to letters written by the Earl to Diana and released today to the public by her former butler Paul Burrell, Spencer was as fed up with his sister as the royal family.

“I know how manipulation and deceit are part of the illness,” Earl Spencer wrote. “I pray you are getting treatment for your mental problems.”

It was also revealed that the Earl turned down his sister’s request to live on the grounds of the family’s Althorp estate, where her body is now buried, and accused Diana of being fickle and causing hurt to those closest to her. “Our relationship is the weakest I have had with any sister,” Spencer said.

Diana Conspiracy Theories – our award winning feature. Regularly cited as the home of the Diana Conspiracy Theory.


21/10/03
Blair Says No to Diana Inquiry
– Burrell letters draw responses from government and royals

THE FRESH revelations surrounding the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, will not result in a public inquiry, Tony Blair has said.

The Prime Minister was responding to the allegations made this week by Diana’s former butler Paul Burrell who claims to have letters in which the princess predicts the cause of her own death.

“There has been an exhaustive investigation by the French authorities into the circumstances surrounding Diana’s death” a spokesperson for the PM said. “There will be nothing to be gained from repeating that here.

In the letter revealed by Burrell, Diana is alleged to have written about someone within the royal fold “planning an accident in my car, brake failure and serious head injury.”

Prince Philip is said to be outraged that Burrell released one of his letters in which he told Diana that Prince Charles would be stupid to leave her for Camilla Parker-Bowles. Buckingham Palace is believed to be trying to get hold of the letters and could even consider legal action.

Diana’s death shook the royals as it laid bare some of the internecine tensions that appear to bedevil this most famous of families resulting in a big drop in public support. Since then, polls have shown that the Windsors’ popularity has climbed again but royal advisers still fear another round of bad publicity.


20/10/03
Diana Predicted Car Crash Death
– Butler’s letter gives conspiracy theories new credence

PRINCESS DIANA predicted the manner of her death some ten months before she died in a Paris car crash, according to her former butler.

Paul Burrel has released what he claims to be a letter written by the late Princess which makes extraordinary reading. In the letter, which Burrel says Diana gave him for ‘insurance’, Diana says, “This phase in my life is the most dangerous,” and accuses a named person of “planning an accident in my car, brake failure and serious head injury.”

The Princess’s prediction came true in Paris in 1997 when Diana and her boyfriend Dodi Al Fayed died when their chauffeur driven car smashed into a tunnel wall.

The official inquiry into the crash blamed Henri Paul, the chauffeur, for the crash but there have always been conspiracy theories surrounding the deaths. Burrel’s letter is taken from his forthcoming book.