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Douglas accused of sexual harassment

Denies claim: Michael Douglas has denied allegations by journalist (Photograph by Richard Shotwell/Invision/AP)

Hollywood star Michael Douglas has been accused of sexual harassment by a former employee.

Author and journalist Susan Braudy told The Hollywood Reporter that Mr Douglas’s alleged treatment left her feeling “humiliated”.

Ms Braudy’s claims came a little more than a week after Mr Douglas, who has close family and property links to Bermuda, issued a pre-emptive denial of the claims.

Mr Douglas, a frequent visitor to the island, and the son of Bermudian Diana Dill and Hollywood legend Kirk Douglas, has described the allegations against him as “a complete lie, fabrication, with no truth in it whatsoever”.

Ms Braudy worked for Mr Douglas’s company, Stonebridge Productions, in the late 1980s.

She claimed he used sexual language in front of her, including discussing extramarital affairs, while she was running the firm’s New York office.

Ms Braudy alleged that Douglas commented on her body, which forced her to resort to wearing loose, dark clothing.

She also alleged he performed a sexual act in front of her during a one-on-one script meeting in his apartment in 1989, and that she rushed out feeling humiliated.

Ms Braudy said: “I realised he thought he could do anything he wanted because he was so much more powerful than I was.”

She added that she ran home and vowed never to be alone with him again.

Ms Braudy finished work with Stonebridge later that year.

Mr Douglas, who spoke to the US online entertainment magazine Deadline this month to deny the claims, said: “I pride myself on my reputation in this business, not to mention the long history of my father and everything else.

“I don’t have skeletons in my closet, or anyone else who’s coming out or saying this. I’m bewildered why, after 32 years, this is coming out now.”

He also claimed there is no evidence against him and that he feared that such accusations could set back the #MeToo movement that has grown in the wake of the Hollywood sexual harassment scandal.

Efforts to reach Mr Douglas by The Royal Gazette for further comment were unsuccessful.

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