Jimmy Savile’s headstone taken away at 1am, smashed up and dumped in a skip once its inscription is removed with grinders – with his family’s blessing

Jimmy Savile is today lying in an unmarked grave after a dead-of-night operation to remove his £4,000 headstone at the request of his family.
Undertakers worked in the dark to rip out the giant memorial and have said it will 'be broken up, placed in a skip and used as landfill'.
The gates of Woodlands Cemetery in Scarborough, North Yorkshire, were locked at around 11pm last night and police stood guard for the two-hour operation.
His loved-ones did not attend and while they had ordered the removal of the grave they were not aware of the undertakers’ decision to do it in the middle of the night.
Undertakers were to wait until 7am today before removing the headstone with Savile’s now inflammatory epitaph: 'It was good while it lasted.'
All its inscriptions will be ground away before the 4ft stone is destroyed.
The Savile family feared the grave could become the centre of a media circus and could have been attacked, so gave funeral director Robert Morphet a free hand to carry out what he called 'a discreet' operation.
'We started just after 11 and finished going on 1am. We were concerned about the amount of people who might turn up if we left it until morning,' he said.
'We decided it was going to be done before then and brought our own lights and generators.

'The grave will now be ground down so the inscription it totally wiped and will be destroyed.

'It will be broken up, placed in a skip and used as landfill.

'For the foreseeable future the grave will remain unmarked. The family will decide at some future point about what to do.'

Grave: Bunches of flowers mark the grave of Sir Jimmy Savile after his headstone was removed in the middle of the night

Decision: Savile's family gave permission for its removal out of respect for public opinion - with the scene shown here at dawn

Gone: The headstone was only put in place three weeks ago

The Savile family has said in a statement: 'Members of the family of Sir Jimmy Savile have decided to remove his headstone from the grave in Scarborough.
'The family members are deeply aware of the impact that the stone remaining there could have on the dignity and sanctity of the cemetery.

'Out of respect to public opinion, to those who are buried there, and to those who tend their graves and visit there, we have decided to remove it.'

The team worked under floodlights, piling the black granite into a truck and replacing the rotting flowers, which have not been refreshed since the allegations broke, onto the patch of bare earth.

Message: A card also left there thanks Savile for the times they shared together from a well-wisher called Sha

But it was not yet clear what – if any – memorial would replace the six foot wide by four foot tall triple headstone which was only unveiled on September 20 spanning three plots.
'There were no pictures taken at all and no family present – only police, a team of four undertakers, and the cemetery authorities,' Mr Morphet added.
'There were no family present. They did not know we were going to do it in the night. But we wanted it to be discreet,' Mr Morphet continued.
'The gates were closed and police stood guard outside and on the graveside.'
Among the last to visit Savile’s grave at dusk was a woman who said she wanted to see the stone for the first and last time because of her friend’s ordeal at the hands of Savile more than 40 years ago.
The woman, who refused to be named, worked at Leeds General Infirmary where Savile volunteered and always thought him 'a bit odd'. But when a girlfriend got married in 1969 she realised he was much worse.

Inquiry: Scotland Yard has contacted the BBC and ITV, which are handing over details of victims who are willing to co-operate. BBC Television Centre is pictured

She said: 'He volunteered to drive her to her wedding in his Rolls Royce but turned up with a chauffeur and sat in the back with her.
'They then had a bit of a tussle. She said he was trying to grope her all the way to the registry office and she had to fight him off.'
Turning back to the grave, she said: 'What a despicable rat.'
It came as celebrities and former BBC staff face arrest for alleged sex offences after Scotland Yard dramatically widened its inquiry into Sir Jimmy Savile yesterday.

As officers revealed the staggering scale of allegations against the late TV entertainer, they made it clear that they will pursue individuals who conspired with Savile or participated in abuse.
Savile, who died last year aged 84, was yesterday accused by police of carrying out four decades of sickening offences on a ‘national scale’.
Scotland Yard has already received a ‘range of names’ among 120 potential leads and will take action if victims provide statements supporting claims of rape or sexual abuse by those close to Savile.
It has contacted the BBC and ITV, which are handing over details of victims who are willing to co-operate.
As the astonishing breadth of the Savile sex scandal became clear, the BBC was facing its biggest crisis in years with renewed questions over why it failed to act on a damning but never broadcast Newsnight film on Savile’s crimes nearly a year ago.
It also emerged yesterday that:

• Police have already identified at least 30 victims of Savile who was at his offending peak at the height of his fame during the 1970s and 1980s
• Savile targeted boys as well as girls – who were mainly aged between 13 and 16
• The first known complaint dates from 1959 when the star was 33 and at the start of his showbusiness career

Police have already formally recorded eight criminal allegations – two rapes and six of indecent assault.

Celebrities likely to be questioned include convicted paedophiles Gary Glitter and Jonathan King as well as other former colleagues at Radio 1 and BBC TV.
Detectives will also probe claims that Savile was free to roam NHS wards attacking young patients, and allowed to prey on teenage pupils at state schools.
Incredibly, five separate police forces investigated Savile while he was still alive yet none of them ever brought charges, it was revealed yesterday.

Allegations: Savile, who died last year aged 84, was yesterday accused by police of carrying out four decades of sickening offences on a 'national scale'

Metropolitan Police Commissioner Bernard Hogan-Howe pledged that detectives would now be ‘asking questions’ of living celebrities about allegations of sex attacks.
He added that police were aware of reports in the Press about a number of individuals. He said: ‘We have seen enough in these public reports that it would be negligent if we did not act and ask questions about them.’
Glitter, who allegedly raped a girl of 13 in Savile’s BBC dressing room, is likely to be questioned.

 

Savile died in October last year, denying his alleged victims the chance for justice.
Mr Hogan-Howe said: ‘Sadly there is little we can do. We cannot arrest the man, interview him, charge him or put him before a court, but we will take statements from victims and we will take these reports very seriously.’
Giving details yesterday of Operation Yewtree – the joint police and NSPCC inquiry into Savile – Commander Peter Spindler said ten officers were investigating the torrent of claims which coincided with the screening of an ITV documentary on the star last week.
Asked if Savile was ‘guilty’, he said: ‘I think the facts speak for themselves, around the number of women who have come forward and spoken of his behaviour and predilection for teenage girls.’
Mr Spindler said the abuse was ‘on a national scale’.
Although Savile is beyond the reach of police, he said: ‘Our job is to deal with living offenders and to safeguard society today.
‘For those who have been brave enough to speak out, we are looking to see if we can identify anyone who could be subject to criminal investigation.
'The victims are looking for an acknowledgement and recognition that what happened to them is in fact true, and they will get that from our analysis of information provided.
‘We are not going to investigate anyone who is still alive unless we get some evidence and that will come from witness testimony.

Quizzed: Celebrities likely to be questioned include convicted paedophiles Gary Glitter, left, and Jonathan King, right, as well as other former colleagues at Radio 1 and BBC TV

‘One of our objectives is to see if anyone still alive has committed offences which are capable of investigation.’
Officers are also speaking to staff at Stoke Mandeville Hospital, in Buckinghamshire, and Leeds General Infirmary, where Savile was a regular visitor during his charity work.
The NSPCC said it has referred 24 calls from abuse victims to police, including 17 women who claim they were attacked by Savile himself.
Police said their initial inquiry was expected to be completed by the end of next month. But the crisis for the BBC is likely to linger much longer.
Savile was one of the corporation’s biggest stars of TV and radio of the 1970s and 1980s, and knighted in 1990.
His stardom gave him the perfect cover for his paedophile activities, and he even boasted to friends he was ‘untouchable’ at the corporation.
BBC chiefs have struggled to explain why Savile was never stopped in his tracks, and face mounting claims of a cover-up – especially after shelving the Newsnight investigation into Savile last year. 
Questions remain over why it did not hand police documentary evidence that girls were abused.
The list of victims has grown daily. None of the women stepping forward to claim they were raped or molested as schoolgirls by Savile has asked for anything in return for telling their story.
The picture they paint is of a ‘classic’ child abuser, targeting vulnerable youngsters at schools, hospitals and children’s homes, including Jersey’s notorious Haut de la Garenne.
He plied them with treats – under the noses of teachers, doctors and BBC managers – and took them for rides in his Rolls-Royce and to the BBC to watch his shows being recorded.
Savile sexually abused them in his car, his BBC dressing room, on hospital wards and in the bedrooms of girls at Duncroft boarding school in Surrey.
The Daily Mail revealed on Saturday how a former beauty queen named Sandra claims she was raped by a BBC employee who was an ‘accomplice’ of Jimmy Savile.
Sandra, now 65, who does not want her full name published, has since reported the man to police for allegedly forcing himself on her in his BBC office in 1970.
He denied her claims when they were put to him by the Mail last week, saying: ‘I haven’t got the greatest memory but I don’t remember any of this. I can’t see why the accusations have been made. I have never raped anyone in my life.’ 

BBC calls in outsider to lead inquiry

The BBC is to draft in an 'independent' troubleshooter to handle the toxic fallout from the Savile scandal. Its newly appointed director general George Entwistle is pictured

The BBC is to draft in an ‘independent’ troubleshooter to handle the toxic fallout from the Savile scandal.
Bosses want an outside figure to lead an internal investigation to avoid fresh claims of a cover-up about who knew what and when.
One MP even likened to BBC’s foot-dragging on the affair to the leaden response of News International to the unfolding phone-hacking scandal at the now defunct News of the World.
Another said the corporation had ‘procrastinated’ about what to do about the allegations because it was worried about the effect on its image.
Yesterday the BBC faced renewed questions over its ‘extraordinary’ decision to drop a Newsnight investigation into the claims almost a year ago.
In addition, critics point out that irrespective of whether the film was ever broadcast, the corporation’s executives had been duty bound to hand over its damning findings to the police.
There is continued unease that some of his crimes were committed on BBC premises amid suggestions some colleagues turned a blind eye to his activities.
On Monday, the BBC’s newly appointed director general George Entwistle admitted that in his former role as TV chief he had known about Newsnight’s Savile investigation but still went ahead with eulogies which heaped praise on the presenter when he died.
He said he had never asked what Newsnight’s investigation was actually discovering.
It also follows claims by his predecessor Mark Thompson, who left the BBC last month, that he knew nothing about Savile’s alleged abuse of teenage girls.
This contradicted the BBC’s press office, which said he had been told about the Newsnight investigation in December.
Clearly stung by suspicions that the Newsnight report was dropped for corporate reasons, something the BBC denies, Mr Entwistle’s decision to appoint an outside figure will be interpreted as a clear attempt to emphasise the independence of the review.
An insider last night said the search had only just begun for the person to lead the inquiry. 
BBC chairman Lord Patten admitted that when the BBC starts its own inquiry, after the police have finished theirs, it would have to look at the issues which were still unresolved ‘in a way which will have to command credibility in the wider community’.
It emerged last night that another of the corporation’s flagship current affairs programmes, BBC1’s Panorama, is preparing a programme on the Savile scandal, after Newsnight’s embarrassing decision to drop its report in December 2011.
The documentary is understood to be led by the man who was working on the Newsnight project, Meirion Jones.
Last night Lib Dem MP Adrian Sanders, who sits on the culture, media and sport select committee, said of the decision to drop the Newsnight report: ‘That seems to me to be an extraordinary thing to do and that is something that will have to be revisited if the scale of the crimes has been proven.’
Tory MP Philip Davies, also a member of the committee, compared the BBC’s handling of the situation with the way that News International dealt with the phone-hacking scandal.
He added: ‘The whole thing is a complete catastrophe for the BBC but more importantly it is a catastrophe for the victims who have suffered in silence.’
A BBC insider said there was no proof that bosses had never lent on anyone to drop the Newsnight report.

•  A campaign to strip Savile posthumously of his knighthood is likely to fail because it would require a change in the law.