Naomi Campbell Admits ‘Failure’ as a Trustee at Shady ‘Fashion for Relief’ Charity – Supermodel Denies ‘Financial Misconduct’ or ‘Use of the Charity for Personal Gain’
There are very few things more enraging than so-called ‘charities’ that mishandle funds supposedly destined for relief of those in need.
The world is already filled with hunger and misery without this kind of behavior.
Take former ‘supermodel’ Naomi Campbell, for example: just last week she received a 5-year ban from running a charity after a damning report found that she and her two fellow trustees were ‘culpable for multiple incidents of serious misconduct and financial mismanagement’.
Now, Naomi Campbell comes public to admit ‘she failed in her duties as a trustee’ at her Fashion for Relief charity – but she still insists she ‘never engaged in financial misconduct or used the charity for personal gain’.
The Guardian reported:
“Fashion for Relief raised nearly £4.8m from fashion show fundraisers over five years to 2020 but gave just 10% of the £4.6m proceeds to partner charities in the form of grants, the Charity Commission inquiry found.”
The Charity Commission revealed that Campbell’s charity spent TENS OF THOUSANDS OF POUNDS on luxury hotel rooms, spa treatments, personal security, and even – believe it or not – cigarettes for Campbell at a Fashion for Relief charity fashion event.
Is that not ‘financial misconduct’? Is that not ‘using the charity for personal gain’?
“A spokesperson for Campbell said she ‘acknowledges and accepts her accountability’ as a Fashion for Relief trustee. While she admitted she “may not have been as actively engaged in the charity’s day-to-day operations as she should have been”, she said she had ‘never engaged in any form of financial misconduct’.
A statement issued on behalf of Campbell on Friday said: ‘For over three decades, [Campbell] has dedicated herself tirelessly to charitable causes, always with the sole intention of helping others and never for personal gain. Naomi has never received payment for her involvement with Fashion for Relief, nor has she billed any personal expenses to the organization’.”
Read: Super Model Naomi Campbell Breaks Her Silence on Jeffrey Epstein Accusations (VIDEO)
The statement by Campbell’s spokesman also addresses a report by The Guardian that UNICEF UK filed a ‘serious incident report’ to the Charity Commission after Fashion for Relief incorrectly named the UN agency as a fundraising partner during a London fashion week ‘charity’ event in September 2019.
“The spokesperson said: ‘At the last minute, the collaboration did not go ahead. All efforts were made to remove the UNICEF brand from event materials. UNICEF was not included in the event invitation or website, and Naomi’s speech made no mention of UNICEF’.”
Campbell’s team considers that their use of the UNICEF brand on promotional materials ‘an honest mistake’ that was ‘made in good faith’.
Fashion for Relief, they say, had discussions with UNICEF UK about a fundraising collaboration but this did not go ahead ‘because of the Covid pandemic’.
Campbell’s ‘charity’ also owed money to ‘Save the Children’ and ‘The Mayor’s Fund for London’ after partnering with them on fundraising events.
They only paid £200,000 and £50,000 respectively when Fashion for Relief was wound up by commission managers in 2023.
The two-and-a-half-year inquiry by the Charity Commission into Fashion for Relief details ‘extraordinary examples of chaotic management and poor record-keeping’ at the charity, together with multiple breaches of trustees’ legal duties.
“These include unsanctioned consultancy and expenses payments of £290,000 over two years to a Fashion for Relief trustee, Bianka Hellmich. The payments, authorised retrospectively by Campbell, were made in breach of their legal duties as trustees. Hellmich, who last week received a nine-year trustee ban, repaid the money after the commission intervened.”
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