A male escort who was chained to the wall and kept prisoner in Boy George’s London flat has slammed the casting of the singer in “I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here!”
Boy George, 61, first met Audun Carlsen, 43, in 2007 when the Karma Chameleon hitmaker got in touch via a dating site and asked Audun to model items from his clothing range.
They met at George’s flat in Shoreditch, East London where they drank wine and took cocaine, but things took an unwanted turn.
After their interaction, George and another man set upon Audun, claiming he had tried to hack into George’s computer. The beat Audun and left him handcuffed to a wall fixture from which he escaped by wrenching himself free.
Still traumatised by the incident, former escort Audun has angrily spoken out at George appearing on “I’m A Celebrity”, which starts on ITV1 on Sunday.
Audun said, “Had I been a woman and he did what he did, he would never have been given the platform. It’s hurtful that big organizations like ITV give him that platform.”
“I think giving him this sort of platform and a record fee sends the wrong message to survivors of violence and abuse and is plain wrong,” Audun added.
A representative for George responded, “George went to jail for four months willingly after openly confessing to false imprisonment during a psychotic break 15 years ago whilst in the midst of a well documented drug problem. Not only has he been a pillar of society ever since, but he also remains sober to this day. He apologized publicly on Piers Morgan’s Life Stories four years ago and we are very proud of him for his rehabilitation.”
“Everyone is entitled to a second chance and George has certainly earned it,” the representative concluded.
George shackled sex worker Audun to a wall and whipped him with a chain while screaming abuse at him when he had a £400-a-day heroin habit.
Audun, who was aged 28 at the time, was beaten and threatened with a sex toy and fled the property in his underpants, and called police at 6.30am from a nearby newsagents.
George was jailed in 2009 for 15 months after being found guilty of assault and false imprisonment, but was given early release after four months for good behaviour.
Since then, the former heroin addict has turned over a new leaf and celebrated a decade of sobriety in April 2018.
In 2017 Boy George sobbed on TV as he described a ‘psychotic episode’ when he kept Audun prisoner in his flat and how he was attacked in prison for being gay.
George claimed he didn’t apologize to Audun because it wouldn’t have made a difference.
During an appearance on Piers Morgan’s Life Stories, he said, “I sent myself to prison. I told the police why I did what I did. In hindsight I was having a psychotic episode. I was a drug addict so I can’t sit here and say my reasons for doing it were founded in any way. But I told the truth. I said, “This is why I did it. I was having a paranoid episode”. I have always denied beating the guy.”
