Bay City Rollers frontman Les McKeown's family say that the '70s rocker hit a downward spiral after he was raped by the band's manager when he was 19-years old.
For decades Les battled with drug and alcohol addiction before eventually dying in April, 2021, aged 65. Now his widow, Peko Keiko, and son, Jubei, have revealed in a forthcoming ITV documentary that a lot of his anguish and suffering was linked to the alleged abuse he suffered at the hands of manager Tom Paton.
"He never told me but he suffered it," Peko said during an appearance in "Secrets Of The Bay City Rollers," according to the Mirror. "When he was sleeping he was screaming. He cried a lot. He said to me 'I hate Tam Paton.' "
Asked if Paton raped him, she added, "I think so."
Jubei linked his father's earlier troubled life to the alleged abuse.
"When he would go on these binges, sometimes he would say he hates himself," he said.
"That was often … almost every time he started drinking," he continued. "And then it kind of made sense. You know, the drinking, just the anger. My dad's a broken man. My dad never found peace in his life. That hurts."
Original member Stuart "Woody" Wood also appeared in the documentary and shared his own experience with Paton.
"Tam was just very domineering, very much the band leader. He was the sixth Roller … on the road, a big kind of bully," he said.
Original singer Nobby Clark further revealed that they were encouraged as a band to sleep with Radio 1 DJ Chris Denning to get airplay for a single. Denning was later jailed for abusing boys.
"It might have been a hit, but at what cost?" Clark said. "I realized the Bay City Rollers were about Tam Paton. He didn't care about the band."
In 1982, Paton was jailed for three years after admitting to molesting 10 boys over a three-year period. He died in 2009.
Les joined the Bay City Rollers in 1973 and remained lead vocalist until 1978.
Zoe Papadakis ✉
Zoe Papadakis is a Newsmax writer based in South Africa with two decades of experience specializing in media and entertainment. She has been in the news industry as a reporter, writer and editor for newspapers, magazine and websites.
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