Naomi Campbell wins appeal over charity ban
A tribunal rules that the model was unaware of misconduct at her charity Fashion for Relief.
Model Naomi Campbell has won her appeal against a ban on being a charity trustee, after a tribunal ruled that she was unaware of misconduct at her charity Fashion for Relief.
Campbell was banned from being a charity trustee for five years in 2024 after a watchdog found that Fashion for Relief funds had been spent on luxury hotels and spa treatments.
However, a tribunal said on Thursday , external that the most serious instances of misconduct in the charity "were concealed" from Campbell by a fellow trustee.
"Ms Campbell was not involved in, and did not know of, that conduct," the three-person tribunal panel said.
The supermodel set up Fashion for Relief to help victims of Hurricane Katrina in 2005, and went on to front further campaigns for disasters and causes around the world.
However, the charity was shut in 2023 and Campbell and two other trustees were banned the following year after a Charity Commission inquiry found "serious mismanagement and/or misconduct" at Fashion for Relief, which was not passing on as much of the money raised as it was supposed to.
Campbell appealed, saying one of her fellow trustees, lawyer Bianka Hellmich, forged her signature and impersonated her using a fake email address to misdirect money that was intended for the charity.
Her "only mistake" was trusting Hellmich, Campbell told the tribunal in June.
The Charity Commission opposed Campbell's challenge and said the five-year ban should be upheld.
In its ruling, the First-Tier Tribunal panel said Campbell's claim that she was deceived had been corroborated by documentary evidence.
"For the avoidance of doubt, we accept that both Ms Campbell's evidence, as well as her conduct during the operation of the Charity, was entirely honest," they said.
They said Campbell did not know â¬4,386 (£3,750) of hotel charges from a trip to the south of France in 2018 - including â¬1,298 (£1,100) for dinner room service, â¬1,163 (£990) for spa treatments and â¬112 (£95) for cigarettes - had come out of the charity's expenses.
"The panel is satisfied that Ms Campbell was not responsible for the inappropriate use of the charity's resources or any unjustified expenditure, nor did she contribute or facilitate it," they said.
Campbell must take some responsibility for failures to maintain minutes and file accounts on time - but that was not enough to disqualify the model as a charity trustee, the tribunal said.
"There was serious misconduct and mismanagement in the administration of the charity she founded, Fashion for Relief," the ruling said.
"The Tribunal has found, however, that its most serious features, including unauthorised payments to Ms Campbell's co-trustee, Bianka Hellmich, failures in the management of the Charity's finances and the misuse of its funds, resulted from Ms Hellmich's conduct and were concealed from Ms Campbell."
Unauthorised payments of more than £290,000 were made to Hellmich for apparent consultancy fees, the inquiry found.
The tribunal ruling continued: "Ms Hellmich deceived Ms Campbell, used forged documents and a false email address purporting to belong to her, and also deceived professional advisers and the Commission.
"Ms Campbell was not involved in, and did not know of, that conduct.
"The Tribunal finds that she had no reasonable basis to suspect Ms Hellmich's dishonesty before regulatory concerns emerged and, when they did, Ms Campbell took reasonable steps in response."
The ruling said Hellmich's solicitors wrote to the tribunal to deny the allegations against her, but she was not called to give evidence and did not take part in the proceedings.
Naomi Campbell blames lawyer for 'fraud and deception' at charity ban appeal
