Award-winning poet Amy K Blakemore says she was assaulted by an editor from Penguin books when they met for drinks in 2015
The publishing industry has become the latest hit by allegations of sexual impropriety after an award-winning poet accused an editor of assaulting her.
Amy K Blakemore, who won the Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award in 2007 and 2008, says Donald Futers, a poetry editor at Penguin Random House, assaulted her in 2015. Mr Futers vehemently denies the claims.
Ms Blakemore said she had kept the allegation quiet until now but had come forward ‘in light of recent developments’, following the #MeToo movements exposure of sexual harassment in Hollywood and subsequent sleaze scandals in politics and the media.
Oxford-educated Ms Blakemore, 26, posted a statement on her Twitter feed on Monday stating she went out for a drink with Mr Futers after meeting at a poetry reading.
She wrote: ‘The evening of that meeting he assaulted me. We had both been drinking. I disclosed what had happened at the time to my partner and a few close friends.’
She posted a statement online suggesting she’d come forward after the #MeToo movement
Ms Blakemore said she went to Penguin over the issue but was disappointed at their response
She claimed that when she went to his employer, she was told to prove Mr Futers was ‘representing Penguin in an official capacity’ at the time of the incident, which she could not.
Mr Futers has released a statement to The Bookseller magazine, insisting he had not assaulted Mr Blakemore.
He said: ‘The allegation has been made that I met this person on the pretext of discussing her work and assaulted her. I vehemently deny both claims.’
Donald Futers has strongly denied Ms Blakemore’s claims
He added: ‘These matters have also been addressed in a separate statement by my employer.
‘To be falsely accused and to have these matters aired in public is extremely distressing. Given the circumstances and the sensitivities surrounding these issues, I have nothing further to say at this time.’
His employer Penguin Random House UK sent an email to staff this week, telling them the company ‘does not – and will not – tolerate any kind of inappropriate sexual behaviour’, The Times reported today.
Penguin’s communications director Rebecca Sinclair told the paper the company had conducted a ‘thorough investigation’ and was ‘satisfied that we have acted fairly and swiftly’.
Ms Blakemore was born in Deptford, south London in 1991 and read English Language and Literature at St Edmund Hall, Oxford. Her collection Humbert Summer won the 2014 Melita Hume Poetry Prize.
Mr Futers joined Penguin in 2012 and became full time poetry editor in 2015.
Penguin Random House in the world’s biggest book publisher and has offices in the Strand