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Mel Greig claims she tried to stop royal prank call going to air in Seven interview

Former 2DayFM DJ Mel Grieg. Picture: Sunday Night

Former 2DayFM DJ Mel Grieg. Picture: Sunday Night

Former Today Network DJ Mel Greig has claimed she tried to prevent the notorious royal prank call from going to air but was overruled by the station.

“I feel like a failure as a human being,” A teary Greig told interviewer Mel Doyle on Seven’s Sunday Night program. “I am ashamed of myself. I should have tried harder to not let that prank call air.”

The station and DJ’s Greig and her co-host Michael Christian made international headlines in December 2012 when the pair managed to get a call through to the hospital where The Duchess of Cambridge Kate Middleton was being treated for morning sickness after they impersonated The Queen and Prince Charles. The Nurse who initially put the call through, Jacintha Saldanha, later took her own life and blamed the DJs in a suicide note.

In last night’s interview Greig said that just moments after the call was made she emailed station management urging them to disguise the voices of the nurses if the call was broadcast. However the decision was made to allow the call to go to air unchanged.

Southern Cross Austereo, which owns the Today Network, is not commenting on Greig’s claims.

“It just didn’t seem right that we would broadcast that without permission,” Greig said. “I just remember myself laughing thinking how funny it was because it had worked. And then smart Mel kicked in soon after that going, ‘hang on this isn’t right’.

“I feel disgusted in myself listening back to it.”

The death of Saldanha had haunted Greig since the event she told Doyle.

“I think of the Saldanha family all the time, and I just want them to see that I’m sorry, because I care so much about Jacintha and what she did and what happened, and I’m so sorry,” she said.

“I don’t ever want to listen to it again, because I’m ashamed of myself. I should have tried harder not to let that prank call air. It never should have aired.”

Barrister Tony Hurran who is representing Greig told the program his client had been used by the station as a shield against the negative publicity arising from the scandal.

“She has been the scapegoat and the fall guy. The decision to broadcast was not hers,” he said.

Greig said her health and career had been devastated by the incident and the resulting fallout when both DJs came under intense media scrutiny and were the subject of threats.

“They targeted my family. They were innocent victims. They would call my mum and say ‘an eye for an eye – she died… and now you have to die’,” she said.

A spokeswoman for Southern Cross Austero which owns the Today Network said the company had no comment on Greig’s statements in the interview.

Last year in December the company released a statement saying the station and Greig had “amicably resolved all aspects of their dispute arising from the royal hoax call which was broadcast by 2Day FM”. 

It goes on to state: “Mel Greig wishes to make it clear that as an announcer she was not responsible for the decision to broadcast the hoax call. Prior to the call being broadcast she made suggestions for changes to be made to the recording of the call. 2Day FM decided that the call should be broadcast without alteration”.

The Seven network said part of the interview had been filmed last year but was held until last night for legal reasons. The network is currently embroiled in an ongoing legal battle with the Australian Communications and Media Authority over a supposedly damning report into the incident.

See the full interview here.

Robert Burton-Bradley

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