Anorak

Anorak News | False Alarm

False Alarm

by | 4th, October 2006

“ALL I did was go shopping,” says Peaches Geldof, daughter of Bob Geldof, patron saint of globalised stadium rock.

But such is life of a young celebrity that when Peaches goes shopping, the newshounds track her every move.

You can hear the shrill blast on the whistle as the paparazzi mass outside the windows of Urban Outfitters on London’s Oxford Street.

But that’s no high-pitched dog whistle, telling the tabloid hounds that their quarry has been cornered.

It is the screech of the store’s alarm. Peaches is holding a £285 cost. The security tag is still on it. Staff arrive. And Peaches is taken upstairs to the management suite for a chat.

“SHOPLIFT QUIZ FOR PEACHES,” says the front page of the Sun. The shop workers want to know why the alarm went off. And there are more questions in the Star: “PEACHES GELDOF IN SHOPLIFT QUIZ.”

Questions and more questions. What triggered the alarm? What was someone with ambitions of cool doing shopping on Oxford Street – no self-respecting Londoner ever even walks down the mobbed Mecca of vendors selling polluted pizza slices, T-shirts bearing a picture of the Pope smoking a refer and language schools?

The Star is right to use its front page to announce “SHOPLIFTING AGONY OF GELDOF GIRL”. The shame!

But reading on we learn that it was a misunderstanding. The Star hears from a shop worker: “Peaches was shopping in here when the alarm went off. It turned out the police weren’t called.”

And that about the coat? Why, as a close friend of Peaches’ tells the Mirror, she had bought it.

Although the Mail adds a little spice. The paper cites a shop source who says guards “had thought Miss Geldof might not have paid for the coat but was walking out wearing it anyway”.

The source goes on: “We could not find a record of her having paid for it and she did not appear to have a receipt…We checked her bags as well.” Finally: “We came to an agreement and she left through the back door.”

Where Peaches, and her new coat, are whisked off in a Mercedes. The newshounds stand down. It’s all been a false alarm…



Posted: 4th, October 2006 | In: Tabloids Comment | TrackBack | Permalink