Lucy Spraggan, at just 20 years old, rose to prominence as a contestant on the British edition of The X Factor in 2012. Then, out of thin air, she was no longer there. People have pondered for many, many years why a prominent participant on a program that has launched the careers of hitmakers such as One Direction would suddenly disappear without providing even the barest hint of an explanation.
Now, for the first time, Spraggan is disclosing the reason why she dropped out of the singing competition. She told The Guardian that she was raped by a hotel employee after a night out celebrating a friend and fellow competitor’s 25th birthday. This is the first time that Spraggan has revealed the reason why she dropped out of the singing competition.
Spraggan, who is 31 years old, said that she became so intoxicated at the open-bar party that she passed out. Members of the X Factor production team were there at the party, and one of them drove Spraggan back to the hotel. When they arrived at the hotel, a member of the hotel staff volunteered to assist her in making her way to her room.
According to an article published by The Guardian, “as they left, the [hotel] porter flipped the security latch on her door to prevent it from locking behind them.” After some time had passed, a friend of Spraggan’s who was celebrating his 25th birthday went to check on her while she was asleep and made sure that her door was secured before he left. Because of his choices, the porter had little choice but to use a trackable keycard in order to get access to Spraggan’s room in order to assault her at a later time.
Spraggan said that she had a difficult time processing the terrible occurrence even though she was aware that she had been raped when she woke up the next day bewildered but completely aware that she had been raped.
“So I put my clothes on and went into autopilot,” she remarked to herself.
She walked inside the police station and made a complaint there. The employee of the hotel was subsequently caught and then given a sentence of ten years in jail after the trial. Spraggan maintained his anonymity throughout the proceedings of the trial, during which he was referred to only as a “television star.”
Spraggan claims that she pulled out of the talent contest only a few days after the assault because she was poorly due to the adverse effects of Pep, which is an acronym for post-exposure prophylaxis. Pep is a medicine that prevents HIV infection if it is administered within the first 72 hours following an exposure to the virus. After being “sequestered in a room on the 11th floor” of a London hotel, Spraggan stated in her new memoir Process: Finding My Way Through, which will be available in bookstores on July 20, that she toyed with the idea of taking her own life during that time.
Spraggan says in her book that on “that evening, I had to relentlessly shake away the constant pull to go towards the balcony doors,” and The Guardian quotes this passage. “All of this could vanish in such a short amount of time,” I thought to myself.
Spraggan, who in her early 20s moved in the same concert circles as another British singer called Ed Sheeran, is now contracted to the music publishing organization owned by Simon Cowell. When Cowell was a judge on America’s Got Talent in 2012, he gave an interview to a publication in which he described what had occurred to Spraggan as “horrific and heartbreaking.”
“When I was given the opportunity to speak to Lucy, I was able to personally tell her how sorry I was about everything she has been through,” Cowell said in an interview with The Guardian. “Despite the unfortunate circumstances under which we first became acquainted, we have managed to cultivate a genuine friendship and a profound respect for one another.” Lucy is one of the most genuine, brilliant, and courageous women I’ve ever had the pleasure of knowing. I have always been supportive of her attempts to bring about good change, as well as her desire to share her experience with others.