Owner of Hampton's Swiss Chalet and riviera, Myck Djurberg, found not guilty of grabbing workmen by the bottom

It took a jury at Kingston Crown Court about an hour this afternoon to find Myck Djurberg, 56, not guilty of the charges dating from November 2013 to June 2015.

Mr Djurberg, who owns the Hampton Riviera and Boatyard, as well as the 150-year-old chalet that was shipped over from Switzerland in 1882, was accused of pinching the bottom of one man at a party in 2013, as well as grabbing or slapping the bottom of another worker on the site “every day.”

Philippa McAtasney, defending, said the three young men who had made the accusations all worked for employers involved in civil disputes with Mr Djurberg, and the allegations were made to derail these proceedings.

She told the jury: “Consider this, of all the hundreds of workers who must have worked on that site over the years, it just so happens that Myck Djurberg has picked on the three who happened to have bosses who were expelled from the site and ended up in serious civil proceedings with him.”

The chalet was shipped from Switzerland in 1882

Ms McAtasney added: “Do you really thing this is the sort of nonsense that should clog up our criminal courts?

“Should this really be occupying your time?

“A spat between grown men as a makeweight for other allegations?”

Ms McAtasney told the court they were not dealing with a complex sexual assault that took years to deal with.

She said: “It is a slap on the arse, to use some of the terminology we have heard.

“These are all adult males who work on building sites who said they were unable to speak out about this.

“That is rubbish.”

Mr Djurberg, whose name was saved in one of the worker’s phones as “Gay Myck”, told the court he was not a homosexual and had been married three times, but it was revealed he had told police in 2009 he identified as bisexual.

He told the court he was not gay, but “loved both men and women.”

The trial began on Monday, July 11 and concluded today, Friday, July 15.