IN hit movie The Bodyguard, Whitney Houston’s personal protection officer takes a bullet to save her life.
But the only physical scar the late singer’s real minder bears is a mark on his head — from when she accidentally threw a bottle at him during a hotel brawl.
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Emotionally, David Roberts is still wounded by his inability to shield Whitney from the drugs that contributed to her death aged 48 in 2012.
The 73-year-old Welshman is said to be the inspiration behind Kevin Costner’s character, Frank Farmer, in 1992 movie The Bodyguard.
In real life, David guarded the I Will Always Love You singer for seven years.
He kept their relationship strictly platonic, but cared enough about her to put his job on the line by exposing hangers-on who were giving Whitney deadly substances.
David claims music industry advisers did not send her for the rehab she desperately needed because it would have wrecked her clean-cut image.
Ahead of the release of his book, Protecting Whitney: The Memoir Of Her Bodyguard, he says: “You and I should be sitting listening to her new records, but we’re not, because it was allowed to happen.
“She needed help and was overwhelmed because of everything that was going on in her life, and her health did not come first
” My anger and hatred to- wards those who had facilitated Whitney’s ability to do this to herself was profound.
“Good heavens, I had talks with her team members about things.
“The argument back in the day was if one goes into rehabilitation, then one’s reputation is tarnished.”
When Whitney, who sold more than 170million records and won six Grammys, was found dead in her bathtub at the Beverly Hilton hotel in Los Angeles after taking cocaine, the shock was felt far and wide.
Last month, Kevin Costner posted an old image of himself next to the star as he turned 70, with the message: “This photo reminds me of how lucky I am to be getting another birthday. We lost such a light when we lost Whitney.”
As the February 11 anniversary of the singer’s death approaches, David is still trying to make sense of her passing.
He was a highly trained protection officer when he was offered the job as Whitney’s bodyguard in 1988.
David’s experience included working for the Metropolitan police, training as a sniper, being involved in the Iranian embassy siege in London in 1980 and keeping dignitaries safe.
At first, he turned the security role down because he had never heard of Whitney, despite her being a chart- topping singer, and was not keen on “looking after pop stars”.
‘Heavily addicted’
But after listening to her music and meeting the down-to-earth icon, he changed his mind.
Just like in The Bodyguard movie, Whitney was plagued by crazed fans, including a heavily armed one with plans to kidnap her and others who thought they were married to her.
David says of the film: “It did, in reality, follow many of the elements that we, Whitney and I, have experienced, or to a lesser degree.
“You get fanatics around the world and you have to keep them away.
“A man with a rifle or bomb is the most difficult threat to deal with. I carried a firearm wherever we went, whether it was legal or illegal.”
There were also troublemakers who harassed Whitney when she wanted to be left alone. In 1991, three autograph hunters clashed with the singer and her brother Michael at a hotel in Lexington, Kentucky.
David stepped in and a bottle was thrown at him in the mayhem. He recalls: “One guy was thumping Whitney’s brother in the face and so I hit the guy once and he fell and went over the sofa.
“I’m now dealing with three of these people who are a threat. One of them was standing behind me and Whitney smashed a bottle of Heineken on my head.
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“I turned around, grabbed him, picked him up and he was shouting, ‘It wasn’t me, it wasn’t me’.
“The reality is I had been facing one of the other attackers and Whitney threw the bottle to hit the attacker. If the bottle hadn’t hit my head, it would have smashed into the second guy’s face.”
Whitney also had the attention of famous men. One was reportedly the Oscar-winning actor Robert De Niro, who it is claimed tried to woo her.
David says with a smile: “I only heard from a third party that Mr De Niro had become infatuated with Whitney and was sending her roses. That carried on until Whitney Houston’s mother got involved and that would be the end of that.”
Another suitor was Eddie Murphy, who had an on-off relationship with the star. David got the impression the Beverly Hills Cop actor was a “nice guy”.
But he does not rate Whitney’s former husband, the Two Can Play That Game singer Bobby Brown.
Recalling how he learned the couple were to marry, he says: “One day, she reached across the table and grabbed my wrist. ‘David, I wanted you to be the first to know and ask you, I’m going to marry Bobby Brown, what do you think?’.
‘A great mother’
“The first thing I thought went something like, ‘You are f***ing kidding me, right, boss?’.”
He was right to be concerned, as Brown has admitted hitting his wife and to taking drugs with her.
Whitney had used illegal substances such as cannabis from a young age, and eventually got heavily addicted to crack cocaine.
David did not see her taking any drugs because it is something she would do alone at home or in hotel suites. But her problem became clear when she was filming Forest Whitaker’s directorial debut, Waiting To Exhale, in 1995.
He says: “I was told Whitney had overdosed and that we were going to take some time off filming. I never knew she was taking them, but I was aware that others in the circle were well involved with the drugs.”
Even though Whitney was in need of medical care, David says help was not sought.
He reveals: “After her overdose, Whitney was unconscious, unable to walk, talk or even sit up in bed.
“She could not be taken to the hospital, nor could a doctor be called to the hotel room where she remained, because of the media scandal that would have ensued.”
David was angry with himself for not being able to prevent dealers getting drugs to Whitney.
He says: “I thought, ‘How had I let my principle slip away for 36 hours, so she could hide in a wardrobe and binge on coke?’. She’d devised a complex plan to do so.”
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Afterwards, David sent a letter to Whitney’s lawyers laying out his concerns about the members of her entourage who were giving her drugs. Word got back to her team and he was dismissed.
He says: “At the end of the day, everyone should be responsible for their own demise and success. But the advice she was given, in my opinion, was wrong.”
The singer’s only daughter, Bobbi Kristina, who was to follow a similar, tragic path. She died in 2015, aged 22, six months after being found face down in the bath, having taken a cocktail of drugs. David says: “When her daughter died, it was heartbreaking twice over, and I was angry.”
He recalls how overjoyed Whitney was when she told him she was pregnant, adding: “Seeing her wheeled out of the delivery room when she had her baby is one of the most memorable things for me. She was a great mother.”
Both deaths were, the bodyguard says, a “total waste.” He adds: “Whitney was one of the most beautiful, lovely, genuine, sophisticated individuals I have had the pleasure to know and to work for.
“All Whitney ever wanted was to love and to be loved.”
Protecting Whitney, by David Roberts, is out on February 4 in bookshops and on Amazon.
