A law graduate has been jailed after falsely accusing her boyfriend of assault so that she could resit her exams.

Rhiannon Broooker, a Birmingham City University law graduate, was studying at the University of West England to become a barrister. However her boyfriend was arrested after she told friends that he had hit and raped her repeatedly.

Paul Fensome, a 6ft 8in heavy metal fan, was charged and held in custody for 36 days. He was released with an electronic tag and ordered to report his location to police six times a day. When police realised that phone records and work rosters proved he could not possibly have carried out the attacks they arrested Brooker. Fensome was subsequently awarded £38,000 compensation.

    Brooker and Fensome

During her trial, prosecutors alleged that Brooker made up the attacks to convince UWE to let her resit her Bar Vocational Course exams which she had failed, they said, because she was out partying. The court heard how Brooker sent abusive texts to herself from a secret second phone and punched herself in the face to convince people she was being beaten.

Sentencing her to three and a half years for 12 untrue rape, assault and false imprisonment allegations, Judge Lambert said Brooker's actions were "cold, calculated, sustained, repeated and under any analysis utterly wicked".
 
Local support group SARSAS told RollOnFriday, "Our concern is that the result of this case reinforces the myth that false rape allegations are common" and said any girls or women living with or recovering from any kind of sexual violence should get in touch.
 
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Comments

Anonymous 04 July 14 12:28

Local support group SARSAS told RollOnFriday, "Our concern is that the result of this case reinforces the myth that false rape allegations are common"
Any police officer will tell you that this statement is not true. Very unfortunately, false rape complaints are common. That is not to diminish the braverly of genuine complainants who come forward. However, the "support group" does damage to those victims of false complaints who suffer very much from such false complaints. As this poor guy experienced (btw £38K for a month plus in jail, reporting your whereabouts to police 6 times a day, and being treated liek a criminal?!? Too low...)

Anonymous 04 July 14 16:26

The SARSAR position is ridiculous - should actual false rape allegations be ignored to try and convince some that most rape claims are real? They should instead be saying how disappointing Brooker's actions are, not the result of the case which was spot on.