There is a report by todays Times by Fran Yeoman of a a mother and her teenage daughter were given custodial sentences yesterday after falsely accusing the girl’s boyfriend of rape.
Louise Brazil, 47, invented the attack on her daughter, Ada, 16 at the time, after Shaun Howes, then 18, ended his relationship with her and moved out of the family home. Brazil, of Burgess Hill, West Sussex, told police that her daughter was a virgin until the alleged assault in October 2003. Ada, who was five months’ pregnant with Mr Howes’s child by the time the allegations were made in March 2004, went along with the story, claiming that he had pinned her down in her bedroom and raped her.
Mr Howes was arrested but told police that he had shared a bed with her for several months, with her mother’s consent. He was on bail for almost three months before police charged the Brazils with attempting to pervert the course of justice. Ada, now 18, admitted the offence in February, but her mother continued to deny it and was convicted at Hove Crown Court last month. She was sentenced yesterday at Lewes Crown Court to six months’ imprisonment. Full story