Hamiltons were victims of 'fantasist celebrity-seeker'

For the defendant, it was a sordid tale of internet sex games which led to rape in a suburban bedsit by a one-time Government minister and an offer from Max Clifford of £100,000 for her story. For her accusers yesterday, they were the deluded imaginings of a fantasist in search of cash and celebrity.

Nadine Milroy-Sloan, 29, appeared at the Old Bailey accused of a catalogue of "devastating" false allegations which led to the arrests of former Conservative MP Neil Hamilton and his wife, Christine, on suspicion of raping her at a group sex party in Ilford, Essex, two years ago.

In May 2001, Ms Milroy-Sloan, of Grimsby, north-east Lincolnshire, told police the Hamiltons and Barry Lehaney, an arthritis sufferer in his sixties, had viciously assaulted her after she had spent six months trying to expose a vice ring.

Orlando Pownall QC, prosecuting, said the claims were lies dreamt up by a woman with a "personality disorder" who told multiple versions of her claims to detectives, friends and neighbours which grew more fantastical with almost every telling.

Mr Pownall told the jury of 10 men and two women: "You may entertain no doubt that her actions were in some measure born of fantasy, but principally of a desire for financial reward and celebrity status.

"You may conclude that she is both naive and cunning in equal measure. On the one hand she gave a series of accounts which were wholly inconsistent with one another. On the other, she has displayed a single-minded determination to pursue the allegations made and continues to do so."

Ms Milroy-Sloan, who has four children, had tried to sell her story to newspapers before seeking justice, the court was told. Three days before she went to police, she had visited the publicist Max Clifford with her uncle, saying she could prove the Hamiltons had tried to recruit her as a prostitute and were involved with a senior police officer in a scam to defraud the Inland Revenue. The policeman turned out to be an innocent constable from Grimsby.

The court heard Mr Clifford contacted the Harrods owner, Mohammed Fayed, who was "interested" in material as part of a long-running financial dispute with the Hamiltons, and offered to arrange a lunch with the millionaire the following day. The publicist told Ms Milroy-Sloan that if she produced evidence, she could get large sums from newspapers.

Mr Pownall said: "Mr Clifford told the defendant that she could expect about £100,000 if she could produce evidence to verify the story. It was even arranged that they would have lunch the next day with Fayed. This meeting never took place because the defendant never produced any evidence of what she alleged had taken place."

Ms Milroy-Sloan denies two charges of attempting to pervert the course of justice by making false allegations of rape to police against the Hamiltons and Mr Lehaney five times between May 2001 and January last year.

She had met Mr Lehaney and other men in an adult internet chatroom under the name "SexyBabe@Tesco.net", the court heard. She travelled from Grimsby to London to meet Mr Lehaney in May 2001.

Mr Pownall said Mr Lehaney used three aliases on the website. One of the names, Lady Joan Hamilton, he used to hold conversations about "threesomes" with Ms Milroy-Sloan and sent her a photograph of a naked model he claimed was "Lady Joan".

The defendant later told her family the photograph was of the woman who raped her, Christine Hamilton, along with Mr Hamilton, at Mr Lehaney's flat in Ilford. Mr Lehaney had given Ms Milroy-Sloan his real named and invited her to visit. She issued multiple descriptions of "Mr Hamilton", ranging from a "youngish fella in his thirties with dark hair" to saying she recognised the former MP from photographs, the court heard.

In fact, the Hamiltons were nowhere near Ilford and had been drinking at Claridge's in Mayfair, central London, and dining at home with friends at the time of the attack.

The jury was told Ms Milroy-Sloan, who was paid by a tabloid newspaper, now accepts that the Hamiltons, who were arrested amid huge publicity in August 2001, had not been at the flat or involved with her.

Instead, she claimed it was two people bearing an "uncanny resemblance" to them and any inaccuracies in her allegations had been due to the emotional turmoil of the attack.

The trial continues. It is expected to last six weeks.