Three men who were falsely accused of rape by the same woman said they tried to kill themselves as a result of her lies and one was twice sectioned in a psychiatric unit, a court has heard.
Eleanor Williams, 22, from Barrow-in-Furness, was convicted in January of nine counts of perverting the course of justice.
Her Facebook claims of being raped and trafficked by an Asian grooming gang sparked a worldwide solidarity movement with its own line of merchandise, Justice for Ellie. It also ignited community tensions in her Cumbrian town, Preston crown court was told on Monday.
Police recorded 151 crimes by other people linked to the case, including 83 hate crimes, Williams’ sentencing hearing heard.
Her story was shared online by public figures with large followings, including Countdown’s Rachel Riley and the former Greater Manchester police detective Maggie Oliver, the court heard.
Supt Matt Pearman said it caused the sort of “open hostility” not seen in Barrow since 1988, when workers at the Vickers shipyard went on strike for 12 weeks. He said Barrow had yet to recover from the impact of Williams’ lies.
Though Williams singled out Asian men in an incendiary Facebook post on 20 May 2020, she also wrongly accused three white men of rape, the court heard.
One of them, a trainee electrician called Oliver Gardner, met Williams just once, in what the prosecutor Jonathan Sandiford KC described as “a chance encounter” in Preston on 18 July 2019.
The jury was played CCTV footage...
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