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A traumatised mother has told how she found a noose in her schoolboy son’s bedroom as he prepared to commit suicide over a rape allegation.

She said her family endured five “horrendous” months of torment as police ­investigated the alleged attack by the 16-year-old at a house party.

Her son was dragged out of his classroom and held in a cell for nine hours, but police were unable to find a shred of evidence against him.

When his mother – who we are calling Sarah to protect her son’s identity – found Alex (not his real name) at his lowest ebb, he was close to taking his own life.

Sarah, 42, relived their terrible ordeal after reading of Karin Cheshire, 48, from Southampton, who killed herself a year after her son, Jay, 17, was pushed to suicide by a false rape allegation.

Sarah said: “I read Karin and Jay’s story and just starting crying. Alex was accused and then got lower and lower and lower. I went to his room one day and he was there with a rope he’d rigged up in the wardrobe. He just started crying, saying, ‘I don’t want to be here any more’.”

Alex had been at a party in May 2014 when he kissed a teenage girl he met on the night. He claimed that later she was about to perform a sex act in the toilet, but they were disturbed.

When rumours of the incident began to ­circulate at school, the girl told teachers he had forced her upstairs and pushed her to the floor.

Sarah said: “The police called and told me they had him in the cells. They’d gone into his class and taken him from school. He had never been in serious trouble before.” The family had to wait five months before police confirmed there would be no prosecution.

Meanwhile, Alex sank into depression, and started using drugs and alcohol to deal with the stress.

“He failed his GCSEs,” said Sarah. “It ripped our whole world apart.”