A mother who went on the run with her two young sons had previously drugged them and made false allegations of sexual assault against their father, a judge has revealed.

Samantha Baldwin separated from the boys' father and then made accusations against him in December 2014.

During a lengthy police investigation and family court trial, it emerged 40-year-old Baldwin gave her children substances to induce positive results for sedatives and anti-anxiety drugs to implicate the father.

In a statement at Nottingham Family Court, Judge Jeremy Lea said he found the father innocent, a decision Baldwin disagreed with.

He described how, while he was making a judgement on the boys' future, Baldwin made a quick getaway from court before collecting the boys from a secret location.

They were missing for 10 days before a tip-off from a member of the public led to their discovery at the Sherwood Hideaway woodland retreat in Ollerton, Nottinghamshire, on April 6.