Last updated at 16:59 16 March 2007

A young mother who cried rape by inventing a story that she had been forced into sex, has been jailed.

Kerrie Doyle, aged 22 years, was led sobbing to the cells after the judge who sentenced her was told that the man she had accused of rape had been arrested by police.

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She admitted that Jay Slade had not forced her into having sex and had phoned him to apologise for making the false claim, not knowing he was being interviewed by police at the time and had put the conversation on loudspeaker.

Officers then charged Doyle with perverting the course of justice and she was found guilty by a jury at the end of a four-day trial in February.

Judge Christopher Critchlow, who jailed her for nine months, heard how Doyle maintained she was raped and that she only made the call to make her now ex-boyfriend happy.

Kathryn Hirst, defending, told the court: "She still maintains that she was the victim of the rape."

However, she added that her client had apologised

for the "mess she had got into."

The judge, sitting at Reading Crown Court, had heard how within days of the alleged attack, Doyle had begun texting Mr Slade.

One message read: "I love you loads, will be dreaming of you all night. Miss you loads. Can't wait to see you, you horny little devil."

Doyle's best friend, Mary Tucker, told the jury the defendant had asked her to make a false statement to police and to say that that they had been on a night out in Windsor when they bumped into Mr Slade and he asked Doyle to go back to his mother's flat.

It was only after they left the police station, said Ms Tucker, that Doyle revealed that no rape had taken place.

"We came out and she was like 'ha ha, I think we've got away with it. They believed us, it was all lies," she said.

Mrs Hirst said that imposing a custodial sentence would be especially difficult to bear for Doyle, because she would have to be separated from her 16-month-old son.

"The separation from him is something she would find extremely hard," she said.

Despite the plea concerning the young defendant, who had hopes of becoming a vet, Judge Critchlow sentenced her to nine months behind bars.

"You were convicted by the jury of perverting the course of justice by making a false allegation of rape.

"It happened in March 2005, two years ago. You were clearly going through a difficult period in your life for one reason or another," the judge remarked.

"You were involved in a relationship with a much older man.

"But such an offence as this must result, in my judgement, in an immediate custodial term."

The judge imposed the sentence, bearing in mind that as a result of her actions, a man had been arrested on suspicion of rape and held in custody.

Doyle, of Gordon Road, Ealing, West London, wept uncontrollably as she was led down to the cells from the dock, clutching her coat and a pre-packed bag.

Relatives in the public gallery sobbed and waved to her.