Mother who cried rape after meeting man on dating website is jailed for two years



Jennifer Day: 'Extraordinary performance'

A mother was jailed for two years yesterday for crying rape against a man she met on a dating website.

Jennifer Day, 34, who made the false allegation against former boyfriend Andrew Saxby after a row, was told by the judge that she had undermined efforts to treat genuine rape victims fairly and sympathetically.

The court also heard that Mr Saxby was subjected to 'degrading and upsetting' examinations while being held by police for ten hours.

Judge Ian Graham said the investigation had wasted £4,000 of taxpayers' money and 270 police man hours.

He added: 'The police have put great stores on providing sympathetic treatments of women who make genuine complaints of rape and you abused that.

'You have undermined and jeopardised the efforts that are being made about the need to treat genuine victims of rape properly, fairly and sympathetically.

'The offence is in itself a serious one, it has terrible consequences potentially and actually for the victim and wider implications for those women who have genuinely been raped.'

Day, a former nurse, from Corringham, Essex, split up with the father of her four-year-old daughter in 2007 after he had an affair with their lodger, Basildon Crown Court heard.

She began drinking heavily to cope with the rejection and using dating websites. In September 2007 she met Mr Saxby, who worked for the Ford car company, through the Dating Direct website.

They began a relationship, but the court heard that she was also seeing another man.

In January last year, the couple rowed after Mr Saxby accused her of having another man at her home. Afterwards, Day dialled 999 and accused Mr Saxby of rape.

He was arrested in front of his colleagues and taken to the police station.

Judge Graham said: 'It was an extraordinary performance which involved deliberate untruths as the jury found.'

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The court heard that Mr Saxby was released without charge after Day dropped the allegation, although she still maintained it was true. She was found guilty of one count of perverting the course of justice last month.

During the trial, the court heard how Day had a history of making up stories. The jury was told that while working at Royal London Hospital in East London as a nurse, she suffered stress-related hair loss and led her colleagues to believe it was cancer.

Rebecca Lee, mitigating, said Day had been under a lot of strain following the break-up of her relationship with the father of her daughter.

She said: 'She got involved with dating websites and going out when her daughter was staying with her former partner, going out to pubs and engaging in what she would call risky behaviour and behaving totally out of character.'

Day apologised unreservedly for the allegation, the court heard.

But the judge rejected calls to suspend the sentence.



'Mr Saxby is a completely respectable man who had formed a relationship with you and had shown considerable affection and kindness of the kind you said you craved,' he said.



'His reward was to be the subject of this completely false complaint.'

Day burst into tears as she was taken down to the cells.

The case will re-ignite calls for alleged rapists to be given anonymity until a verdict is delivered.

While anyone who claims to be a victim of a sex attack is given anonymity for life, someone charged with rape or sexual assault can be immediately named.



Even if the allegations are ultimately proven false, those accused often find their lives turned upside, and find their reputations still suffering even years after the claim.



Some have found themselves shunned by their family, friends and community, others have lost their jobs and homes or found themselves the victims of vigilante attacks.



One recent victim of false claims said he felt like killing himself during a 'year of being told I'm a rapist'.



The two-year prison sentence for Jennifer Day follows calls for longer sentences for women who falsely allege rape.



The conviction rate for genuine rapists is low in Britain - just one in 14 cases reported to the police end in conviction - and false accusations will do little to improve what ministers have called a 'culture of scepticism' towards genuine rape victims



The courts have begun to recognise the trauma suffered by those who are falsely accused, with one taxi driver whose 'life was ruined' by false claims expected to receive a five figure payout, while a former magistrate who spent two years in jail on false rape charges is currently suing his accuser for £300,000.



However victims of false charges say the law needs to immediately grant accusers anonymity until proven guilty.