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A homeless former lawyer who sneaked into a woman's bedroom wearing fishnet stockings and a purple G-string has been cleared of trespassing.

Irish-born Desmond Moran, 53, claimed he had taken so many drugs that he thought the terrified woman was a giant panda.

He could not recall why he was dressed in women's underwear when he got into her Bayswater flat.

The woman told a court she was sleeping in bed with her two children when she awoke to find Moran staring at her from the doorway.

She watched as he slowly crossed the room to stare out of the window.

(Image: Getty)

Jurors at Southwark Crown Court stifled giggles as they were shown the stockings and G-string Moran had been wearing.

The woman, who cannot be named, told the court: "I woke up and I saw him there and he was just looking at us, I felt like he was looking at me even though the two kids were there.

"I said 'Who are you, what are you doing? What are you doing in my apartment?'

"That's when I started getting quite anxious and I started screaming at him, and the children woke up.

"When I first saw him I couldn't see much, I thought he had an apron on, he wasn't wearing trousers or a jacket, it was like a costume, and when he went to the window and turned around I could see his bottom - I think he had a G-string on."

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She said Moran did not answer even when she started shouting at him during the encounter in the middle of the night on 14 July this year.

After Moran left, she ran to her live-in nanny's room and locked herself and her children in until the police arrived.

Moran was quickly discovered down in the basement of the block of flats in a shelter used to keep the communal bins, still wearing his fishnet stockings and G-string.

His backpack, a black laptop and a variety of drug paraphernalia were also found on the concrete floor of the basement.

Moran, who was high on crack cocaine and crystal meth, had been sleeping rough for a number of years.

(Image: PA)

He said he went into the block of flats to get a bed for the night and denied ever seeing the woman.

He added: "I honestly didn't see a woman on the bed, I didn't see any children in the bed, I honestly thought it was a big panda bear in the bed, that's what it looked like to me.

"I had taken some drugs but I am pretty certain that's what I saw, I didn't see any woman, I didn't see any kids... were they under the panda?"

Moran, originally from County Tipperary, continued: "I went to the bay window and the window was open, and I thought "why is the window open?"

"I went over and I looked down into the street.

"Then I thought 'I'm just going to leave.' I was nearly out of the room, I hadn't seen the woman, then it all happened so quickly - she was screaming 'who are you, get out of my house'."

"Then the kids started screaming, but it didn't sound like kids screaming - it didn't sound real, it honestly sounded like a tape recording of kids screaming, I know it sounds strange."

Moran could not explain why he was wearing the stockings and G-string.

He said: "I could make surmises but I don't know.

"I wasn't in full control of my reasoning or faculties, that's why I kept moving, I went up three or four landings, I kept going up stairs.

"I stopped on the landing then I came to the property that I entered, I had no idea why I was in there or what I was doing, I turned the handle and it wasn't locked.

"I was wearing fishnet stocking, underwear and I was also wearing a tee-shirt.

"I had no shoes on, I had no socks on.

"I think I was conscious I wasn't wearing trousers but not in the way I would be conscious if I was standing here now without them.

"I think it was a reaction to the cocktail of drugs, I'm not trying to run away or hide from anything, I hold my hands up."

Moran, of no fixed address, sobbed in the dock as the jury cleared him of trespassing with intent to commit a sexual offence after just 30 minutes' deliberation.