Woman, 22, lied that she was raped by Asian grooming gang and hit herself with hammer to fake injuries
3 January 2023, 19:39 | Updated: 4 January 2023, 05:04
A woman who claimed she had been raped and trafficked by an Asian grooming gang has been found guilty of perverting the course of justice.
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Eleanor Williams claimed she had been groomed, trafficked and beaten by a gang in a Facebook post in May 2020 that got shared more than 100,000 times.
The 22-year-old showed off injuries she said she got from the ordeal – but jurors found she had caused them to herself and made up her allegations.
Prosecutors said she used a hammer to attack herself, the culmination of a series of claims she made about men raping her that dated back to 2017.
Her posts led to demonstrations in her hometown, Barrow, Tommy Robinson went to the town to "investigate" the claims and her allegations led to worsening community tensions.
Williams was found guilty of eight counts of acts tending and intended to pervert the course of justice at Preston Crown Court on Tuesday.
She stared straight ahead as the verdicts were read out.
Detective Chief Superintendent Dave Stalker, of Cumbria Police, said: "Williams had produced compelling evidence when reporting her abuse, whilst her posts on Facebook caused uproar in the community, increased community tensions and negatively impacted trust in the police."
Williams was found by police near her home with the injuries she said were caused by an Asian gang, claiming she had been taken to a house and raped in 2020.
A hammer with her blood on it was found close by, and prosecutors claimed she has used that to make the wounds herself.
"I wanted people to know what was going on in Barrow, still is going on," Williams had claimed to the court.
Jonathan Sandiford, prosecuting, said Williams went on social media and used "random names" on the internet before claiming they were traffickers or victims.
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She would send messages to herself designed to appears as if they had been sent from traffickers or victims and had used real people to send messages saying they were from the alleged crooks.
Some of the names she used were real people, and others were invented.
One was a friend of Williams'.
One of the men she made claims against, Mohammed Ramzan, a business owner, said he had been put "through enough hell", while another, Jordan Trengove, said it "can ruin your life and it has ruined mine".
