South Shields rape case 'fantasist' is put behind bars for string of North East crimes

A "fantasist" who made false rape allegations against six innocent men and sparked a £10,000 police investigation has been jailed for eight years. Liam Smith, also known as James Robertson or James Smith, made a total of seven untrue reports to the police, against six different victims. Prosecutors say Smith had a problem separating "fact from fiction" and may have made the damaging claims out of a "desire for attention". As a result of his lies, six men, who had consensual encounters with Smith in Newcastle, Wearside and South Tyneside, faced the trauma of being wrongly accused and questioned or even arrested. The identities of the men have not been revealed during the case at Newcastle Crown Court in a bid to protect them from the "profound" repercussions and consequences associated with such accusations. At the sentencing hearing today victim impact statements from the men who were falsely accused laid bare the devastating consequences of being falsely accused. Some of the victims considered taking their own lives and feared people would think there was "no smoke without fire". One man said: "I constantly feel like it's hanging over my me. I feel like I now have a criminal record. "I was thrown into a cell for hours, wondering what it was all about. "I'm scared anyone finds out I was arrested, especially for the offence of rape. "People think 'no smoke without fire'." The man said he now fears having police checks for job applications in future. Another said he was in "total shock" when he found out he was being accused and added: "This allegation has turned my world upside down. "At one point I felt I wanted to take my own life." The men spoke about feeling embarassed and traumatised by being arrested and having intimate samples taken for testing and the agony of having to wait to find out what was going to happen. One said being falsely accused "ruined my life" and another said "I feel damaged". The men said the accusations have impacted their social and romantic lives and worry about the affect of false allegations on real victims. One of them said: "I don't want genuine victims to feel they won't be believed." On top of the human cost, the court heard the case cost £10,000 to investigate. Smith, 27, of Armley Ridge Road, Leeds, originally from South Shields, South Tyneside, denied seven offences of doing acts tending and intended to pervert the course of justice and was convicted of all charges. Judge Penny Moreland told him: "In short, over a period of two-and-a-half years you made seven false complaints of rape against six different men. "The men were all arrested or interviewed as voluntary attenders and all were subject to forensic medical examination to obtain samples, finger prints, photographs and so on." Judge Moreland added: "A number say, in terms, their life was ruined by what you did. "All talked of fear or reputational damage, no smoke without fire, mud sticks, even though what you said was a lie." The judge said false claims have an affect on genuine victims, who fear they may not be believed due to people like Smith telling lies. Prosecutor Anne Richardson told the court during the trial: "Essentially the Crown's case is that this defendant has made a number of rape allegations against various men, all of which were false and therefore he lied to the police and started a chain of investigations which were not only unnecessary and time consuming but which caused appalling suffering and anxiety for those innocent men who were accused by him." Smith claimed the allegations he made were true, save for one, which he said he later recognised was a flashback to an earlier incident. Miss Richardson added: "The defence suggest all other allegations are true and he is a very unlucky man to be accused of falsifying such claims. "The Crown say here is a very troubled young man who essentially must have real problems sifting the wheat from the chaff, fact from fiction and that, for whatever reason, perhaps his latent desire for attention, perhaps because he is a fantasist, has caused these six men to be arrested, interviewed, detained and subjected to intrusive police examination, resulting in them having undergone enormous anxiety and embarrassment, when in fact they are innocent men who have done nothing more than engage in lawful sexual activity with a completely consenting male." The court heard the first complaint, in 2018, was when Smith told police he had been raped by a stranger in a public sauna. It turned out he had actually been speaking to the accused man on Grindr and there had been some consensual sexual activity between them. Miss Richardson said the pair "did not part as friends" after the encounter, as Smith had wanted to spend the night together but was rejected. Afterwards, Smith called 999 and made a rape complaint. Miss Richardson said: "The man had only been home a few hours when the police arrived and he was arrested for rape of the defendant. "On arrest he said 'but we haven't even had sex', his mobile phone was taken from him and he was placed in a police cell, having had his photograph and fingerprints taken." The court heard Smith failed to turn up for a medical examination in relation to the claim and withdrew the allegation after around a month. Within that month however, Smith had made an allegation against another man, who he said had pinned him to a bed and raped him. This man was not arrested but was questioned by the police voluntarily. Smith made his third allegation in 2019, when he reported that another man, who ended up being questioned by the police but not arrested, had raped him but withdrew the allegation within days. Almost a year later, in 2020, Smith made his fourth allegation when he dialled 999 and reported that a man had raped him at knifepoint. As a result, the accused man was arrested and interviewed. The court heard while that investigation was going on, Smith made a second rape allegation against the same man, who was detained for 14 hours and had to provide intimate samples for analysis. Smith then withdrew the second complaint against that man, which he put down to the flashbacks from the first attack. Later that year, Smith made a complaint against a fifth man, who was arrested, interviewed and kept in custody for around eight hours. Smith made a final complaint, against a sixth man, in early 2021, who he said raped him when they met the first time. The man was arrested and kept in custody for over 10 hours. Smith claimed he withdrew allegations to protect his mental health, not because they were untrue. Sam Faulks, defending, said Smith has mental health problems.