When Dawn Annandale‘s memoir CALL ME ELIZABETH was released last year, its story of how a mother turned to prostitution sold big, but was greeted with skepticism. Expect that to grow by leaps and bounds after the news (reported by the Indepenent) that she admitted lying about allegations of rape and wasting police time in court, which may be subject to a prison sentence.
The court heard that she told police an intruder had broken into her home at Lyminge, near Folkestone in Kent, and raped her on March 14. She believed that the accusation might delay a 35,000 pound debt collection court hearing against her three days later. It was only after a seven-month police search for the offender, at a cost of £15,000, while panic spread among the residents of Lyminge who believed a rapist was on the loose, that one of Annandale’s friends contacted the police to say she was lying – and last October, she admitted it. Detective Chief Inspector Tony Kofkin said: “In this case, we spent an enormous amount of time using dozens of officers investigating what appeared to be a terrible crime in what is a lovely, quiet part of the world. It is also difficult to imagine what effect this had on local people’s well-being. But it was also one that did not occur.”
CALL ME MADAM, a sequel to her memoir, is slated for publication by HarperCollins UK by the end of the year – but if the book does end up published, it will be marketed as fiction.