[UPDATE – 17 August 2022. Esther Baker sued over this article in High Court Case QB-2020-001013. She lost. The court granted both summary judgement and strike-out finding the claim had no realistic prospect of success. No other person mentioned sued and the time limit has elapsed. Judgement here. My follow-up article here. This article has been added to the “DEFENDED!” category and readers may rely on it.]
Esther Baker has been handed another life-long restraining Order, this time by the County Court, for racist harassment of a proven child abuse victim. She was also ordered to pay £12,500 damages.
Last week on Thursday 30th January 2020, there was a hearing in Baker v Hemming. Three more passages of Esther Baker’s defamation claim were struck out, after she tried to include further allegations that Hemming raped her. The judge removed these sentences because Baker’s allegations of rape have already been ruled untrue. Meanwhile, MHN is finally able to report on a County Court judgement made late last year in which Baker was made subject to a lifelong restraining Order and damages for multiple counts of stalking, including racist stalking, of a proven child abuse victim who cannot be named for legal reasons.
Readers will be familiar with disturbing news personality Esther Baker. Like Carl Beech, Baker made untrue allegations. Specifically, she alleged that she was raped by (then MP) John Hemming. By Order and Reasons of 19th November 2019 (sealed 20th), High Court Judge Mrs Justice Steyn ruled that they were untrue, there was no public interest in repeating them and restrained Baker for life from doing so. The only outstanding legal question is whether Baker lied and whether she Perverted the Course of Justice, as opposed to (for example) making an innocent mistake.
The Judge Mrs Justice Steyn has made very clear that Esther Baker’s allegations are untrue and defamatory. MHN underlining.
Last year, much of Baker’s libel claim against former MP John Hemming was struck out and she lost the counterclaim, as set out in my article of the time and my follow-up article when the Order was made. Last week on Thursday 30th January 2020, there was another application. Baker had put in a revised version of her Reply to Defence in what remains of her claim. She had also put in a Part 18 Response. Shortly afterwards Baker faced an application to strike out the claim.
The same week MHN also obtained the complete transcript of judgement in a harassment case against Baker that took place last year. Your author has wanted to write about this for a long time but has been waiting for the official transcript of the judgement. Esther Baker was sued in the County Court by a child abuse victim. They have anonymity, so I will be blocking out their name, sex, location and the names of any lawyers from the judgement extracts.
However, MHN can reveal that Baker has been successfully sued under the Protection from Harassment Act 1997 – anti-stalking legislation – for a years long campaign of racist stalking against a proven child abuse victim. The judge ruled on 20 allegations and found 16 to be true. Multiple counts were expressly found to be racist. Baker had caused the child abuse victim psychiatric injury.
The judge expressly accepted counsel for the victim’s argument that, “the Defendant’s conduct is vindictive, obsessive and unpredictable and that it has been particularly malevolent”.
The express findings of the County Court judge agreeing Baker behaved in a “vindictive, “obsessive” and “malevolent” way. MHN has erased the barrister’s name to protect the anonymity of the victim of Baker’s years of racist stalking.
Baker is appealing the harassment judgement and, bizarrely, portraying this as some kind of success on Twitter (archive) along with the fact that only 3 passages of her statements of case and not her whole claim were struck out. During the hearing on 30th January, Baker bizarrely argued that the finding her rape allegations were, “untrue” is a technicality. It was not. Baker deliberately chose to drop her defence of Truth as Mrs Justice Steyn very clearly noted.
Baker’s conduct was particularly vile. She has sought to portray her behaviour as legitimate challenge to allegations of sexual abuse. However, what she did went far further than mere criticism. The judge quoted multiple racist slurs (I will not say regarding which race to protect the victim). It was even alleged that Baker had even been in contact with the abuse victim’s convicted abuser to offer assistance with the abuser’s case.
Baker appears to believe her string of court defeats is a success. “All of this” she says.
All this ‘success’ has been expensive for Baker. Baker was made bankrupt last year and she presently owes John Hemming nearly £20,000 in costs. In addition to the damages she owes the child abuse victim, costs are to be assessed in the County Court and are estimated to be in the region of £28,000. So that is around £60,000 – and there is more to come as Hemming’s damages for her libel of him are yet to be assessed by the High Court.
Far more interesting than the strike-out judgement however was the fact that hitherto unknown Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) documents were put into evidence for the public hearing on 30th January. This means that they have passed into the public domain under CPR 32.12. Specifically, the original reasons the CPS gave for not charging John Hemming and the response to Baker’s “Victim’s Right of Review” (VRR) appeal.
The documents reveal that Baker has had auditory hallucinations (voices in her head) since she was a child. They also reveal that Baker has a history of making up stories for attention. These were apparently significant behavioural issues given they were also referred to in her medical records and given that her contemporaries specifically recall this about her decades later.
In this letter from the CPS to Esther Baker they point out to her that she has been hearing voices in her head – auditory – hallucinations – since she was a child. Due to her medical issues she has had limited recall of any events before the age of ten, except for her detailed allegations of child abuse.
In this letter from the CPS to Baker, they refer to her being known for making up stories for attention as a child.
Although the evidence against Baker seems strong, it is important to note that the case is indeed going to trial. Whether she is a liar, mad or just mistaken is yet to be proven. However, Ms Baker has taken the very unusual course of formally declining to file evidence. It has been explained to her that if she does not do so then she will not be able to call witnesses. Even so, she persists. I was reminded of an episode of Blackadder, in which mad Captain Rum reveals his ship has no crew.
Blackadder: I was under the impression that it’s common maritime practice for a ship to have a crew?
Rum: Opinion is divided on the subject.
Blackadder: Oh, really?
Rum: All the other captains say it is. I say it isn’t
Baker intends to go to trial without evidence. Opinion is divided on the wisdom of this. Baker appears to think it is a good idea. That opinion is, *cough* a minority opinion.
Esther Baker has also made veiled threats to sue me for libel.
Esther Baker makes vague libel threats.
Let me be very clear. I can compare Baker to Carl Beech because her allegations against John Hemming have been found to be, “untrue” by a High Court Judge and because of their lurid nature and implausibility.
Whether or not Baker was lying is as yet unproven. It is a matter for trial (unless further grounds emerge to apply for strike-out or summary judgement). However, I can say that I believe that there should be a police investigation into whether they are lies and that I believe that there are grounds to suspect they are lies. I base this on, for example, the inconsistencies in Baker’s statements noted by the CPS and her refusal to answer questions put by John Hemming during the civil case as well as all the reasons set out in my previous article here.
One recent incident of suspicious behaviour by Baker was a failure to answer questions about her alleged rapist’s identifying characteristics. During the Staffordshire Police investigation into Baker’s claims, Hemming was told by police that she had identified two physical characteristics he does not have – a birthmark and an intimate feature. Hemming also identified that he had a feature that she did not mention. A mark on a leg.
After Hemming raised the leg mark in pleadings, Baker added a new element to her pleadings saying her abuser had a mark on his leg. This was not in her original Particulars of Claim. So, Hemming asked which leg. He asked the colour of it and the shape of it. If this mark was burned into Baker’s mind for decades, she should be able to answer. Baker refuses to answer, which leads to the suspicion that she only knows what Hemming recently mentioned in his pleadings. Which leg, Esther?
I can say without fear of libel that Baker is a proven, malevolent, racist stalker based on the County Court judgement. I can say that she is obsessive and that she damaged the health of a proven child abuse victim. I noting in passing for what it is worth, that Baker has filed an appeal. I can say that she has made untrue allegations of child abuse. Unfortunately for Esther Baker, I have an LL.M LPC (Commendation), nearly 10 years of experience as a McKenzie Friend and have assisted in 5 libel cases.
For all Esther Baker’s empty threats, she has huge debts and is likely to be made bankrupt again as soon as the first bankruptcy expires later this year. The reason for this is several debts occurred after the bankruptcy and are not incorporated into it. If she tried to sue me for accurately quoting the court judgements that she has engaged in racist stalking or made untrue allegations of child abuse she may get to go bankrupt for a third time.
Turning to Baker’s reference to police investigations, Staffordshire Police Professional Standards are investigating a police complaint I have made. The officer investigating has told me in writing that there is in fact no evidence he can find that Staffordshire have ever investigated me as a result of Baker’s complaints.
It is important also for members of the public to understand that even though they may not be subject to injunctions, helping Baker breach her restraining Orders or trying to circumvent them could land a prison sentence for contempt. Furthermore, they could land a free-standing libel case. Bankruptcy beckons for anyone foolish enough to support Esther Baker.
Several apparently well meaning members of the public like Brian P Willmot have been found making posts (archive) supporting Baker. Given the woman Mr Willmot is supporting is a proven racist stalker, perhaps he should reconsider. If not, he may receive formal legal contact from Hemming or his representatives in due course.
Whatever the outcome of the trial, what is now clear is that Staffordshire Police squandered vast amounts of public funds on the words of a mentally ill woman known to have a history of making up stories for attention and for which there was no forensic evidence. There must be answers into how this occurred and action must be taken to ensure police officers are held accountable.
Numerous institutions, such as IICSA, deserve scrutiny for their role in this scandal, as do Exaro ‘journalists’ like Mark Watts and David Hencke. MHN will be producing a series of articles over the coming weeks.
[Corrected a minor typo on 30 September 2020]
Haha!
Esther Baker is so self-deluded. £60K in debt. “All of this” she has achieved without help ROFL PMSL.
On the basis of the facts set out in my article I have formed the opinion that Baker is an unsuitable person to be a Core Participant in IICSA except possibily if they have her in as a person who may be criticised. In particular I rely on the finding by the High Court that Esther Baker’s allegations of rape against Hemming, were untrue. I also rely on the finding that she stalked another child abuse victim and the racist elements of said stalking.
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At Wimbledon magistrates during one of my first hearings, [Baker] was described as a child abuse victim by the CPS. I would have been sentenced, had I pleaded guilty, on the basis that she was a victim as described. Imagine it! And she would have been filled with joy. Baker and Poulton are the worse kind of humans imaginable.
Bakers online life has replaced the school age fantasies she so desperately wanted people to believe. [Redacted] I barely get to know about much on Twitter these days but what I have seen leads me to believe that hanging should be an option for any judge unfortunate enough to find this monster in front of them.
If ever there was a case for someone to be locked up indefinitely this is it. She’ll destroy everything she touches for many moons to come.
[Redacted]
[This comment has been edited by MHN for legal reasons, edits shown in square brackets]
Well, well, well, the CPS letters do not help the Police [various forces] in their ready acceptance of her allegations and pursuit of innocent individuals.
They also create problems for the likes of ex-Exaro reporters too. Particularly [Redacted by MHN] – alleged to be having a relationship [non-professional] with Ms Baker which in itself causes a bad mental image tbh.
I believe it was her “mentor” Mr Wilmer who was fond of “tick tock”. How ironic.
I appaude your balanced views and reasoning behind them. I am particularly impressed about the next to last paragraph with regards to police accountability. I am aware of another case of the police using “using” people with mental illnesses for their own ends. There are far too many cases that rely on unproven statements given by so called experts. There may well be a vast amount of cases with similar “facts”. Thank you again for your diligence in this case and bringing it to the fore.
“Numerous institutions, such as IICSA, deserve scrutiny for their role in this scandal, as do Exaro ‘journalists’ like Mark Watts and David Hencke. MHN will be producing a series of articles over the coming weeks.”
Looking forward to more of this exposure. All authority figures and journalists should be brought before court for the parts they originally played and continued to play in giving high profile platforms to Baker and Beech; giving police the runaround; latterly perverting the course of justice by intimidating witnesses who repeatedly warned police there was a subversive group comprised of police, ex police, nhs workers and members of the general public who were conspiring to harm targeted individuals by long term planning, plotting and the swapping of information regarding their assigned targets.
It turned out Ms Baker was fed false information about John Hemming’s body, and police need to know who gave her this information, and from whom and how journalists had acquired this very personal information and other such salacious garbage in the first place.
Promises made by journalists to Carl Beech that they would stand by him through thick and thin were found to be empty. In light of this, Esther Baker should consider her own position and where she will inevitably end up if she does not stop and blow the whistle on them. The journalists who coerced people such as herself, are still living normal lives and dining out on the higher profiles she and Beech lent them. Her correspondence with certain journalists should be handed to the police, for them to see how this started and how deep it goes.
Just a note to add that even Brian Willmot’s support of Ms Baker is somewhat limited.
On June 25th, he tweeted this:
[…] I have NO doubt that Ms Baker was sexually abused as a child. BUT I HAVE SEEN a lookalike to J Hemming and I think it may be a case of mistaken identity. ✝️
@ Achelous on February 2, 2020 at 5:14 pm
Barely a peep from the #MeToo movement or those who made an issue of expressing concern for Esther Baker’s “insides” having been wrecked by alleged multiple rapists, whom she has alleged left her incapable of bearing children. People also seem no longer interested in asking for the finer details of the nights she allegedly spent at Dolphin Square with a gang of paedophiles. Nor has there been a murmur about Carl Beech’s recollection of seeing her there in a dentist’s chair. When he was a child himself. Despite their enormous age gap.
And the police went along with these two devious fantasists for how long? Each police officer involved in interviewing Baker and Beech must be thoroughly investigated themselves and dismissed. If only for taking no heed whatsoever of those who had reported the conspiracy Baker and Beech were involved in.
The CPS VRR Response of 15 March 2018 sent to Esther Baker and now in the public domain expressly states that, there was, “no medical or forensic evidence to support the fact that you were sexually abused”. So if she was left unable to have children there is no medical evidence that condition arises from sexual abuse.
@ Samuel Collingwood Smith
on February 2, 2020 at 11:20 pm
As was suspected by those who disbelieved this and everything else Esther Baker has said under her own name and various pseudonyms. She and Beech between them, were using up almost every story told by genuinely abused people and fiction writers. Not one police officer suspected or realised this, and were dismissing or arresting those people who were pointing out the conspiracy and all the players in it.
Making it quite apparent that every police officer who interviewed Baker and Beech is unfit for purpose, and best left to plod the streets. Where they are at least in the public eye for most of their shift.
Their days of cosying up and taking tea of an afternoon in an interview room with the likes of Baker and Beech spinning their yarns, must be numbered now. And seen to be numbered by suspension and dismissal.
They have assisted Baker and Beech in wrecking the lives of not only the targets, but the families, friends and colleagues of the targets.
Baker and Beech’s cases in particular, were set to undermine democracy itself, and the assistance given them by police, politicians such as Tom Watson, and mainstream media workers must be investigated in that vein.
Esther Baker does not stop with the invention. She actually emailed John and Staffordshire Police around 2:30 am this morning accusing me of breaching her anonymity as a victim of sex crime under the Sexual Offences Act 2003. The only alleged perpetrator referred to in my article is John Hemming, in respect of whom she has unambiguously waived anonymity.
@ Samuel Collingwood Smith
on February 3, 2020 at 11:33 am
This is the behaviour of someone who may have taken advice that her only way out of avoiding arrest or going to prison, is to lay a trail showing there is a case for her being mentally unstable and irrational.
Who doesn’t recall the night she erroneously posted one of her direct messages on twitter? Stating she had heeded advice from one of her advocates to get herself onto a psychiatric ward without delay?
She should be banned from the internet and making contact with everyone involved in this grave matter.
She is not behind the door, and has demonstrated a rare level of deviousness for someone in her current position. However, it may become apparent she is taking advice from people whose agenda now sees her as easily as disposable as Carl Beech.
Sam, It’s a little difficult to see how [even trying to put self into her shoes] she can expect to even attempt to claim “anonymity” when she very clearly waved it, both initially with the Sky etc interviews and was quite prepared to use the IICSA without anonymity. There are various documents in the IICSA “stash” that prove that Baker waived her anonymity rights in regards to allegations against John Hemming [and others]. She also clearly instructed her legal advisors to name Hemming in such matters to the IICSA hearings.
It’s also clear that by allowing those CPS letters to be put into the civil case and by knock on effect the public domain, that she also waived her privacy rights in regards to such. Otherwise surely she should’ve sought a specific order preventing further publication?
One might also reasonably observe that the “silencing” tactic of attempting to now use such ridiculousness, as you’ve suggested she has in the email, is further evidence of her harassing and aggressive behaviour but now towards Hemming, yourself and indeed towards Staffordshire Police.
If nothing else, that email demonstrates an aggressive behavioural pattern which was also clearly exhibited in the civil case re CSA survivor.
There is also the small matter of the incitement by others too. Some of which may already be in breach of court orders.
Sadly, all of this was predictable, she digs holes for herself and then aggressively tries to justify digging the hole instead of thinking things through. It’s a regular pattern.
Ffs. And here we have it. In black and white. No lessons learned by Esther Baker whatsoever, and NHS worker Sue Crocombe, self confessed long time friend of convicted, time serving paedophile Carl Beech, persisting in her encouragement of Baker to continue along the path of destruction of herself and her targets.
‘The ‘Wall’ came down amidst much shame and embarrassment, so what is Sue Crocombe’s current agenda, when she knows Esther Baker is only steps away from prison? Is she still deluding herself and others that there will be some miraculous ‘break through’ which will prove Beech and Baker have been telling the truth all along, and all current evidence known to the courts was fabricated to silence Baker and Beech? Ffs.
Sue Crocombe
@shinybluedress
Replying to
@Esther9982
Keep going Esther. Like a terrier dog. Don’t give up x
10:15 AM · Feb 1, 2020
👩💻 Esther Baker 👩💻
@Esther9982
·
Feb 1
Replying to
@shinybluedress
Never will!!
6:33 PM · Feb 1, 2020
I’m curious find out why Hemming’s application to strike out Esther Baker’s claim was unsuccessful? If she is producing no evidence at all, what possible form can the ‘trial’ take?
Is it going to be worth my while making the trip, or will it all be over in five minutes flat?
One might speculate that Baker is going to need a massively sized magicians’ hat to pull the gigantic required rabbit out.
Not least because it’s clear that she is going to have to try and rewrite the definition of perverting the course of justice [thank you CPS charging guidelines and the R v Cotter & Others case] and also attempt to justify herself as a core participant at the IICSA now that she has proven [in a civil court] racially aggravated harassment as a backdrop to her behaviour. Behaviour which was clearly encouraged by others.
Re the IICSA, Alexis Jay’s decision making in allowing Baker that core participation status looks increasingly questionable. Especially in light of the various “leaks” to Mark Watts which only seem to have occurred in the Westminster Strand of the inquiry. I wonder what the common denominator is? or more accurately whom? 😉
If Ms Baker has been found by a civil court to have engaged in a sustained, malevolent campaign of harassment, aggravated by racist elements and involving serious alarm or distress, the obvious question is, surely, why has she not been charged with a criminal offence? This would seem to be an offence under section 32(1) of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998. At the very least she surely could be charged under section 4A of the Protection from Harassment Act 1997, for which the maximum sentence is up to 10 years’ imprisonment.
I appreciate the lower threshold for proof in a civil court, but in this case the evidence would surely be incontrovertible and would easily reach the threshold for charging.
There is also absolutely no question that charging Ms Baker with this offence would be in the public interest. I have read Ms Baker’s Twitter posts for some time and have seen for myself her sustained campaign against one particular proven CSA victim whom I shall not name as I do not know whether this is the person who brought the civil case against her or not. This activity has in itself caused damage not only to the particular survivor in question but to all genuine CSA victims.
Do you know whether there is still an active investigation into alleged perversion of the course of justice? Ms Baker herself seems to claim that no such investigation has been undertaken, or possibly that an investigation concluded that she should not be charged: it is hard to follow everything that she posts on Twitter. Again, there surely seems to be sufficient evidence at least for her to be charged. It has been proven on the balance of probabilities that she made false allegations to the police, allegations that consumed vast public resources and inflicted serious damage against John Hemming and others.
> why has she not been charged
> with a criminal offence?
A question we have put to police. Merseyside police are supposedly looking into it.
> Do you know whether there is still
> an active investigation into alleged
> perversion of the course of justice?
Staffordshire Police claim to be liaising with the CPS. How they can be doing this impartially whilst simultaneously being sued by Hemming for £10m and being investigated by Professional Standarss is unclear. John has filed the claim at court now, incidentally.
I am planning some detailed articles on these points by the end of next week.
Thanks for these clarifications.
It seems that Mr Hemming has conducted himself with rare qualities of dignity and decency. He has never once portrayed himself as a victim, even though he quite obviously is one. He has sought no publicity for his cause, however justified it may be. He seemingly has no desire to visit vengeance against his accuser, no matter how understandable such a desire would be. And, finally, he has never once sought to cast aspersions on the millions of people in the UK alone who are genuine victims of sexual crimes.
My great concern about people such as Esther Baker is the damage that they do, not only to the falsely accused, who are immediately impacted, but also to the genuine victims of child sexual abuse, who are impacted indirectly, but who are impacted nonetheless.
The publication this week of the IICSA Westminster report ought to have been a major media event and a focus of national conversation. The report’s 190 pages contain many shocking examples of abuse and cover-up involving people of considerable prominence in public life. Some are still alive and some are even still in office. But the report got about a half-day’s publicity, most of which was devoted to the downfall of David Steel. The big story of the day was that £150 million of public money had been squandered because of a moral panic sparked by the bizarre fantasies of Carl Beech and fueled by the credulity of Tom Watson. Of course, most of IICSA’s resources have been dedicated to uncovering genuine cases of institutional failings, by children’s homes, penal institutions, schools, churches, and local and national government. Carl Beech, Esther Baker, and others like them have inflicted incalculable damage upon genuine victims.
Hi you should check out @JacquiDillon’s timeline. She has been making lots of crazed allegations about you including stalking and stuff. Do a Twitter search over 3rd March 2020
I have received multiple emails about this. I did not know about Dillon’s posts until I started to receive emails, and I do not operate the accounts @LegalAidLoser or @BeckyBrooke9982. I am sensitive to the issues and I am aware that Dillon has been, and is, very poorly and has had some charitable achievements. I am aware that she was being actively goaded by those accounts (although to be fair, they were responding to her … strident … comments).
Even so, there comes a point when enough is enough. I have sent Dr Dillon and her solicitor a letter of claim and a signed Form N1 to contemplate. I have explained the immediate consequences of further posts. Dillon is welcome to argue with those accounts or sue them, as long as she stops saying they are me. The fact that they are taunting her about her suspicions is regrettable but not an excuse.
If Dillon were to sue @LegalAidLoser or @BeckyBrooke9982, do you think she would win?
Dunno.
I have not reviewed all the tweets on both sides, and have neither the time nor inclination. It is clear that both sides have been going at it for some time.
However, Dillon can leave me out of it, or she risks spending a lot of time in the next year or two in the Queen’s Bench Division.
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