A party animal. A sex maniac

Husband's cry-rape pain By Robert Stansfield And Adrian Shaw the Mirror 7 June 2005

THE husband of rape liar Merete Underwood last night branded her a boozy, sex-mad party animal who made his life hell.

Engineering boss Toby Underwood told how the 32-year-old binge-drinking love cheat even invited men back to their home then finally left him to bring up a child she had with another man after yet another fling.

The doting husband stayed with his wife as she slept around, but the final straw came when she accused an innocent man of raping her after she had a one night stand with him.

Toby, 34, spoke as Underwood was starting a 12-month jail sentence for lying to police to cover up the fact she had enjoyed sex with the interior designer who she met in a bar after leaving her husband and two-year-old son James in another pub.

He said: "It's horrible, she's hurt everyone so much and put so many people through so much pain.

"My marriage has been a rollercoaster, four years of complete hell.

"She has no consideration for other people's lives and she deserves everything she gets. I'm glad she's been jailed. Marrying her was the biggest mistake of my life."

Toby recalled how the rape lie night began when the couple went for an after-work drink in February last year at a London pub with little James. He said: "We'd had one drink, I pleaded with her to come home as it was dark and minus six. She had James in a buggy, it was no place for a baby.

"She took him into the pub. She drank more and more then went to the toilet. I waited 10 minutes but she'd gone. I was concerned she didn't come back that night but it wasn't out of the ordinary so I didn't phone the police." He reported her missing next day, then got a text message from her phone that said: "Merete is okay, but cries and wants to go home, but not finished with her here. Good f*** she."

Toby, of Kingston, Surrey, said: "I was destroyed. I thought she was coming home in a body bag. I could never have believed she would send messages like that and make it up."

But that was the beginning of a cruel deception on his wife's part that continued with her telling police she had left the pub for some fresh air when a stranger grabbed her by the hair, bundled her into a car and drove her to a hotel in Bayswater, West London.

The Norwegian national claimed two men then took it in turns to rape her as she was held captive for 12 hours.

Underwood pointed the finger at the 34-year-old interior designer and gave police a full description of him.

In fact, London's Middlesex Guildhall court heard, she had gone to a wine bar spotted the man, chatted him up and went to his hotel where they had sex.

But he was arrested and spent 24 hours in cell and had the spectre of a rape conviction looming over him.

Even after Underwood was charged with perverting justice, she kept up the lie for a further year. It was only when a jury was about to be sworn in that she finally admitted the charge.

Prosecutor Joanne Hacking told the court the ordeal had left the innocent man "terribly traumatised".

Campaigners insisted Underwood's sentence was too short. Ian Kelly of UKMensaid.org.uk - a support group for male victims of false allegations - said: "It should have been 12 years."

Toby, who met Underwood when he worked in Norway, has filed for divorce.

He said: "I'm not James's biological father. She had him by a different man two years into our marriage. But I'm fighting for custody and hopefully we can build a happy home together."