A British woman has been jailed for six years in Hong Kong for blackmail and perverting the course of justice after a court found she made a false allegation of rape.
Isabel Rose, 26, from Hackney in east London, alleged that a British banker raped her after she travelled to Hong Kong to visit him in January 2024.
The man was arrested after she reported the incident but later released without charge. Rose was subsequently arrested and charged.
Local media reported that Rose was in Hong Kong’s District Court on Wednesday for sentencing after being convicted in March. She had denied the charges.
‘I didn’t wanna have sex’
According to local press reports, Judge Adriana Tse sentenced her to five years in prison for blackmail and three years for perverting the course of justice, with one year to be served consecutively.
Prosecutors argued that Rose fabricated the allegation in an attempt to extort £100,000 ($134,000) from the man, whose identity was withheld. Rose denied the charges throughout the trial and has consistently maintained that she was raped.
Rose had travelled to Hong Kong on 31 January 2024 after meeting the man while in Thailand a month earlier, according to court documents.
At the centre of the prosecution case were WhatsApp messages exchanged between the pair in the hours and days after the alleged rape on 1 February at his apartment.
In one message sent the following morning, Rose wrote: “Are you annoyed I didn’t want to have sex,” to which the man replied: “What no of course not. Was impressed by your restraint.”
Later that day, Rose wrote: “You violated me last night, I didn’t wanna have sex.”
He replied: “I’m really deeply sorry, I was slightly drunk and I misread your signals, it’s no excuse and I know it doesn’t make it any better.”
In a later exchange, Rose wrote: “You basically raped me.” The man replied: “That’s not what I’m into at all and I feel sick.”
The pair later exchanged messages about money. According to the written judgement of the verdict published in March, the man agreed to reimburse Rose for her travel and accommodation.
In one message, Rose wrote: “Send me the right amount you owe me for everything. Think about that. Think carefully.”
He transferred £5,000 that day and tried to send a further £5,000.
Rose subsequently wrote: “You’ve given 10% of what I’m owed. 100% of my soul gone.”
In a later message, the man wrote: “But I don’t have 100k, I have no way of paying you that.”
Rose reported the rape to police on 3 February. The man was arrested and questioned before being released without charge. Rose was arrested the following day and later charged with blackmail and perverting the course of public justice.
‘Cruel and evil’
In her verdict, Judge AN Tse Ching relied in part on the messages exchanged after the encounter, according to the South China Morning Post.
At Wednesday’s sentencing, Tse said the defendant had committed a “cruel and evil” offence by extorting money from the man, the newspaper reported.
“The defendant took advantage of [the man]’s kindness, naivety, friendship and romantic interest,” Judge Tse said.
She called Rose “an author of her own wrongdoing” and said her false report to police had been “vengeful and wicked”.
