MP Fiona Onasanya, pictured outside the Old Bailey last week, denies lying about a Russian driving her Micra to avoid a speeding fine
A Labour MP who claims an ‘untraceable’ Russian man sped in her Nissan Micra had driven alone to a house on the street where the car was caught doing 41mph in a 30mph zone, a court heard today.
Dr Christian DeFeo, who wrote press releases for Peterborough MP Fiona Onasanya, said he felt ‘compelled’ to appear at the Old Bailey at the 11th hour after reading a court report online this week.
Dr DeFeo told jurors he had a moral duty to contact police and told them the MP had driven to his house, alone, in her Nissan Micra, on the night the speeding ticket was issued.
Miss Onasanya is accused of orchestrating the plot in an attempt to evade prosecution just weeks after being elected.
She allegedly conspired with her brother Festus to offload the blame when her Nissan Micra was caught speeding in July last year and the siblings told police that a Russian man named Aleks Antipow was behind the wheel.
But an investigation later found that Mr Antipow did exist but was visiting his parents abroad at the time.
Onasanya, from Peterborough, denies one count of perverting the course of justice.
Her brother has pleaded guilty to three charges of perverting the course of justice, including to one related to the July 24 incident.
Dr DeFeo told the court he had ‘enormous hopes invested’ in the Labour MP, who was elected in 2017, and added: ‘I never dreamed in my darkest dreams – I never thought I would have to be sitting here [giving evidence].
‘It is with the greatest reluctance I have to do this. To do otherwise, I cannot. It’s morally and legally unacceptable not to.’
Dr Christian DeFeo, pictured with his wife, told the Old Bailey that the MP had driven to his house alone when she claims a Russian man was behind the wheel, the court heard
Onasanya is accused of plotting with her brother Festus Onasanya to claim that a Russian man was behind the wheel of her Nissan Micra when it was clocked doing 41mph in a 30mph zone on The Causeway near Thornley in Cambridgeshire at around 10pm on July 24 last year.
The court was told about an email exchange between Onasanya and Dr DeFeo, arranging to meet on the same day.
Asked what time she was there, the witness said: ‘I cannot say a specific time, however she arrived late and was there quite late because we offered her a bed to stay the night.
‘She arrived in her car. She arrived alone. She pulled up her car in front of our house. I greeted her at the door.’
Festus Onasanya also used a similar ‘method’ involving fake driver details, when he was caught speeding on June 17 and August 23 last year
Dr DeFeo said Onasanya, his wife and himself spent no less than two hours discussing the ‘nitty gritty’ of a charity lease in his living room.
They were there together throughout apart from the occasional ‘loo breaks’ and his wife going into the kitchen to prepare a ‘hot lemon squash’.
The Peterborough MP allegedly conspired with her brother Festus to offload the blame when her Nissan Micra was caught speeding in July last year.
Jurors were told that Mr Onasanya, 33, a singer from Chesterton, Cambridge, used a similar ‘method’ involving fake driver details, when he was caught speeding on June 17 and August 23 last year.
He has already pleaded guilty at the Old Bailey to perverting the course of justice in relation to the incidents, as well as to the charge incident involving his sister.
Miss Onasanya, a former solicitor who is now a Labour whip responsible for party discipline, deliberately gave police false details so they could not trace the real driver, jurors at the Old Bailey were told.
The investigation was triggered when the MP’s Nissan Micra was detected driving at 41mph in a 30mph zone at 10.03pm on July 24 last year in Thorney, Cambridgeshire.
The MP, who had risen for Parliament’s summer recess several days earlier, replied to a notice of intended prosecution (NIP) naming Mr Antipow as the driver.
Officers became suspicious when they unsuccessfully tried to contact Mr Antipow, and found that the address and phone number on the document were false.
The court heard how analysis of records for Miss Onasanya’s two mobile phones placed her in the area where the speeding offence took place.
Prosecutor David Jeremy said: ‘Mr Antipow does exist, but he was not driving Ms Onasanya’s car.’
Miss Onasanya became ‘trapped in a number of lies’ when she decided to ‘adopt her brother’s method of evading prosecution’, jurors were told.
Mr Jeremy said: ‘This case did start as an offence of speeding. It has become, as a result of the choices made by Miss Onasanya, a case about lying.
‘Lying persistently and deliberately, lying all the way to this court and, it may be, even lying in this court. Lying in a way that has had to be coordinated with lies told by her brother.’
Mr Antipow was connected to the siblings due to living in a property that they rented in Chesterton for several months in 2016.
Investigators found that Mr Onasanya had previously lived at the false address for Mr Antipow that was provided on the prosecution notice, while its occupants are said to be linked to him.
A phone number supposedly belonging to the Russian was traced back to a company called IT Fleet Automotive, where Mr Onasanya worked as a self-employed delivery driver, it was claimed.
When the original prosecution letter to Mr Antipow was returned to police due to the incorrect address, officers wrote to the MP in September asking her to clarify the details.
When another NIP letter was sent to Mr Antipow and again received no response, investigators repeatedly failed in their attempts to get hold of Miss Onasanya.
She told investigators in November that Mr Antipow had filled in his own details on the returned speeding form.
When the MP eventually agreed to attend a voluntary interview at Bedford police headquarters on January 2 this year, she refused to answer questions.
Mr Jeremy said: ‘What a shame she did not tell the truth from the beginning’.
‘By this time Miss Onasanya would have known that she and her brother had a problem – that the speeding allegations had not gone away and been fobbed off using Festus’s method.’
Miss Onasanya denies one count of perverting the course of justice. The trial continues.
Sorry we are not currently accepting comments on this article.