WHEN police called at the family home of a Nottingham taxi driver he was stunned to be told be was being arrested for raping a woman in 2003.
That day – October 6, 2011 – remains etched on his mind as it marked the beginning a nine-month battle to clear his name for a crime he did not commit.
The man, 39, who asked not to be named, had been living with his wife and four children, including newborn twins, on the Bestwood Estate and working hard for a Bulwell-based taxi company.
This month his accuser, Gaynor Cooke, was jailed for perverting the course of justice, but her victim has told the Post of the high price he has paid for her lies
The nightmare began when a DNA sample he gave to police after a passenger smashed up the stereo in his taxi was matched to one taken from a woman who claimed she had been attacked years before.
Back in 2003, Gaynor Cooke alleged she was violently raped in a taxi driver's front passenger seat and, as well as a 18-page statement on her "ordeal", DNA was taken.
There was no match at the time but that changed after the incident with the stereo in January 2011.
In October that year detectives came to the taxi driver's door, told him about the rape claim, and took him away in a police van.
In the months that followed, Nottingham City Council suspended his taxi licence and he had to rely on financial help from his sister to pay his mortgage and claim Jobseeker's Allowance.
"My two little babies had just been born," he said in a voice breaking with emotion.
"I couldn't even cuddle them because I'd lost confidence. I lost everything.
"I told my wife everyday 'look I never did it' and she supported me and she said 'I know you didn't''."
In his desperation to clear his name, he turned detective to prove his innocence.
He compiled maps of the scene, in Ossington Close, Nottingham, where Cooke said she'd been raped, gathered alibis from his taxi firm boss and a bakery where he had worked a shift that night.
The name of the taxi firm Cooke said he worked for was wrong and he had not driven the make of car she claimed she was raped in, he said.
He admitted he had consensual sex with a woman at his home around that time – when he was a single man – but he had not sexually assaulted anyone.
The truth only came to light last year as the case was being prepared for trial at Nottingham Crown Court.
Detectives in Nottingham tracked down a St Ann's couple who Cooke had spoken to at the time of the rape allegation.
They revealed the story was a lie – told to cover up the fact she had been unfaithful to her partner, who had since died.
When police visited Cooke, 41, now of Pen Green Lane, Corby, Northamptonshire, and confronted her, she replied: "You've got me there."
The "rape" allegation against the 39-year-old driver was dropped. He said: "I could have been given five years in prison, lost my reputation, my family and my life."
This month Cooke pleaded guilty to perverting the course of justice, between October 25, 2003, and January 20, 2012, after making a false complaint of rape. Recorder Shaun Smith QC sent her to prison for two years and said: "You destroyed an innocent life."
