Rapist's lawyer who 'humiliated' victim in court by wrongly suggesting she had ... trends now
A rape survivor says she has been 'vindicated' after the lawyer representing her attacker was found to have abused his position by questioning her sexual history and appearing to suggest she had a personality disorder during a trial.
Ellie Wilson, 26, filed a complaint against Lorenzo Alonzi after he told jurors it was an 'injustice' her rapist and ex-boyfriend Daniel McFarlane was set to be jailed while Ms Wilson graduated with a first-class masters degree with distinction.
Advocate Mr Alonzi - a senior Scottish lawyer qualified to take on the most serious criminal cases - also questioned whether she had a personality disorder, without any medical evidence, and commented on her sexual history in his closing remarks.
The Faculty of Advocates' complaints committee unanimously upheld five of Ms Wilson's complaints, calling his behaviour 'inappropriate' and 'discourteous'.
The sanction against the lawyer is yet to be decided - with reports suggesting he could face a fine of up to £3,000, surrender the fee he was paid to take McFarlane's case, pay Ms Wilson compensation or be given an official reprimand.
Ellie Wilson, whose rapist Daniel McFarlane was represented by Mr Alonzi in court
Lorenzo Alonzi has been reprimanded by the Faculty of Advocates' complaints committee over how he conducted himself during a rape trial
Five of Ms Wilson's complaints were upheld unanimously by the Faculty of Advocates' complaints committee
Today Ms Wilson, from Glasgow, says she feels 'vindicated' at the verdict, after a long and costly battle to obtain a copy of the trial transcript that has already transformed Scotland's attitude towards open justice for survivors of sexual violence.
'I left court feeling humiliated and traumatised by what happened and I think that often a lot of people within the legal profession would say (the way he conducted himself) was normal, and I knew it wasn't,' she told MailOnline.
'To be vindicated means everything to me. What I experienced in court had such a huge impact on me - I was left suicidal, and I had to take time off work.
'That was because of the treatment of Lorenzo Alonzi. It was because of him I felt like that.'
She added: 'I felt like he was really trying to blame me for what happened. He kept trying to imply I was promiscuous.
'I just felt like I was being villainized, like I was the one on trial.'
Mr Alonzi, of Black Chambers in Edinburgh, took McFarlane's case after he was charged with raping Ms Wilson, who has waived her right to anonymity, and with destroying, or requesting others to destroy, incriminating evidence of the attacks.
Jurors found him of two charges of rape and attempting to defeat the ends of justice following the trial in June 2022, and he was jailed for five years a month later.
Despite ensuring her rapist met justice, Ms Wilson says she was not willing to stand for Mr Alonzi's interrogation style - which 'repeatedly crossed the line', the committee concluded.
Transcripts show that Alonzi, an advocate since 1990, repeatedly asked her about her sexual history - a privileged line of questioning that requires special dispensation from the courts in Scotland.
The complaints committee concluded that he 'ought to have known where the line was' following repeated warnings by the judge he was going too far - and concluded that he 'abused his position' by continuing to press Ms Wilson on her private life.
It also took umbrage with Mr Alonzi's questions about whether she may have had a 'narcissistic personality disorder' - a line of questioning for which there was no supporting medical basis, nor evidence entered into the court.
Mr Alonzi, the committee concluded, was 'discourteous to the court' by pursuing the 'entirely irrelevant' line of questioning.
And he was further reprimanded for referring to both Ms Wilson's sexual history and the baseless claims about her mental health in his closing remarks to the jury before they retired to consider the verdict.
'He deliberately put these matters to the jury, despite knowing that the trial judge would likely then be forced to direct the jury to disregard them,' the committee said.
The lawyer was also
