A WOMAN breached her restraining order by Tweeting banned messages, a court has heard.

Penelope Mellor, 57, denies two counts of breaching a restraining order which was put in place to prevent her from contacting or posting about Shy Keenan, who lives near Colchester.

The five year order was put in place at Chelmsford Crown Court in March 2015, forbidding Mellor from publishing any information relating to Ms Keenan or her family directly or indirectly on the internet or via any other media outlet.

It also banned Mellor from posting or documenting any complaints about the book Broken or any other book or article written or published by Ms Keenan.

In October the same year, it is alleged Mellor breached the order by Tweeting a reference to “Joanne Pepper”, an alias which had been used by Ms Keenan in the past.

The following year in August, Mellor is also alleged to have Tweeted cryptically about autobiographical book Broken, labelling it “utter drivel” and “self-serving b*******”.

At Chelmsford Crown Court yesterday Anthony Abell, prosecuting, said: “The word Broken does not appear in the Tweet but we say we can draw the conclusion it is referring to that.

“Although she is being subtle, she is in effect referring to the book.”

Essex Police contacted Mellor via email after her Tweet referencing Joanne Pepper was posted but she did not reply.

Mr Abell said: “She was spoken to on January 28, 2017 when she was interviewed under caution and effectively, she made no comment to the questions which were put to her.

“Before her arrest she had told a police officer by email Joanne Pepper was an auto correct spelling error for the name of someone she went to school with and she had not noticed the error until she was contacted by the police.

“The prosecution say that is simply a manufactured excuse by Mellor and we say it would be a fantastic coincidence an alias of the very lady who the crown court order said not to send Tweets about would suddenly pop up by accident as some court of auto correct error.

“We say that is an excuse she has made up and she was deliberately trying to hide on social media an alias name which somehow or another she was able to discover.”

It is agreed by the defence Mellor, 57, of Coven, Wolverhampton, posted both Tweets from her own personal Twitter account, however, the defence argue she was not referencing Ms Keenan in either post.

At the outset of the case Judge David Turner QC, told the court: “This case is about two tweets. You may think why have you been assembled for something so trivial sounding.

“But the prosecution said it is not trivial sounding because the tweets were made in breach of a restraining order.

“If the restraining order is breached, that’s a criminal offence and that’s why you are here.”

The trial continues.