Christine Keeler‘s 1963 conviction for perjury was the ‘ultimate in slut-shaming’ and a posthumous exoneration would be an opportunity to acknowledge historic discrimination against women in the justice system, according to the family’s legal team (Pic from frontpage of Daily Mirror during the trial of Stephen Ward trial by Doreen Spooner).

Earlier this month, the son of the woman at the centre of the Profumo scandal handed in a petition to the Ministry of Justice calling on the Lord Chancellor to recommend the King exercise his royal prerogative of mercy.  Christine Keeler was jailed for nine months in 1963 for giving misleading information in court and obstructing the course of justice following evidence given in a case in which she herself was the victim of violence and her attacker, and her stalker, admitted the violence.

Seymour Platt, Keeler’s son, together with granddaughter Daisy Devine-Platt and legal team including the human rights barrister Felicity Gerry KC, handed in the petition together with a 300-page dossier.

Christine Keeler died at the age of 75 years in 2017. The last paragraph of her Will was directed to Platt, saying: ‘it is my wish that he will look after my rights and reputation and do what he can to make sure that the truth is told about events of which I took part during my life.’

Felicity Gerry was contacted by the family five years ago to lead the call for a petition for a pardon.

‘I’ve always thought it was wrong that she went to prison,’ she told the Justice Gap. ‘But I didn’t realize why she went to prison – any more than anybody else does. Everybody thinks she went to prison because of the Profumo affair; but, actually, she went to prison as a victim of violence. It was almost retribution for her role in the Profumo affair.’

John Profumo, the Secretary of State for War, had been having an affair with Keeler who was also involved with Yevgeny Ivanov, a Soviet naval attaché. The relationship were described as a ‘love triangle’ and raised fears for national security. You can read our interview with Geoffrey Robertson on the Stephen Ward case (here).

At the height of the scandal, Keeler was the victim of a violent assault by a man called ‘Lucky’ Gordon. He was prosecuted; but sacked his lawyers and represented himself. In cross-examination of her, he admitted assaulting her. She later told the police she had not mentioned two other witnesses because they asked her not to. On the basis that she had lied about about who was present, Gordon’s conviction was quashed by the Court of Appeal. Bizarrely, Keeler was prosecuted for perjury and perverting the course of justice, pleaded guilty and was sent to prison whilst her attacked walked free.

Here for the handing in of the petition for a posthumous pardon for #ChristineKeeler pic.twitter.com/fSuViGeVMq

— Dr Felicity Gerry KC (@felicitygerry) May 9, 2025

Felicity Gerry argues that there was no ‘perjury’. ‘If you lie in court, it’s only ‘perjury’ or ‘perverting the course of justice’, if it’s what’s called a ‘material lie’. That has been that law for hundreds of years now. She didn’t really lie. She didn’t mention two people who were there,’ the barrister explains. Lucky Gordon had 13 previous criminal convictions and had been deported from Denmark two years earlier for attacking a woman. In February 1973, he was imprisoned for stabbing a woman in the back and neck with a screwdriver.

Earlier this year, the Criminal Case Review Commission after a three-year wait rejected the family’s application whilst recognising the merits of the arguments. ‘Miss Keeler could not have secured a fair trial, particularly in view of the unprecedented level of prejudicial media coverage of her,’ the watchdog said. ‘A judgment from the Court of Appeal quashing the perjury conviction would not be able to restore Christine Keeler’s reputation or alter her public image,’ it argued.

The family has called the CCRC’s decision ‘a disgrace’. ‘My mother was a victim of violence and sexual abuse,’ Platt said at the time. ‘She was sent to prison for denying two men were present when she was assaulted.  Take a moment to reflect on that: she told the truth about being violently attacked, agreed to shield two men from public scrutiny, and yet she was the only one imprisoned. Even her attacker walked free.’

From the BBC’s 2020 production: The Trail of Christine Keeler

‘It’s extraordinarily disappointing that the CCRC didn’t take the opportunity to send this to the Lady Chief Justice and she was denied the opportunity of exonerating Christine Keeler,’ agrees Gerry. ‘Now, the ball is in the court of the Secretary of State and it’s a woman [Shabana Mahmood]. Hopefully, she will she do the right thing.’

Slut-shaming
In the petition, Keeler’s lawyers argues that her treatment ‘[v]iewed through a contemporary lens’ would be identified as ‘slut-shaming’, the ‘practice of denigrating a woman for behaviour disapprovingly framed as provocative or promiscuous, while ignoring or excusing the behaviour of associated men’. They quote a contemporary headline from The People: ‘Christine Keeler is a shameless slut.’

In a recent account of the trial by Thomas Grant in his 2015 book Jeremy Hutchinson‘s Case Histories, the author talks of ‘a period of collective insanity’ induced by the scandal where ‘Britain Fell pray to the delusion that ‘the establishment’ was in a terminal state of moral decay.’ Hutchinson was Keeler’s barrister and vividly recalled his client as traumatised by events and as ‘a wholly passive party. Events happened to her, she did not instigate them.’ The book quotes Rebecca West’s extraordinary contemporary account of Keeler’s ‘terrified dignity’ in the face of a mob outside courtroom – see below.

The petition argues that the case is ‘perhaps the archetypal example of the destructive force that is the intrusive treatment of women as scandal fodder’. Throughout her life, she ‘suffered relentless and voracious media coverage’ but she was someone who was ‘wrongly framed as scandalous’ despite the fact that in 1963 she had just turned 21 after having been ‘abused and used as a teenager’. ‘Granting this petition is an opportunity for public recognition and reappraisal of the enormous damage that can be done to women by the State, the media and by abusive individuals,’ it argues. ‘A posthumous pardon is also an opportunity to acknowledge historic discrimination against women and to reduce the continuing legacy for women today.’

Felicity Gerry notes the double standard whereby almost immediately John Profumo is accepted back into society – he received a CBE in 1975 for his charitable works. ‘He was rehabilitated, why not her?’ Gerry says. ‘Now we have policies on violence against women and girls and, without a doubt, under the current CPS policy, she wouldn’t be prosecuted. We should recognize that she was a victim of violence and there was no public interest in prosecuting her for keeping two men’s whereabouts out of her evidence. There was the framing of her, firstly, as a liar and, secondly, as a slut and that has affected all of us. It’s the ultimate in slut-shaming.’

‘There is a real public interest in this case for women in the criminal justice system. Women who are sent to prison. Women who are constantly wrongly sent to prison and disbelieved, who are accused of crimes where they are trafficked or coerced or compelled. We’re still sending very, very vulnerable women to prison, and we’re still framing women as ‘sluts’ and ‘liars’.’
Felicity Gerry

Rebecca West Christine Keeler’s ‘terrified dignity’

Christine Keeler was every afternoon led out by the police and put in her car, which was covered by a tent of photographers, who climbed on the footboards, the bonnet and the roof. Then they fell away and their place was taken by a mob of women, mostly old or middle-aged, without exception ill-favoured and unkempt, and shabby elderly men. Inside Christine Keeler sat in terrified dignity, her face covered with the pancake make-up which levels the natural toning of the skin, and her determination not to show her fear ironing out her features to the flatness of a mask. The cries and boos of the crowd expressed the purest envy. It was disagreeable to see a number of women candidly confessing that at the end of their lives they bitterly resented not having enjoyed the happiness of being prostitutes; and a number of men in the same situation wishing that they had been able to afford the company of prostitutes.

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