A HAMPSHIRE gran has denied being a racist – despite sending hundreds of letters containing racial slurs.

Pensioner Margaret Walker sent the handwritten mail to parish councils, MPs, businesses, pubs and clubs nationwide.

The targets of her anonymous campaign ranged from politicians – including Prime Minister David Cameron, who she claimed was “flooding the country with ethnic people” – to the BBC, which she claimed was a “Marxist organisation”. Walker, 73, of Walnut Drive, Fareham also referred to Scottish people as “scum”, called people of Pakistani origin “scroungers” and used a variety of racist terms.

Many of the letters, sent over several years, referred to the unsolved case of white 14-year-old Charlene Downes, who disappeared from Blackpool in 2003.

Two Middle Eastern men were acquitted of her murder in 2007 after the Crown Prosecution Service conceded it had “grave doubts” about crucial evidence.

Despite their acquittal, the court heard that Walker referred to the men in her letters as “Muslim, paedophile murderers”.

Fareham Magistrates’ Court was told that Walker said in a witness statement that those who went to the police after receiving her letters were “unconcerned about a murdered child”.

She admits writing around 500 letters but claims they were not antisocial. She told the court: “I wrote the letters because I was absolutely disgusted that for 30 years my countrymen, cousins, children have been sexually abused, raped and in some cases murdered by Muslim paedophiles and people didn’t know what was going on in this country because it was hidden by the establishment.

“I’m English and if you’re English in this country with a voice you’re called a racist.”

Walker said she had remained anonymous so that she would not be stopped by the police.

Walker had previously been backed by the British National Party, who called for members to support a demonstration at her last court hearing.

But the political party was forced to distance itself from Walker yesterday when BNP press officer Tim Rait was called to the witness box and presented with the letters she had sent. Reacting to the content, he said: “It’s not a thing we would have issued – maybe that’s tantamount to disassociating ourselves with it.”

The court will determine if Walker, already subject to a temporary antisocial behaviour order, should be given a full Asbo barring her from sending more letters.

Proceeding