Blackmail plotter in appeal bid

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One of the men jailed for blackmailing a member of the Royal Family over tapes featuring gay sex claims is to appeal against his conviction.

Ian Strachan was jailed for five years for attempting to extort £50,000 from the unidentified royal.

His lawyer Giovanni Di Stefano has confirmed that he plans to lodge an appeal against the conviction.

Strachan, 31, and his co-accused Sean McGuigan, 41, had denied charges of demanding money with menaces.

Mr Di Stefano said: "We are appealing against conviction. There was never any blackmail he wanted to expose."

'Corrosive evil'

Among the claims in the recordings were that the royal, referred to as witness A, performed a sex act on his employee, witness D, at a party.

Strachan, who is originally from Aberdeen, in Scotland, and McGuigan had used the tapes to demand money from the royal after trying, unsuccessfully, to sell them to newspapers.

The Old Bailey heard that Strachan was a "Walter Mitty"-type fantasist who routinely claimed to be a friend of royals and lived an extravagant lifestyle.

The judge, Mr Justice Cooke, said the offence was so serious that the pair had to be jailed.

He told them: "The corrosive evil of blackmail means that any sentence must have a deterrent effect."

And the judge said he was sure that the men had acted together to target the royal - a victim who was "particularly susceptible".