A beauty queen has called for more to be done to crack down on online trolls after photos were taken from her Instagram account and doctored to make her appear naked.
Tabitha Bennett, who is in the running to be Miss England, said the fake images were shared on fake social media profiles which were also used to send abusive messages to other beauty queens.
The 20-year-old said the abuse made her want to pull out of the competition and made her unsure who she could trust.
A Meta spokesperson said the fake accounts have been taken down, while Cheshire Police have previously confirmed they are investigating Ms Bennett’s online harassment.
Tabitha BennettMs Bennett was crowned Miss Lancashire in March but four months after she took the crown the harassment began.
She told North West Tonight: “I love Instagram, I spend my life on it. Such a positive platform has such a negativity and I don’t know how they haven’t learned from previous events with other people.”
Abusive messages were sent to people she knew, including the organisers of Miss England, from fake accounts purporting to be her.
She said they also shared a picture that had been edited to make her appear topless with the caption “sexy fun by me.”
The post included a “chatline” phone number which actually linked to a charity event she was running as part of the pageant.
Tabitha BennettMs Bennett, from Knutsford in Cheshire, said she reported the harassment to Cheshire Police two months ago but no action has been taken.
“A policeman came out and he was fantastic and we really thought we were going to get to the bottom of this,” she said.
“When they come and they give you so much hope and then you don’t hear anything, you think ‘how else are we going to find out’?”
Tabitha’s mum Vicky is also a former Miss Blackpool and has been on the receiving end of the abusive comments.
“A lot of it has been directed towards me, saying that I’m chasing my dream through Tabitha.
“Which is absolutely not true, Tabitha’s wanted to be Miss England since she was a little girl. It’s always been her dream.”
The Miss England grand finals will be held on 20 November and Ms Bennett is concerned the activity will start again.
“How upsetting that a build up to something so amazing is going to be overshadowed by me thinking that this is going to flare up,” she said.
