Briton seeks £17,500 payout for attempted abduction in Outback
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Joanne Lees, the British backpacker whose boyfriend, Peter Falconio, vanished in the Outback last year, is seeking criminal compensation from the Australian authorities for her ordeal.
Ms Lees, 28, who hid in desert scrub for six hours after a gunman tried to abduct her on an isolated highway in the Northern Territory in July 2001, has filed two claims for compensation in a court in Alice Springs. She could be granted up to $50,000 (£17,500).
She and Mr Falconio were driving from Alice Springs to Darwin in a camper van when a man in a pick-up truck waved them down. Ms Lees heard a gunshot after Mr Falconio got out. She was bound, gagged and thrown into the truck but managed to escape and hid until her assailant gave up the search. She stumbled on to the highway and flagged down a passing lorry.
Police believe her boyfriend was murdered, although his body has not been found. Ms Lees initially shunned the media and refused to sell her story. She later received a reported £30,000 for co-operating with a documentary about the case for ITV1's Tonight With Trevor McDonald.
Ms Lees stayed in Australia for three months and then went home to Huddersfield, in West Yorkshire, although she returned to the Northern Territory earlier this year to film the documentary.
Papers filed in the Alice Springs Local Court indicate that she is seeking compensation from the Northern Territory government under a law on assistance to victims of crime. A pre-hearing case conference, the first step in the process, took place last week.
Ms Lees' account of events was initially doubted in some quarters, but last month police produced compelling evidence to back her story, including photographs showing severe grazes to her elbows and knees suffered in her escape.