Woman 'shocked at judge's flashing'

As she glanced down at the bottom of her newspaper she noticed the "very kind looking" gentleman had exposed himself. The woman spotted the man on four separate occasions on the rush-hour trip from Raynes Park, south-west London, to Waterloo, and later identified him by video as Lord Justice Richards, one of Britain's most senior judges.

She told London's City of Westminster Magistrates' Court that the man who had exposed himself had "boxed" her into a corner, against the glass panels in the first carriage so that no other passengers could see.

She described him as a well-dressed, grey-haired man, aged 55 to 60 years, who was "presentable and looked like a very kind man, which is why initially I thought this was an accident".

Recalling the incident on October 16, she told the court: "Because I was embarrassed and nothing like this had happened to me before, I assumed this was an accident. I did not want to draw attention to the situation, to me or to the gentleman, so I carried on reading my paper.

"Sometimes the gentleman would adjust himself slightly, sometimes his genitals would be exposed and sometimes not as much.

"I did not see him actively adjust himself but now and again I would just check to see that I was not seeing things. I would look at the bottom right-hand side of my paper and there were different levels of exposure - fully exposed or slightly exposed."

Sir Stephen Richards, a 56-year-old father of three who sits in the Court of Appeal, has pleaded not guilty to two counts of exposure.

It is alleged that he exposed himself to a woman on two separate occasions on a train between Wimbledon and Waterloo on October 16 and October 24.

Sir Stephen, from Wimbledon, south-west London, is charged with two counts of "intentionally exposing his genitals intending that someone would see them and would be caused alarm or distressed".