A woman who claims she was “falsely accused” of leaking Ferne McCann’s shocking voice notes last year has broken her silence.
Annie Bullah, who is the fiancée of Ferne’s criminal ex-boyfriend Arthur Collins, was previously arrested on suspicion of creating an Instagram account that leaked Ferne’s voice notes.
The 35-year-old was questioned by the Met Police over the claims, and could have faced a potential sentence of two years.
The grounds for imprisonment in this case would be if she had been guilty of harassment and malicious communication, however, the police have said they will be taking no further action.
Annie has now opened up about the situation, claiming she’s had a “year from hell”.
The fiancée of the TOWIE’s star ex said she was furious that Ferne, 33, was allowed to continue filming her TV series and appear on shows like This Morning after making “horrid comments” in the leaked voice notes.
In the leaked recordings to an anonymous Instagram profile, Ferne can be heard calling her former TOWIE co-star Sam Faiers a “fat c***”, and labelling one of her exes Arthur Collins’ acid attack victims a “silly b****”.
The accused spoke to the Daily Mail about the ordeal and said: “In January 2023, I received a phone call saying that I was a suspect for harassment and malicious communication for Ferne McCann and her fiancé Lorri Haines.”
“I was mortified. I’m a mother and I knew that I hadn’t done anything wrong.”
“Then I was arrested and put under caution. I went to the interview and there were all these handwritten letters supposedly from me.”
“It was very distressing because even if you’re innocent, people are found guilty every day when they haven’t done the crime,”
“In the interview, they quizzed me about Arthur and asked if he had forced me to do it, was I under duress, all these horrible things,” she confessed.
The recordings, which were released online in 2022, prompted the ex-Towie-star to apologise and admit it wasn’t her “finest hour”.
During an appearance on This Morning, Ferne said: “I need to take this opportunity to publicly apologise again to those affected.”
“Obviously the words that I used were unpleasant and I have reached out privately to those people.”
She continued: “It is very difficult because I would love to sit here and share exactly what went on but it’s now part of a criminal investigation so I can’t do that but what I can say is these voice notes were from a time when I was in a very vulnerable situation.”
One of Arthur Collins’ acid attack victims, Sophie Hall, spoke out after hearing the recording and said she felt “sick to her stomach” after she listened to the recording of Ferne calling her “ugly”.
The TV personality’s boyfriend at the time Arthur Collins threw acid on Sophie Hall in a London nightclub in 2017, which left her scarred for life.
Sam Faier’s family, including her sister Billie and mother Suzie, were also appalled and upset at the language Ferne used to describe Sam when she branded her a “fat c***,” especially since the voice note was allegedly sent quite soon after Sam gave birth to her third child.
Annie continued with her rant and said: “Everyone makes mistakes and everything Ferne said was awful.”
“She has a platform where she can speak to millions of people and she needed to use it to say she’s human and I said some horrible things but instead all she thinks about is money and Showbiz and I was put in the dirt when she should have taken accountability.”
“Ferne got to keep her TV show and she just came back whereas I emailed the police daily telling them I was depressed but all they said to me was to go to A&E if I felt low.
“I struggled for a year. Arthur and his family supported me through it, but it was a dreadful time… she ruined my life.”
Annie also claimed she was an “easy target” to suspect for this crime as she is set to marry Ferne’s ex, Arthur.
However, sources close to Ferne have denied she named Annie as a suspect in the case.
Annie continued: “I got with Arthur in 2022 and she was aware that we were together. I had seen everything that came out with the Lady Whistledown account.
“People like to talk in Essex and a few people had mentioned to me that she I was said to be the person behind the account. I thought, ‘why? Is it because I’m with Arthur so I’m an easy target?”
“It was okay for Ferne… she’s in the limelight, I had to deal with everything on my own while she was on This Morning. I had people asking me in the gym, mums from the school…
“I had to continually say, no, it wasn’t me and I am with Arthur so I’m an easy target.”
Now that the police have confirmed they won’t be taking further action, Annie said she can now finally get on with her life.
“Four months ago, I got told by my solicitor that it was going to the CPS for a decision. I was so worried,” she said. “But a couple of weeks ago, I got no further action from the police, which was such a worry off my shoulders.
“It was almost a year, which was such a long time for it to be hanging over me. It was a dreadful time but finally now I can get on with my life.”
