Boy George faces a jail term for falsely imprisoning

Boy George faces a jail term for falsely imprisoning a male escort.

He was told in court today that a prison sentence was 'the most likely option' after a jury convicted him of handcuffing Norwegian Audun Carlsen to a wall at his flat.

The singer, 46, whose real name is George O'Dowd, also beat Carlsen, 29, with a metal chain as he tried to escape from the flat in Shoreditch, East London after a kinky photographic session, Snaresbrook Crown Court heard.

Mr Carlsen fled in his underpants and alerted police.

A jury found Boy George, left, guilty of falsely imprisoning male escort Audun Carlsen, right
O'Dowd claimed he had handcuffed Carlsen to a wall while he investigated whether he had tampered with his home computer on April 28 of last year.

He accused Mr Carlsen of stealing photos of himself from the laptop, taken when the pair met three months earlier.

The defence claimed that the dispute was over whether Mr Carlsen had stolen photographs and, in so doing, 'messed up' O'Dowd's computer.
The suggestion that it was because Mr Carlsen refused to have sex with O'Dowd on the previous occasion was 'entire fantasy or a lie', the defence said.
O'Dowd denied to police that he punched or assaulted Mr Carlsen or swung a chain at him as the escort fled the flat, and suggested the bruises Mr Carlsen sustained could have been due to the fact that he was HIV positive.

Jurors saw photos of welts on Carlsen's head and injuries to his arm.

Boy George performing in Peru last year. He has been warned he faces a jail sentence
But Mr Carlsen told the court that O'Dowd concocted the story about computer tampering so he could punish him for not having sex during the first meeting.

He said: 'I think he couldn't handle the refusal - me not having sex with him.'
O'Dowd told police he was annoyed about that claim. 'I'd never have slept with someone who is HIV positive,' he told police.
The prosecution said the pair first made contact on the Gaydar website, a social networking site primarily for gay and bisexual men.more