A jury has seen mobile phone footage allegedly taken when a Kingston magistrate and friend racially abused and attempted to evict Romanian tenants.

Stephanie Lippiatt, of Lower Ham Road, has been a magistrate for 21 years and is currently on trial for unlawful eviction, racially aggravated assault and racially aggravated damage to property - three charges she denies.

The 63-year-old was arrested with her friend Victor Hawes on June 18 last year, after allegedly trying to evict the partner of tenant Maria Perec from her property in Durlston Road.

Croydon Crown Court was shown mobile phone footage of the incident on Friday, March 12, which showed Hawes raging, and throwing out Miss Perec's property, while hurling racist abuse at her and partner George.

The court saw footage allegedly showing him calling them "Romanian cockroaches" while Mrs Lippiatt tried to get him to leave the property.

He was filmed throwing their belongings out of the front door, and clothes and possessions were strewn over the staircase and entrance hall, the court heard.

Miss Perec accused Mrs Lippiatt of pushing her and stamping on her foot during the late-night incident, and said she threw her drawers down the stairs, which the magistrate denied in court.

When she was arrested with Hawes, she was recorded by PC Cougar to have said outside the station: "They are bloody foreigners and they will get away with it."

She denied saying bloody but when asked what she meant by that, she told the court: "I think at that point in time the reality of the awfulness of what had happened sunk in."

Mrs Lippiatt said she knew it would not be an easy matter because police would deal with it in a more vigorous manner, because there was an allegation of racism.

She told the court she was 63, with no previous convictions, no points on her licence and was of impeccable character.

She said "I see it in court all the time but that's not to say that's how I behave."

She denied prosecutor allegations that she used her job as a magistrate to her advantage when speaking to police.

She told the court: "Last year when I was 62, I would have said it wouldn't have even crossed my mind that I could find myself in this position."

Speaking about her time in the police cell, she said: "When that door shut I could not even look at the door. They kept saying 'Are you all right?' and I couldn't even speak.

"I completely lost control of myself. I was screaming and I was crying and I was begging them to let me out."

At one point she asked if she could go in a cell with Hawes, who has pleaded guilty on the first day of the trial, because she was scared they might not notice if she dropped dead of fear.

The tenancy dispute was sparked when Mrs Lippiatt returned from five weeks in Thailand to news that Miss Perec had moved in her lover.

Mrs Lippiatt said she was happy to let George live there if the other tenants, including Hawes, agreed, but she became "exasperated" by the lack of co-operation.

In the end, she agreed to give Miss Perec her money back for the remaining month's rent, which had already been paid, and they would both leave the house.

But on June 18, the court heard, she was too busy to deliver the cash and Hawes agreed to do it on her behalf.

On the day he was due to do so, he was run over by a bus, the court heard.

Mrs Lippiatt said: "He had cuts all over his back and had obviously had a wheel go over his back. You could see the tyre marks on his T-shirt."

She said he went to the Owl and the Pussycat pub, instead of hospital, to find somebody to do his work as a labourer the next day.

He needed five months off work after the accident and it turned out he had two fractured vertebrae and broken ribs, the court heard.

Mrs Lippiatt said: "It wasn't just a passing brush - he had been thrown down the bus."

She decided to drive him to the house because he had been drinking - something she was wary of after her husband Clive was killed by a drunk motorbike driver, the court heard.

When the altercation between Hawes and George started, she thought it would come to nothing.

She told the court: "As a magistrate you see it all the time, two men mouthing off at each other and, nine times out of 10, it comes to nothing."

She described it all as an "absolute nightmare" and said she just wanted to get Mr Hawes away from the house.

The trial continues.