Birmingham Mail columnist Maureen Messent is to appear in court next month charged with wasting police time.

She revealed in the newspaper earlier this year how she helped a terminally ill aunt to die.

The claims were made as part of a debate into changing euthanasia laws.

Maureen, (pictured left), said she gave a fatal overdose of morphine to Eileen O’Sullivan, who was suffering from lung cancer, 40 years ago when she was living in Devon.

The journalist, (67), will face Newton Abbot Magistrates on August 15.

The Crown Prosecution Service decision to bring charges came after an investigation by Devon and Cornwall police.