A man from Dunedin, New Zealand, faced the Dunedin District Court on June 22 after pleading guilty to three charges under the Harmful Digital Communications Act.

He was accused of writing fake articles on a parody site and falsely claiming that a s** worker and OnlyFans model, Lisa Lewis, had AIDS.

The man was granted interim name suppression, but the victim went public with her story.

Lisa Lewis claimed that the man tried to destroy her livelihood by spreading defamatory rumors about her and her occupation.

“The most defaming and slanderous thing anyone’s ever said about me,” said Lewis, who described herself as an “OnlyFans online creator p^rn actress”.

She believed the man wanted to destroy her and her income.

“He didn’t destroy me, but he did humiliate me,” she added.

The defendant wrote a series of false articles about Lewis to harm her reputation.

In June 2018, he claimed she had been employed to provide s**ual services to elderly war veterans.

A year later, he wrote that she was living in a state house while providing commercial s**ual services.

He also wrote that Lewis had been arrested and charged by police, attaching a pixelated courtroom photo of a similar-looking woman to dupe readers into thinking it was her.

None of these stories about Ms. Lewis were true at all.

The man unleashed his campaign of abuse because he “thought it was funny,” said Counsel Anne Stevens QC.

She described her client as someone who drank all the time and was always drunk, losing his judgment.

The defendant did not recognize the harm he was causing, Stevens added.

Lewis believed someone else encouraged him to do this and said she would love to know who and why.

The case was brought under New Zealand’s Harmful Digital Communications Act, which criminalizes digital communications that cause “serious emotional distress.” The law was introduced in 2015 to tackle cyber-bullying and other forms of online abuse.

The man’s interim name suppression was due to end in August, but Judge David Robinson lifted it after the defendant pleaded guilty to the charges.

Robinson sentenced him to three months’ community detention, 12 months’ intensive supervision, and 100 hours’ community work.

Lewis gained notoriety for a bikini-clad pitch invasion during an All Blacks rugby match in 2006.

She was not involved in prostitution at the time, but she later turned to s** work to support her family.

Although OnlyFans is not a site for prostitution, some people use it to sell s**ual content.

Lewis has been vocal about the stigma attached to s** work and said she is not ashamed of her profession.

“s** work is work,” said Lewis.

“I’m a single mum, and I have to support my family.

“I have a mortgage, I have bills to pay, and this is how I pay them.

“I’m not doing anything illegal, and I’m not hurting anyone.”

Lewis said the impact of the man’s actions was “massive,” and she was glad he was held accountable.

She hoped the case would serve as a warning to others who think they can get away with online abuse.

“This person wanted to destroy me, but he couldn’t,” said Lewis.