The former prostitute at the centre of the Jeffrey Archer libel trial has died after a car crash involving a suspected armed robber.
Ms Monica Coghlan was driving a Ford Fiesta which was struck by a Jaguar, allegedly driven by a fleeing armed robber, in Scammonden, near Huddersfield.
The 50-year-old was taken by air ambulance to the Leeds General Infirmary but died from her injuries.
A 32-year-old man has been arrested in connection with the incident.
British police said the accident followed an earlier incident in which a man brandishing what appeared to be a handgun raided a chemists in Birkby, Huddersfield.
He ran out of the shop carrying medical supplies and then allegedly threatened the driver of a white taxi parked outside. "The man climbed into the cab and drove off alone but was then in collision with a Land Rover," police said.
After the collision, he forced his way into a Jaguar car, which crashed into the Ford Fiesta a short time later.
Ms Coghlan was thrust into the limelight during Jeffrey Archer's libel trial against the Daily Star newspaper in 1987. The multi-millionaire novelist and former Tory party deputy chairman sued the newspaper after it ran an article about him and Ms Coghlan.
She said one of Mr Archer's business associates met her at London's Victoria Station to pay her £2,000 on September 8th, 1986. Mr Archer said the cash handover had been a "lack of judgment" and he maintained he paid the money only to help Ms Coghlan escape hounding reporters by going abroad.
He sued the Daily Star for suggesting he had slept with her and won £500,000 in damages. Ms Coghlan was back in the limelight 13 years later when Mr Archer was charged with perjury and perverting the course of justice in connection with the libel trial.
PA