Heather Mills was ‘explosive’, says judge

Heather Mills's evidence was "inconsistent, inaccurate" and "less than candid", the High Court judge who presided over the Mills-McCartney divorce said in a devastating judgment which the former model tried unsuccessfully to suppress. Mr Justice Bennett's entire 58-page ruling was published online today after Mills was told she could not appeal against its publication. Mills, who was awarded £24.3m on Monday, wanted the full judgment kept secret because she said it contained information that could affect her daughter Beatrice's security.

The ruling - written before Mills poured a carafe of water over her husband's divorce lawyer Fiona Shackleton in court on Monday - reveals a judge who is less than impressed with the claimant, accusing her of "make-belief" and of being a "less than impressive witness". By contrast, Mr Justice Bennett describes Sir Paul McCartney’s evidence as "consistent, accurate and honest". He said: "He expressed himself moderately though at times with justifiable irritation, if not anger."

The judge also questioned Mills's claims that she owned a penthouse flat in Piccadilly worth "approximately £500,000" when she met Sir Paul, along with a Brighton property "worth £250,000". "I have to say I cannot accept the wife's case that she was wealthy and independent by the time she met the husband in the middle of 1999," said Mr Justice Bennett.

Mills also appeared to feel that she was entitled for the rest of her life to spend at the same "rate" as her husband, the judge said. "Although she has strongly denied it, her case boils down to the syndrome of 'me, too' or ‘if he has it, I want it too'," he wrote. And he was particularly scathing about the role that Mills claimed to have played during the marriage, offering advice to her husband and his family and helping him resurrect his career following the death of the former Beatle's first wife Linda McCartney.

However, he praised Mills performance representing herself in court. "She has conducted her own case before me with a steely, yet courteous, determination," he stated, adding that Mills was a "kindly person and devoted to her charitable causes".

And he sympathised with Mills over her claims of vilification in the media - to a point. "I accept that since April 2006 the wife has had a bad press," he said. "She is entitled to feel that she has been ridiculed, even vilified. To some extent she is her own worst enemy. She has an explosive and volatile character."