Nigella Lawson: I Used Coke, But I'm Not a Cokehead

Nigella Lawson may not be a cokehead, but she has used cocaine, she admitted in court today. She estimated having used it about six times, most recently in 2010 when she was a victim of "intimate terrorism." She also admitted smoking marijuana, but said though she smoked it "relatively recently," she's since quit, Sky News reports. So why the recent claims she's an addict? Ex-husband Charles Saatchi "had said to me if I didn't get back to him and clear his name he would destroy me," Lawson testified.

The drug allegations started circulating after Saatchi was pictured grabbing her throat in public, and Lawson says the claims were all about "salvaging Mr. Saatchi's reputation and destroying mine." And when she expressed reluctance to testify at the fraud trial of her and Saatchi's ex-assistants (the trial during which she gave this testimony), Saatchi made the threat to "destroy" her, the BBC reports. Lawson also said she endured "a long summer of bullying and abuse" from Saatchi, whom she divorced in July. (More Nigella Lawson stories.)