THE man charged with sending racially aggravated messages directed at Brexit court campaigner Gina Miller has been revealed as a disgraced Sussex Lord.

Rhodri Colwyn Philipps, 50, was charged on Tuesday with sending malicious communications with racially aggravated factors, the Metropolitan Police said.

Phillips, the 4th Viscount St Davids, is also known as a keen polo player.

He previously owned a £3.6 million ten-bedroom property in Northchapel, near Petworth.

He has experienced a number of financial problems in the past, having been declared bankrupt in 2011 for the second time in his life.

In the same year, his 10-bedroom property, Strange Place, in Northchapel, West Sussex – which is worth £3.6million – was repossessed by Barclays Bank.

Back in 2008 he was given a two-year suspended sentence in Germany after an epic spending spree that led to the ruin of his engineering firm Hans Brochier.

He spent more than a year in prison while claims that he used company funds - more than £350,000 on promoting an opera singer, £12,000 to rent a private jet and £5,000 on a shotgun from James Purdey - were investigated.

Now living in Kensington, the viscount is known for his love of polo and is married to interior designer Sarah Louise Butcher.

He also holds the titles Lord Strange of Knockin, Lord Hungerford, and Lord de Moleyns.

Phillips is part of one of the oldest aristocratic families in Wales, whose ancestors can be dated back to the Normans.

Members of his family have served as MPs and have sat in the Lords.

Ms Miller, 51, complained of receiving a series of racist messages following her decision to spearhead the legal challenge, which resulted in an historic Supreme Court defeat for the Government over Brexit in January.

The Guyana-born mother of three became the face of the first successful legal battle against Brexit.

However she said in a radio interview that it had resulted in her becoming “apparently the most hated woman in Britain”.

Philipps was arrested by officers from the Met’s Operation Falcon on January 25 after a complaint was received concerning alleged threats made online against a 51-year-old woman.

Phillips has been bailed to appear at Westminster Magistrates’ Court on April 4.

This week Peers inflicted a second defeat on the Government’s Brexit Bill by demanding a “meaningful” parliamentary vote. on the final divorce deal.

Voting was 366 to 268, majority 98, at the end of a passionate and sometimes bad tempered three-hour debate in a crowded House of Lords on Tuesday.

The amendment to the European Union (Notification of Withdrawal) Bill was approved with Labour, Liberal Democrat and some Tory backing.

The latest reverse represents a double blow for Prime Minister Theresa May and it could put at risk her timetable to start talks on quitting the EU later this month.

MPs will now have to decide whether to overturn both defeats when the Bill, which will allow the Government to trigger the Article 50 process of leaving the EU, goes back before them next week.