A TOP surgeon yesterday challenged the right of the General Medical Council to charge him with a second case of serious professional misconduct.

Professor Kyprianos Herodotou Nicolaides, from South London, is alleged to have given evidence to a disciplinary hearing intended to mislead the GMC's professional conduct committee.

In May 1998, the 49-year-old professor was found not guilty of serious professional misconduct after complaints from Jennifer Sabin, from Morpeth, Northumberland, that he had made sexual remarks to her.

He told the hearing he had never been subject to any previous allegations of a sexual nature. Four months earlier, King's College Hospital had held an investigation into a complaint of sexual harassment from the professor's former personal assistant.

Yesterday, counsel for the professor, Robert Francis, said the proceedings were a breach of the Human Rights Act in that the prosecution was attempting "a second bite at the cherry". The application was rejected and evidence in the case will be heard today.