A North Yorkshire woman has spoken of the traumatic impact of being the victim of a terrifying and obsessive stalker.
Andrew Philip Russell, 35, of George Street, Pontefract, was jailed for five years four months at York Crown Court for stalking involving serious alarm or distress after a campaign of abuse spanning almost two years.
Russell went to great lengths to intimidate the victim, causing her to fear for her life.
The woman, who is from the Selby district, was forced to move home several times because of the abuse.
She told the court: “The prolonged abuse and manipulation have had a profound effect on my mental health.
“Living in constant fear, uncertainty, and instability has caused significant emotional distress on me and my children.
“I have experienced anxiety, and a persistent sense of insecurity, which has affected my ability to function day-to-day.
“The repeated upheaval and the responsibility of shielding my children from harm while coping with my own trauma have been overwhelming.
“Even now, I continue to struggle with trust and feelings of vulnerability, and I have required ongoing support and intervention to manage these effects.
“We have already served a sentence – living in fear, displaced, and traumatised.”
Fitted tracking device
Russell was in a relationship with another woman when he began to stalk the victim.
He led her to believe she was being stalked by an ex-partner who was in prison for assaulting her, and who she believed was asking other people to target her on his behalf.
But it was actually Russell who was behind the threats and intimidation masking them as though they were orchestrated by her ex-partner from his cell.
The campaign of abuse began with her car being fitted with a tracking device, followed by threatening messages from fake social media accounts, and numerous attempts to hack into her social media and email accounts.
Masquerading as her ex-partner, the threats included telling her that he was “angry at being in prison”, that he “wants to punish her” that “people were being paid to watch her”.
One day she came home to find her house had been broken into with her wifi and security cameras disabled.
She then began to receive phone calls and voice messages threatening her and her family from an unknown person and voices she did not recognise.
Still believing the threats to be organised by her ex-partner who assaulted her, the victim became so afraid that she refused to attend court to give evidence against him.
Meanwhile Russell was pretending to support her.
began to suspect that the threats and intimidation were not actually from her ex-partner at all, but from Russell himself.
The police investigation found that Russell was indeed behind the stalking campaign. He was caught when CCTV showed him topping up one of the multiple phone numbers used to stalk the victim.
The victim was forced to move home several times as each time Russell found her, on one occasion, claiming he taken a wrong turn down the street where she had moved to, forcing her to move and uproot her children yet again.
As well as jailing him at York Crown Court on Friday (21 November). Judge Morris also imposed a ten-year stalking protection order on him on his release from prison.
‘Immense bravery’
Detective Sergeant Michelle Neighbour, of North Yorkshire Police’s Stalking Support Team, said: “I want to recognise the victim in this case who has shown immense bravery throughout the last three years.
“Her life and that of her children have been turned upside down and completely disrupted by the actions of Russell, yet she had faith that justice would be served. I thank her for that as a dangerous manipulator is now behind bars.
“Despite his conniving attempts to evade prosecution using fake profiles to hide his identity, Russell was found out and while denying it throughout the investigation, audaciously claiming that he was also a victim, he eventually did the only right thing he could do, and pleaded guilty.
“This case demonstrates the incredible lengths that stalking perpetrators will go to in order to stalk their victims.
“If you are you receiving unwanted contact from anyone, including an ex-partner, then I urge you to report the matter as soon as possible.”
