'Stalker ruined my life'

FANCY dress shop owner Maddy Leighton has told of her nightmare ordeal at the hands of a stalker.

Nicholas England, of Banbury, Oxfordshire, was jailed for four months in the spring for stalking and common assault on Miss Leighton, who he used to live with.

He was also given a restraining order banning him from seeing or contacting Miss Leighton for two years.

He started writing to her from prison, and immediately on his release he went to see her, hung around outside her shop and sent her hundreds of text messages, as well as numerous phone calls and answerphone messages.

This week he was back before magistrates in Devizes for breaching the terms of the restraining order. He admitted the charge and was bailed to appear before Salisbury Crown Court for sentencing.

She first met England in June 2000 through a radio dating service. She had just come through a messy divorce and had thrown herself into running Ab Fab, her Devizes-based fancy dress hire shop.

She said; "At first he was charm personified, he was handsome and attentive, very clever and extremely manipulative.

"I suppose I was vulnerable and he locked on to that. He bought me flowers every week, told me I was beautiful and constantly asked me if I loved him."

Within six weeks of meeting Miss Leighton, England was made redundant. He started saying that he was fed up with having to travel from his Banbury home, and with only seeing her at weekends. "He started saying maybe he should look for a job near Devizes," Miss Leighton said. "Then he asked if he could stay with me until he got himself sorted out. He ended up living with me for 14 months, and during that time I think he worked for six weeks.

"He first assaulted me when we had been living together for four months. After that I was left with bruises all over my body and a permanent scar under my eye. If my neighbour had not heard me screaming and come down and pulled him off me it could have been a lot worse.

"I reported him to the police, but like an absolute idiot I fell prey to all the letters and texts apologising and begging my forgiveness and promising that things would be different.

"Like a fool I dropped the charges, and I don't think Devizes police have ever forgiven me for that," she said.

"If I had had the right advice at the time, I would never have done that, but I was still vulnerable and messed up from my divorce and the side effects of some medication I had been prescribed.

"After the assault he was all sweetness and light and charm and bought me flowers and said he loved me, but looking back it was only a matter of time before he did it again.

"On May 2 he assaulted me for the second time. I had been taking some self-defence classes, but when you're pinned up against the wall and he is waving a large metal candlestick at you, everything that you have learned just goes out of the window. I managed to escape by wriggling out of half my clothes and ran outside to phone the police, still only partially dressed."

This time Miss Leighton didn't drop the charges, and Nick was eventually jailed for four months for the assault, of which he served two.

"I wouldn't even have known when he was coming out of prison, if he hadn't written to tell me. He came out a day earlier than I expected, and I was just sitting outside the shop having a cigarette when he walked straight up to me. How the hell was I supposed to get to a phone to dial 999?"

Miss Leighton reported him to the police and England was eventually arrested for breaching the restraining order. He was held in custody last Thursday night and then bailed to appear before Kennet magistrates on Monday.

She claims that while waiting for the court case she received 154 text messages, and numerous phone calls from England, despite blasting her personal alarm down the phone at him twice.

He even came to her shop in Devizes on the Saturday before he was due in court, she said. "I was just coming back to the shop from my lunch and as I crossed the road I saw him loitering outside.

"I wasn't going to go anywhere near the place after that, so he started texting me telling me that there were customers waiting outside. The only reason they had to wait was that I was too scared to go near the place when he was there.

"I replied three times to his barrage of text messages, telling him to leave me alone, and that now counts against me in court, because they say that I encouraged him. I am not made of stone. If he hadn't been at liberty during that time I would not have had to reply."

Miss Leighton is now so terrified of what England will do next that she is planning to sell her shop and leave the area she has lived in for ten years, and where her daughter still lives.

"I am jumping at shadows and I am so aware that I am a woman working on my own. Even the sound of his voice on the answer phone is enough to make me shake with fear," she said.

"I can't relax for a second and I can never get away from it - that's no way to live. If the whole of the criminal justice system isn't enough to keep him away then I have no option but to move.

"I have had extra security installed in the shop. I lock the shop door and have a notice telling customers to ring for attention, and I look at them through the spy hole before I let them in. I can't rest unless every door around me is locked, I feel like I am the one living in prison."

Miss Leighton needs another few months to find a buyer for the shop, but says that if England receives another short sentence for this breach, then she will sell at a loss, just to get away from him.

"On a purely financial level I had to pay £108 to an emergency locksmith to get the locks changed after he assaulted me for the second time. I have installed new security at the shop and at my home.

"I can't change my phone number, because I have had thousands of pounds worth of stationary printed for the business, so I have had to buy another phone for personal use.

"About five people have the number to that and he would have to drag them over hot coals before they would reveal it to him," she said.

As we are talking her work phone beeps, with a text message.

Miss Leighton says it's from England, telling her that his sister is ill and asking her to call him.

This is just five and a half hours after he swore to the court that he would never contact her again. He is not going to stop, ever," she says.

"He has been told repeatedly by the courts to stop doing this and leave me alone, and I have taken out a £700 civil injunction against him, and he has listened to nobody."

Help is available

SINCE Nicholas England's appearance in court last week for breaching the Restraining Order against him, Maddy Leighton has been in touch with his ex-wife and several former partners.

She discovered that he has another Restraining Order against him and has been in court for assaulting a woman before.

"The Restraining Order makes no difference. You are not talking about a rational individual here, he needs psychiatric help," she said.

"I will never live with a man again. I will never be able to have any kind of close relationship with a man again, I can't trust anyone enough.

"I will always treat every man I meet as guilty until they can prove they are innocent. Better paranoid than dead, is what I think now," she said.

"Take care before you fall in love with anyone, you may not know that man at all," said Maddy.

The Wilts and Swindon Domestic Violence Intervention Partnership has a 24-hour help line for anyone in a similar situation to Maddy. They can be contacted on (01225) 709 493.