A Swindon woman has been sentenced for harassing her ex-boyfriend across two counties, despite there being a non-molestation order in place.
In January, retail store manager Jennifer Gaunt, 35, pleaded guilty to harassment via social media and email in both Wiltshire and Hampshire between 31 May and 30 September last year.
Appearing before District Judge Joanna Dickens at Swindon Magistrates’ Court this morning, she was spared a prison term despite ‘presenting some sort of danger to future partners’.
Prosecutor Ben Worthington told the court Gaunt had written a series of detailed messages about her victim on Twitter and sent him emails, which was in breach of the non-molestation order imposed following a previous conviction for harassment against the same man.
He said her victim had taken a significant amount of time off work, suffering from severe depression and suicidal thoughts as a result of the harassment.
Defending, advocate Mark Glendenning told the court his client has struggled with the breakdown of their relationship. He told the court Gaunt is working with addictions charity The Nelson’s Trust and her GP.
“I appreciate you may say ‘well, the things he did to you’ but I want to say this: what you did was really serious, what you did was prolonged and the worse bit of it was making posts that were publicly available to others”, Judge Dickens said.
Continuing: “You may say ‘well I don’t have that many followers’ [on Twitter], who cares. As soon as it becomes out of your own private communication with him, then other people know about it. In this case, other people did know about it. Things were said which you believed to be true but, of course, he says they’re entirely untrue. Again, what does it matter? At the end of the day, you have deliberately put things in the public domain so other people have a terrible opinion of him.
“In your case, you have previous convictions for stalking and harassment which make the case more serious.
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“I appreciate there are a lot of issues in the [pre-sentence] report about your own background and your own feelings about things, which I fully take into account. In fact, if it wasn’t for that, I would be sending you to prison today. I’m not going to send you to prison today for this offence for a number of reasons.
“One, I don’t think it’s going to assist in preventing further offending – I think you need to do some very serious work with yourself and with probation in order to deal the underlying cause of this. And secondly, because of the factors in the pre-sentence report which I have heard about. I’m not going to say in open court because they’re private to you.
“Ultimately, at the end of the day, this is incredibly serious and if there are any further offences of harassment you’ll almost certainly going to go to prison for it. From now on, from this second onwards, there has to be no contact with Mr [redacted].
An 18-month community order was imposed on the defendant, of Tryon Close, Liden, with directions to undertake 25 rehabilitation activity requirement days with the National Probation Service. Gaunt was also handed a 12-month restraining order preventing her from contacting her former partner directly or indirectly.
She was also told to pay a £100 fine, £85 costs and a £34 victim surcharge.
