Stalker jailed for revenge attack

A jilted lover was jailed for a total of two years at the Old Bailey yesterday for launching an obsessive terror campaign in revenge against his former girlfriend and her family.

Anthony King, a 25-year-old former disc jockey, was told by Recorder James Chadwin that his conduct was "of the most despicable kind and a gross abuse to the intimate relationship" he had with his girlfriend.

Gemma Jones, 18, a magazine sales executive, and her family became victims of King's psychological stalking - fuelled by his fury after she ditched him at the end of a two-year relationship. Both her mother and father have since suffered breakdowns.

King bombarded Ms Jones with telephone calls, vandalised her father's BMW car, sprayed graffiti over their garage and porch and posted pornographic photographs of her at a railway station and on a tree. He also suggested her parents were colour prejudiced.

He told police afterwards that he wanted "to have a pop" at them before going to Australia because he felt they did not approve of him because he was black.

In August last year, under cover of darkness, he stole into the garden of their Surrey home with a can of petrol and set fire to a pile of garden furniture just outside the house. The family's dog alerted them to the blaze, which damaged walls, guttering and windows frames.

King, from Sutton, Surrey, had admitted causing damage, displaying the photographs and arson earlier this month, but was remanded in custody for pre-sentence reports. Neither Ms Jones nor her parents were in court to see King, who has already served seven-and-a-half months in prison, sentenced.

Recorder Chadwin said that he accepted King was "under the impression you were being victimised by her parents because of your colour". He had received a letter which indicated "some support" to King's proposition, but added: "However strong, your feelings about any sense of being victimised cannot possibly justify any of the acts you did."