Man jailed for 'obsessively stalking ex-girlfriend'

A man who obsessively stalked his ex-girlfriend, breaking a restraining order and putting a tracking device on her car has been jailed for three years.

Basil Thomas, from Stockport, followed and watched his victim.

He climbed into her garden and moved CCTV camera - and even turned up outside the hospice her mum was in.

A court heard how Thomas, 50, from Cheadle, started bombarding his former partner with letters and emails after their six-year relationship ended.

He would also turn up at her home, and in June this year he was handed a restraining order banning him from going within 100m of the 46-year-old or visiting her home.

But just several weeks later, Thomas followed the woman around a local supermarket in Macclesfield until she left the store.

When she returned home and checked her CCTV, Thomas was seen climbing over a wall and entering her back garden.

He moved the camera to face the sky before taking off the black mask covering his face, but was still caught on CCTV.

Thomas also turned up outside her mum’s hospice and a few days before his arrest he admitted watching her and her daughter while out shopping in Cheadle.

After the victim told officers she felt she was being followed, police searched her car and discovered a tracking device.

Thomas, of of Cranleigh Drive, was arrested and on September 30 was found guilty of stalking and breaching the harassment restraining order at Manchester Magistrates Court.

He was sentenced today, October 28, at Chester Crown Court to three years in prison.

Thomas was also handed an indefinite restraining order.

Speaking after the sentencing Det Con Alison Shields, of Cheshire police' s Public Protection Directorate, said: