Sheffield gas fitter who fixated on widow after repairing her boiler locked up for stalking
A Sheffield gas fitter began stalking a widow after fixing her boiler has been locked up.
Craig Foulstone, of Packmans Way, Grenoside, became fixated on the woman in Worksop after fixing her boiler in 2022.
She told Nottingham Crown Court in a victim impact statement at his sentencing today (December 11) how it felt like “craig was everywhere” whenever she tried to leave the house, and she now suffered with PTSD.
Her statement read: “Sometimes I can't be certain he's not here.
“Even now, some days I go out and get all worked up, because it feels like he’s always about. Some days I can’t even go out the house at all.
“I began looking at licence plates of cars checking to see if it was Craig’s. I saw a car that was the same model as his at a supermarket car park and thought he was about again.
“Every day I wake up and I feel scared.“
Foulstone, 58, was prosecuted and handed an interim stalking order in September 2024.
But, within weeks, he began pestering his victim again, delivering letters to her house and breaching an order not to create social media accounts not in his own name.
Then his victim was in a pub on October 12 when she noticed him brush past her. Hours later he tried to approach her in a different pub. Foulstone turned up at her home on three occasions earlier in October and left letters for her.
Officers found he had created fake Facebook profiles under false names, and they found he had been carrying a knife in a public place, which breach a suspended sentence order.
The court heard Foulstone has 11 previous convictions for 18 offences, including breaches of restraining orders in 2019, 2022 and 2023.
Recorder Richard Davis said he was concerned about Foulstone's 2010 conviction against a previous partner and told him: "You should be in no doubt as to the level of emotional harm she has suffered."
Clarkson Baptiste, mitigating, said Foulstone’s offending came about when he fell "head over heels in love" with her and "didn't realise what harm he was doing," and wanted to apologise to his victim.
Foulstone admitted five breaches of a restraining order and breaching a suspended sentence.
The judge handed him a 15 month prison sentence and activated the six month suspended sentence to make a total of 21 months in prison.
A 10-year restraining order was also imposed which bans him from contacting the woman and entering Worksop.